[quethenoo]

Yes agreed, but Blind hasn't played centre mid for ages so Jose is unlikely to risk that. He should be used more.

He played there for Holland v Sweden the other day, but yeah not for united.

 

[Randall Flagg]

Etihad 2012 springs to mind. Zero ambition at all.

 

[tony54]

If you take city's ridiculous start to the season to one side, we have made a solid start to the season.
Whilst I would love us to win the PL, the start is to be competitive in it first. That includes going long in the CL too.

We have a solid team but we still short in a couple of positions and another world class forward player that can turn this type of game into a win. Let's be honest, there were a few of them where Ronaldo was the difference.....

I agree on your summation, but we were lucky not to have been beaten by two goals. On reflection Mourino probably played the right tactics especially when you consider we had our three best players out of action., fellaini, Bailly and Pogba. After watching Liverpool for the first time this season, I was impressed with how good their team really is, especially their forwards.
The match has verified which positions we are still weak in., left back, midfield back-up, and a Griezeman type player up front.

 

[Bestietom]

You said it was embarrassing that we didn't have a midfielder on the bench, but that midfielder could only have been McTominay due to injuries. So if Mourinho judged that being chucked into a game at Anfield was too much for McTominay at this stage in his career then there was no other option. Seems a strange thing to describe as embarrassing.

So you think that there was no need to have a midfielder on the bench to bring on. Sorry we are looking at things in a different way. We call it quits. @Rusholme Ruffian

 

[TheReligion]

All if and buts...

Had Mourinho played an expansive game and lost he would have been accused of the opposite. Mourinho is a calculated coach, you could say he has a chess players mentality and will work out the teams needs over the season.

How other teams play against Liverpool is different and does not equate when playing United. The historical rivalry lifts their game and atmosphere to a different level. They even organised opening the Dalglish Stand for this game to pump up the players and fans.

Can't you ban some of these cretins Sults?

Good post

 

[VP89]

Can't you ban some of these cretins Sults?

Good post

Ban who, and why?

 

[TheReligion]

Ban who, and why?

The persistent moaners and matchday morons.

Why? Because I'm sick to death of the life sucking leaches.

 

[Rusholme Ruffian]

I said that is one that springs to mind, not that it was the only one.

 

[Litch]

It's Jose's way and it brings success where ever he's managed. At times it's frustrating as hell but let's be honest, that midfield yesterday was never going to offer you anything other than a defensive platform.

 

[Rusholme Ruffian]

So you think that there was no need to have a midfielder on the bench to bring on. Sorry we are looking at things in a different way. We call it quits. @Rusholme Ruffian

I think if Pogba and/or Fellaini were fit there would have been a midfielder on the bench (and we'd probs have had 3 in midfield anyway). What I'm saying is that deciding not to pick a rookie midfielder with no experience is not embarrassing. But yeah, agree to disagree! :-)

 

[Bestietom]

Right I'm going out on the piss now. Talk tomorrow.

 

[VP89]

The persistent moaners and matchday morons.

Save your name calling, I'm surprised you haven't yet been warned about it.

We didn't play well against Liverpool, that much is apparent. It's not a moan but an evaluation of a game we should have imposed ourself better upon.

I normally would agree with @Sultan on his posts, but this was a Liverpool side there for the taking. SAF always went out to try and win the game more often than not, and he would have here too. In fact I think Mourinho wanted to as well, as seen by the first half and his post match comments saying he would have switched things up if he had fellaini on the bench to win it.

But, it's the players on the pitch which really didn't step up. Mkhitaryan, Herrera, Lukaku went anonymous. This was their first big game and it simply wasnt good enough. Herrera I have some sympathy for because coutinho would drop deeper to outnumber him but still, there was zero composure whenever he did have the ball.

Anyway, I'd suggest you save name calling on the forum, I did it once ages ago and realise it was childish. It's even more childish for trying to ban others with different opinions.

 

[Bestietom]

I think if Pogba and/or Fellaini were fit there would have been a midfielder on the bench (and we'd probs have had 3 in midfield anyway). What I'm saying is that deciding not to pick a rookie midfielder with no experience is not embarrassing. But yeah, agree to disagree! :-)

Talk tomorrow @Rusholme Ruffian . Pub calls.

