[Revan]

Di Maria has not proved anything here apart from his first weeks, he does not seem to rate Herrera. Blind and Shaw are good signing.

For the future yes. For now, I don't know what to say. Very good defensively but attacking-wise he seems completely lost.

 

[Sassy Colin]

On the balance of play we were much the better side, the final ball really, really let us down today.

Correct, although you seem to be one of the few who saw it this way, looking at the posts in this thread.

De Gea made a rare mistake for the goal, should have kicked the initial shot, which hit the post, away.

Otherwise, we were below par in and around the box. If 1 of those Mata shots had gone in, I believe we would have gone on to win this.

 

[onlyoneunited]

We actually played well for the first half in good control of the game but with no real penetration or shots around their area. Then the second half started, and i guess Moyes must have flown in from Spain and given the talk and the tactics because after that, even though Southampton stepped it up, we were nothing like the team from the first half.

It also seems that not just in this game but earlier ones too, Mata has good opportunities to play in Di Maria with a through ball but instead chooses not to and to play it square. Same with Rooney now and then too, almost like they have been told not to try through balls unless its a 6 yard one.

Finally the substitutions put the nail in the coffin for this game, we lost all pace going forward with Di Maria going off. Then Herrera came one and did nothing and worst of all Blackett came on and we lost the brains of Blind at the back and thus got caught, plus the fact Shaw was playing well to begin with. Now if Shaw was carrying a knock then just slot Di Maria or Januzai in there don't mess with the defence that has been doing okay for once.

 

[jem]

Just checked the score. I'm still fuming, I switched the game off after he took Di maria off for fecking Fellaini.

I had no problem with that. Di Maria was ineffective today (due largely to being out of position, mind you.)

 

[ForlansHair]

1 shot on target in the whole game from both sides. Dire.

We have the most creative player in world football in 2014 playing for us, and we stick him up front. The whole thing was a mess, absolutely shocking.

 

[Sandikan]

first time for a long while I'm furious.
appalling game to lose, and the 3 at the back now has to go. it's utter nonsense, built on safety first.

We don't get after teams anymore, it's patient start and then build up later. Except, the later might not come if the other team get into the groove.

No Falcao on the bench was shown to be utter nonsense with VP and Di Maria off for the last 20.
Relying on pumping long balls in.

Garbage.

It's whenever we think we've got an easy run of games, this happens!

Will say one thing though, if we don't have a nice lead over 5th place by March we're in serious diddly.

 

[Spoony]

Let's be honest we've been dire all season save the Newcastle home game. What makes it worse is we've spent £200m and been as bad as last season.

That takes some doing.

 

[Nick 0208 Ldn]

Koeman and Southampton learnt lessons from the previous match, Van Gaal and United did not.

Disappointing, if somewhat predictable.

 

[ThaReaper01]

Absolutely fecking pathetic. Sick of van Gaal stupid decisions.

 

[GDaly95]

Our wing backs didn't do enough. The main point of this formation is supposed to be about adventurous wing backs beating their man and getting down the wing. Valencia did it twice I think, Shaw just cut in and laid it off or put in a lackluster cross from deep.

Di Maria up top made no sense. If there was space to run into it would have been logical, but there wasn't. Meanwhile Rooney was giving the ball away for fun in midfield, I can't believe LvG didn't switch them.

We need wingers. This system isn't working because the final third is so congested. We need people to get out wide, otherwise the opposition won't be stretched and it'll be easy for them.

I really understand LvG's decisions today. It was obvious from early on that the above things just weren't working and he didn't really do anything about it.

Fair play to Southampton. Outstanding performance. They did everything right.

We're really in poor form now. At first we all thought it was just away from home but really its a general problem. Badly need to turn this around.

 

[pacifictheme]

LVG has had an absolute shocker. Di Maria up front was stupid and I'm still in a state of shock at his decision to bring Fellaini on for Di Maria.

Looks like we may have chosen the wrong Dutch manager.

Well di Maria was awful all game. Plus hes coming back from injury. Substitution made sense.

 

[poisson]

We'll soon slip to a place in the table that reflects our performances. 6-7th. You can't get away with being shite for long. It catches up with you eventually.

It'll catch up with van Gaal as well.

Agreed. Very worrying to say the least!!!