 

[Wilt]

We were without 3 key players, 4 if you count Zlatan .....it will be a different game at Old Trafford.

 

[Acole9]

Most boring United match I've seen since the van Gaal era (Although not quite as bad as that) Happy with the draw though so can't complain too much.

 

[Litch]

I agree on your summation, but we were lucky not to have been beaten by two goals. On reflection Mourino probably played the right tactics especially when you consider we had our three best players out of action., fellaini, Bailly and Pogba. After watching Liverpool for the first time this season, I was impressed with how good their team really is, especially their forwards.
The match has verified which positions we are still weak in., left back, midfield back-up, and a Griezeman type player up front.

Agree but equally Rom could have slotted it in and we win 1-0. You always need a bit of luck in big games. Wasn't a surprise to me as they have over 200m worth of talent going forward. Only 5% of teams in the world can say that.
Equally, the 3 players you mentioned missing from our team influence the game where the equivalent ones that played don't in the same way.
I completely agree with you about what we are missing and after watching Griezeman yesterday again Madrid, he'd be prefect. Danny Rose at LB for me and a Pogba type cover would be good.

 

[TheReligion]

Save your name calling, I'm surprised you haven't yet been warned about it.

We didn't play well against Liverpool, that much is apparent. It's not a moan but an evaluation of a game we should have imposed ourself better upon.

I normally would agree with @Sultan on his posts, but this was a Liverpool side there for the taking. SAF always went out to try and win the game more often than not, and he would have here too. In fact I think Mourinho wanted to as well, as seen by the first half and his post match comments saying he would have switched things up if he had fellaini on the bench to win it.

But, it's the players on the pitch which really didn't step up. Mkhitaryan, Herrera, Lukaku went anonymous. This was their first big game and it simply wasnt good enough. Herrera I have some sympathy for because coutinho would drop deeper to outnumber him but still, there was zero composure whenever he did have the ball.

Anyway, I'd suggest you save name calling on the forum, I did it once ages ago and realise it was childish. It's even more childish for trying to ban others with different opinions.

I've been banned on numerous occasions so don't worry about me and the rules of the forum. I've not called any particular person anything, there's actually thread in the general that criticises the regular matchday morons so I'm pretty confident I'm doing nothing wrong.

With regards to banning, you need to relax and not take everything i say so seriously! A forum should have a number of diverse opinions and I encourage that. It is better to construct your opinions with some detail as opposed to simply moaning repeatedly which is what let's the vast majority down.

I fully understand why United played how they did. I also think Klopp should share responsibility given he wasn't prepared to change his approach either in order to win the game It's sad that is going unoticed.

There were a number of factors at play yesterday which influenced our set up. No strong spine, international break, players missing and lack of central midfield players to work with. We were out numbered in the middle of the pitch and had a tough time. Individuals didn't perform and that sometimes happens.

 

[Toad]

It's quite obvious what happened now, just read in an article that LVG was in attendance and ended up completely ruining it for us.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-4980260/Things-missed-Liverpool-vs-Man-United.html

Louis van Gaal is a man who knows a thing or two about beating Liverpool and the former United boss was in attendance at Anfield.

He shook hands warmly with Mourinho in the tunnel before the game and perhaps passed on a word of advice.

 

[Tapori]

He played there for Holland v Sweden the other day, but yeah not for united.

I stand corrected; They won 2-0? Possibly Jose missed a trick. Then have Mikhy in place of Young if you have to include him.
Always been a fan of Blind in a midfield 3 when needed.

 

[sglowrider]

Cnutis making a defence of Jose's approach yesterday:

http://www.skysports.com/watch/vide...hester-united/11082187/in-defence-of-mourinho

 

[Ban]

Ban who, and why?

Here I am.

 

[Peanut Butter]

Some of you need to watch this morning's Sunday Supplement. It's sad that our British journalists are speaking a lot more sense than some Utd fans (not just from here.)

Both Neil Custis (yuck) and James Ducker making some superb points about yesterday's result.

Everyone has been lauding Utd's expansive 4-0 wins yet when we want to shut up shop and try to nick a win, people lose their minds.

Apparently in Fergie's last 16 visits to Anfield we only scored 13 goals.

 

[Red Primus]

There were a number of factors at play yesterday which influenced our set up. No strong spine, international break, players missing and lack of central midfield players to work with. We were out numbered in the middle of the pitch and had a tough time. Individuals didn't perform and that sometimes happens.

Agreed. There is context here. Everyone's willfully ignoring the circumstances you've described. This is not a regular game with a full strength team where we can pick and choose the approach. Mourinho can only plan with what he has and may HAVE to have. He can hope to win with an under-strength team or nick a draw, which he did.

Just within the next few days he will have two more games to contend. Throwing our players at Liverpool in the last 30 minutes this time would have been foolhardy. It would be a disaster when we face Benfica in just a few days with more injuries because the players went all out here. I'm sure he included his approach for Benfica in his gameplan against Liverpool. Now he has some more fresh players for that game as well as getting rid of any bit of rustiness and strengthening their match fitness level. It is unfortunate that the first team they faced was Liverpool after the layoff. I'm pretty sure they would have been set up a little different if the circumstances were dissimilar.

 

[themoyesboy]

- Why was a Liverpool defender named MOTM in a game that ended 0-0 and where the other team spent most of the game defending? Can anyone explain this?

It was a terrible game where almost nothing happened. The Liverpool defender did a couple of decent things close to the time when the MOTM was named, and so they just picked him. I think Neville admitted almost immediately that it wasn't exactly a solid choice, but the game was so bad who else could they have gone for? De Gea certainly had the defining moment of the match with an incredible moment of brilliance. But he had so little else to do, that too would have been a bit contentious. He would have been my choice personally though.

- Neville and Tyler spending the first ten mintues of the game bleating on about United's more positive set up than last year, even though it was if anything mroe negative than how we set up last year. Then feeling they had to cerry on going on about it despite it becoming more and more obvious they were talking shite. To the point Neville had to wait until after the game before he thought it was safe to completely change his mind.

- Basically the only impressive thing about this game was how much shite various people managed to talk about it.

These marquee games are the ones that draw the biggest audiences. Most of them have been utterly dire in recent years and it is damaging for Sky. It has punters question the value of their subscriptions when the games they choose to watch are utter dogshit. So I think this is why Sky were trying to pretend yesterday's game was a cut above all the other shit that had gone before it, but the reality is they were fooling nobody

 

[themoyesboy]

Liverpool are probably the worst of the big teams we'll face and look at the approach. The City,Spurs and Chelsea away games will be a delight to watch. Can't bring myself to understand or justify Jose's cowardly set up in big games. It's one thing to set up to defend and counter, it's another thing to camp around our half and keep hoofing out the ball like we're Burnley under the cosh from a big team. It's bullshit

A point at Anfield is not the end of the world, but I absolutely agree with you. Spurs and Chelsea games will be even harder coming up. City could easy find themselves 6 or 7 points ahead of us before we play them, and we have every reason to fear them on current form. If the gap reaches 10 points I doubt many on here will still be speaking enthusiastically about our title aspirations.

Bottom line though I think most of us know we are not ready to be champions. But we're certainly making progress and I fully expect us to finish runners up this season. The bad thing is we'll be left watching that lot parading OUR trophy and their oil money around Manchester, but hopefully it will only be for one season.

 

[Hed Zitin]

Made a good decision not to watch this. Knew it would be negative football.

It's a good point if that's all you try for.

 

[dichinero]

Liverpool are probably the worst of the big teams we'll face and look at the approach. The City,Spurs and Chelsea away games will be a delight to watch. Can't bring myself to understand or justify Jose's cowardly set up in big games. It's one thing to set up to defend and counter, it's another thing to camp around our half and keep hoofing out the ball like we're Burnley under the cosh from a big team. It's bullshit

This.
I'm struggling to understand how people can say that this Liverpool side is a very strong side. That back 5 is there for the taking for anyone that is willing to have a go.
Spent all this money and we are worried about the likes of Mignolet, Moreno, Lovren et al. Just another poor excuse from a poor game.