 

[Sassy Colin]

Didn't think we were so bad. It's our play - or lack of it - in the final third that's killing us. I'd rather go back to that diamond we had at the beginning of the season where we were scoring and stop worrying about the defence. What's the point of worrying about the defence when we can't score? And those players really need to pull their fingers out of their ar*e. They are great players there and being payed well. They need to step up.

Agreed. Very poor final balls, ineffective in and around the box.

 

[togg]

I have a feeling that LVG is going to stick to 3-5-2 come hell or high water!

To be honest? Nah...I don't think we are going to make 4th...not with those matches in March April. The teams around us are starting to up their game. Arsenal....even Liverpool are probably going to go on a burst. We haven't played well all season really, but the last 5 games have been rather worrying.

 

[NK86]

All that possession, and just couldn't muster one decent ball. I thought the players were all fine up until their final third.
3-5-2 needs to stop. We don't have the players for it.

Valencia was my MOTM. Only positive from today is that it looks as if he's found his sprint again

Valencia's crossing was as awful as always. Looping the crosses in with their defenders towering over our players in the box. Wasted so many good opportunities in the final third that guy.

 

[Jazz]

Shaw was getting a lot of possession out wide but didn't have the final ball. I assumed that he wanted Blind out wide for his delivery and that's why the change happened. Who knows though.

Think this is correct. Shaw just does not have that final ball. Don't know what he's afraid of once he gets to the final third. Really irritating.

 

[dasty]

Absolutely pathetic. For a moment I thought my mind drifted back to last season. No one has a clue what they are doing on the pitch and LVG is too stubborn for his own good. He had been outsmarted by Koeman twice now.

 

[Hamadovich86]

Koeman bitch slapped van Gaal in this one. I can't even blame the players they looked totally lost.

 

[Pscholes18]

FFS even Phil Neville having a go at LVG....ADM to PSG first chance he gets...played out of position, getting subbed in favor or fecking Fellini? LVG needs to sort this shit out asap.

 

[nick2004]

Mata should have scored twice.

 

[FreakyJim]

That was a performance straight from last season under Moyes.

Which performance this season isn't? Very very few.

 

[pacifictheme]

Just checked the score. I'm still fuming, I switched the game off after he took Di maria off for fecking Fellaini.

You sound like a proper fan.

 

[DevilRed]

For the future yes. For now, I don't know what to say. Very good defensively but attacking-wise he seems completely lost.

That's because he is not a fecking wingback. He is a fullback who would be devastating on the left flank with Di Maria as the winger.

LVG needs to change the formation or I fear we will never win a trophy at this rate.

 

[.Rossi]

Clear to see how Southampton have the best df record in the league.

They spotted our weaknesses: cut out the out ball from Carrick to Rooney. cut out the predictable Rooney ball to valencia and pressured Jones and smalling on the ball because they're both panic-stricken.

It worked. We had no clue what to do and they were more then happy to let us keep possession and do nothing with it.

The "philosophy" seems to be about boring passive football, that leads to nothing, in a system that plays players out of position. Until you need a goal that is and then it's lump it up to Felliani.

It's bizarre. The last five games have been dreadful

 

[Man-United]

For the future yes. For now, I don't know what to say. Very good defensively but attacking-wise he seems completely lost.

True. He will be great in the future, but so far he's not done a lot here.

 

[Hernandez - BFA]

Valencia's crossing was as awful as always. Looping the crosses in with their defenders towering over our players in the box. Wasted so many good opportunities in the final third that guy.

Well everyone did. Only Blind actually played a decent final ball throughout the whole game.

Hence why I don't feel it's worthy blaming Valencia for that, otherwise I'd have to be consistent and blame everyone too.

 

[pseudo_canadian]

Here's a funny stat, Moyes had the same amount of points at this stage last season as we do now.

Just shows you how shit the PL standard has been this season compared to last year.

 

[Devil may care]

Just really disappointing, LvG's stubbornness is hurting the team, trying to force a back 3 that requires more from Smalling than he has in his locker, playing wingbacks without actual wingbacks, and the 4 squared in front of Carrick offers so little movement, pace and width to help the wingbacks that Southampton easily shut us out.

They were the better team in midfield, they managed our attack with comfort and sat off when we simply played it back and forth ramping up worthless possession stats. Not sure they deserved to win as the goal was a clusterfeck from us defensively, but a United team creating nothing at Old Trafford is always a sad day.