 

[Tom Van Persie]

All those years Man Utd spent building a reputation as an exciting attacking team will be undone by Mourinho in about 2 seasons. If he thinks he is going to win this league playing football like that he is mistaken. What will he do when you play city? That should be 2 very interesting games. Is it just because its Liverpool or is he going to play this way every time he meets a team he thinks is capable of giving them a game. Man u were very disappointing yesterday. I would think the older fans would be bitterly disappointed and the younger fans happy with the point

Get back to RAWK lad.

 

[Sandikan]

It is a shameful result and to make it more embarrassing was the fact that we had not even got a midfielder on the bench to compete with there 3 midfielders.

This is where the game was lost, and it was Mourinho's responsibility to make sure that we had at least 1 midfielder on the bench so as to change our game play and compete with them in the engine room. Excuses after the game do not cut it.

Farcical stuff.

Shameful?
"Where the game was lost"

I hope a mod has thrown a little shape up or shift off type pm to you

 

[TheReligion]

All those years Man Utd spent building a reputation as an exciting attacking team will be undone by Mourinho in about 2 seasons. If he thinks he is going to win this league playing football like that he is mistaken. What will he do when you play city? That should be 2 very interesting games. Is it just because its Liverpool or is he going to play this way every time he meets a team he thinks is capable of giving them a game. Man u were very disappointing yesterday. I would think the older fans would be bitterly disappointed and the younger fans happy with the point

 

[Di Maria's angel]

Custis makes a few excellent points. Our defense coped well with their attacking threat yet many of our fans seem to over rate most our oppositions attacking players. Not sure how many watched Liverpool vs Arsenal where Salah and Mane ripped Arsenal a new one. I can't really remember Salah doing much after the first 20-30 minutes. I don't understand a lot of the criticism Darmian gets from our own fans. Martial was a little slow in getting back and helping his LB, but the Italian did well on most occasions yet he gets ripped to pieces in his thread. It's so obvious the Mourinho has given him a set of instructions and Darmian follows - is that really hard to understand? A manager giving his employee a job/role and the employee does what he is told.

And, then you have that fact that Klopp was too scared to go for the win by refusing to change his system in the last 15 minutes knowing how effective we've been against tiring opposition defenses. We had a plan and we failed to execute; in addition, we didn't have the resources to change to a different plan. We nullified their attacking threat in hope that we could use Rashford's pace and Lingard's movement in the closing stages but it didn't work. There's more to winning the league than one game at Anfield. Losing could have been disastrous.

A point at Anfield is not shameful in any way. A poor performance at Anfield is almost the norm. There's no harder place to visit. There's no team that cares more about playing us than Liverpool. Klopp has an incredible record against the top 6 since he joined them yet they've only scored a solitary goal against us and that, too, was a penalty. In fact, they've scored 35 goals in the 20 games against the top 6 sides he's managed them in, winning 9 and only losing 2.

 

[Rusholme Ruffian]

This.
I'm struggling to understand how people can say that this Liverpool side is a very strong side. That back 5 is there for the taking for anyone that is willing to have a go.
Spent all this money and we are worried about the likes of Mignolet, Moreno, Lovren et al. Just another poor excuse from a poor game.

Liverpool have only lost 2 out of 22 games against the top 6 since Klopp took charge. And one of them was the defeat against City this year when they had 10 men for half the game. It's not quite as simple as looking at their current form and saying 'they are there for the taking for anyone that is wiling to have a go'.

If you take the City game out of the equation they've actually conceded fewer than Chelsea this season.

 

[wolvored]

In the cold light of day and nearly 24 hours later, and a chance to calm down, a point is a decent result. When you also analyse the game we only had 1 shot on goal and they should have had a penalty, so all told we escaped with a point. City and Spurs apart, this was the next best result out of the top 6. I dont like the park the bus/defensive masterclass or whatever you want to call it, but when you look at the team, and the bench yesterday there wasnt a lot more we could have done.

 

[DomesticTadpole]

Liverpool have only lost 2 out of 22 games against the top 6 since Klopp took charge. And one of them was the defeat against City this year when they had 10 men for half the game. It's not quite as simple as looking at their current form and saying 'they are there for the taking for anyone that is wiling to have a go'.

If you take the City game out of the equation they've actually conceded fewer than Chelsea this season.