 

[stu_1992]

That was really poor and disheartening stuff. Never looked close to scoring (besides the Mata chances I guess), and there was zero tempo until Southampton scored. Blind was the only player I thought was decent tbh. I thought Di Maria being up front, with Rooney in midfield was a mistake for sure. Should have been the other way around. Absolutely wasted Di Maria, though he looked wasteful when he did have it.

Very frustrating to be down to 4th with other teams closing in fast. Needs to improve soon. Possession isn't enough on it's own.

 

[pseudo_canadian]

That was a performance straight from last season under Moyes.

Yup.

 

[El Zoido]

We're crap. Can hardly create chances and can't hit the target with the few chances we do get. Anyone remember when we used to go out and put teams to the sword? It's becoming almost a distant memory for me. Even the games we win are the biggest effort just to scrape through.

 

[charleysurf]

You sound like a proper fan.

 

[SER19]

On the balance of play we were much the better side, the final ball really, really let us down today.

You say that as if there were targets for a final ball. When you pass pass pass without any system whatsoever eventually one of them will be a final ball.

 

[GloryHunter07]

.........

Great post

 

[jem]

Said it in the match thread. When a game is neck and neck and things get tough, he's fecking invisible.

Nice nifty player to have when your team is playing well and moving the ball comfortably. Not a player with lethal instinct to win you a game and make something happen at the crucial moments.

Except he wasn't invisible, was he? He got in a position to score three times and his finishing let him down (and finishing isn't usually the problem for Mata.) I thought he was one of the only ones (along with Blind and Valencia,) who looked like making any happen in the final third.

 

[Booyakasha]

Said it in the match thread. When a game is neck and neck and things get tough, he's fecking invisible.

Nice nifty player to have when your team is playing well and moving the ball comfortably. Not a player with lethal instinct to win you a game and make something happen at the crucial moments.

Mata is the midfield Berbatov.

 

[Raw]

Just shows you how shit the PL standard has been this season compared to last year.

Pretty much. We've gotten away with some horrible performances this season and it finally caught up with us.

Another stat, Moyes' United scored more goals at this stage too.

 

[GDaly95]

That Blackett substitution was completely unnecessary and he ended up losing his man for the goal.

If Blind can play 90 mins after barely playing for 2 months then why can't Shaw.

Some players regain fitness easier than others. It's well documented that it takes Shaw more time than your average player.

 

[caid]

That felt very like our last match against southampton, in reverse.
They scored from their only chance but we cant complain really. We didn't do enough to deserve anything out of the game.

They defended well.
We look pretty toothless without di maria to the point where a rusty, not fully match fit di maria having a poor game still results in a better performance from the team.
I was thinking falcao would come on at about the 80th minute for a defender or something as a 'feck it' type strategy,
until i realised about 5 mins later we'd made 3 substitutions.

Our scoring record just hasn't been good enough recently.
The midfielders are all chipping in but were just not getting much from our strikers.
I dont know how much of that is the strikers fault and how much is the service coming to them but we need more goals in the team really and now.

Southampton look like our main competition this season anyway.
I said before our last match against them that i'd have expected theem to have fallen away by now but they're not going away
and were not getting enough results to pull away from them.

It was good to see blind back and that was probably one of our better games with that formation imo but there was too many off / rusty
attacking players to score against that defence. Mata is about the only one who can come away with much credit really.
Rooney wasn't bad but nothing to be proud of.

 

[Globule]

I've said it before and I'll say it again, we are far too comfortable using the 'out' ball as our first option. The safe pass backwards and sideways is becoming a feature of our play. We played a lot of the match well - if we were winning 1-0 and were trying to control the tempo and keep the ball. Problem was, it was 0-0. Again, a feature of our play.

Another problem (which partly explains the constant use of the safe backwards pass) is that we don't offer enough support to players out wide. Look how many times Valencia and Shaw got the ball and everyone seemed to want to get towards the box, leaving the only options a) beat the man and deliver the cross yourself or b) pass back.

 

[NK86]

Let's be honest we've been dire all season save the Newcastle home game. What makes it worse is we've spent £200m and been as bad as last season.

That takes some doing.

Today somehow reminded me of the infamous game against Fulham last season. So much possession but no idea how to break a team down. Just pumping aimless crosses and long balls into the box.