I would have thought it's the have a go teams they love playing against. They struggle against the park the bus teams who quite often pick them off while they are going gung ho.

 

[redIndianDevil]

A point at Anfield is not shameful in any way. A poor performance at Anfield is almost the norm. There's no harder place to visit. There's no team that cares more about playing us than Liverpool. Klopp has an incredible record against the top 6 since he joined them yet they've only scored a solitary goal against us and that, too, was a penalty. In fact, they've scored 35 goals in the 20 games against the top 6 sides he's managed them in, winning 9 and only losing 2.

No one is expecting us to go to Anfield and rip them apart, but why was it so difficult for our players to string three passes together in the second half? The constant hoofing the ball clear from our defenders when they were not under any pressure is surely due to the manager's instructions? I've watched this clearing the ball thing even against Southampton FFS, this directly results in us relenting possession, invites even more attacks immediately after, absolutely zero chance of counter attacking as the cleared ball is so far off Lukaku.

I agree that it's an excellent and safe strategy to defend deep and get a point at Anfield, but what our players did wasn't defending, it was blindly relying on luck IMO, a better finisher than Salah would have buried that rebound after De Gea's wonder save, had Emre Can used his head, he would have scored easily. My biggest gripe yesterday is that we did not even attempt to counter attack yesterday.

Also what's this nonsense about Liverpool not changing their formation or going for the win, even if they had attacked even more we were never going to score by the way we played, plus don't they always play 4-3-3 with three midfielders? They subbed in three attackers too. Who came up with this bullshit excuse? Are we only capable of counter attacking or even attacking when the opposition play careless open football?

As for all the people in this thread saying we missed Fellaini, guess what Fellaini played against Southampton where we tried to hold on to an one goal lead, we looked just as bad as yesterday then too. Mario Lemina, a newbie to PL managed to boss our midfield.

When Mourinho signed for us I knew we'd be defensive against slightly better or equal teams, but not even trying to counter attack or play football is just not right after spending so much money on players.

 

[GaryLifo]

Too many FIFA playing football manager types commenting these days.

Ferguson was negative at Anfield on way more occasions than he went there on the front foot. We mostly played like dog crap even when we won there.

Liverpool are now 8th aren't they?

 

[dichinero]

Liverpool have only lost 2 out of 22 games against the top 6 since Klopp took charge. And one of them was the defeat against City this year when they had 10 men for half the game. It's not quite as simple as looking at their current form and saying 'they are there for the taking for anyone that is wiling to have a go'.

If you take the City game out of the equation they've actually conceded fewer than Chelsea this season.

Well, personally I believed and still believe that we had the stronger team yesterday regardless. And they were not particularly good either yesterday which is what annoys me in all honesty. Both teams didn't look on it yesterday and the onus was on us to exert ourselves more. With all respect to Liverpool, our ambitions should be higher and neither do I call them rivals in that regard.

 

[Rusholme Ruffian]

Well, personally I believed and still believe that we had the stronger team yesterday regardless. And they were not particularly good either yesterday which is what annoys me in all honesty. Both teams didn't look on it yesterday and the onus was on us to exert ourselves more. With all respect to Liverpool, our ambitions should be higher and neither do I call them rivals in that regard.

Liverpool will always be an extremely tough game for us purely because of the fierce rivalry. League positions matter little in games like that - it was just the same in the 80s when they were winning everything and we could only manage the odd FA Cup, we'd often beat them and win the battle but they would win the war.

 

[Pogue Mahone]

Well, personally I believed and still believe that we had the stronger team yesterday regardless. And they were not particularly good either yesterday which is what annoys me in all honesty. Both teams didn't look on it yesterday and the onus was on us to exert ourselves more. With all respect to Liverpool, our ambitions should be higher and neither do I call them rivals in that regard.

Well if you don’t call them rivals that’s that then...

 

[LeftyBlaster]

This.
I'm struggling to understand how people can say that this Liverpool side is a very strong side. That back 5 is there for the taking for anyone that is willing to have a go.
Spent all this money and we are worried about the likes of Mignolet, Moreno, Lovren et al. Just another poor excuse from a poor game.

Absolutely this. Pathetic approach and performance from us and Jose.