Shinji Kagawa

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Absolutely has to start tonight, no excuses, unless of course we actually progress with him on the bench...
 
He is clearly not starting it makes way, way too much sense to happen. Trust me he won't start
 
Adebesi said:
There have been so many occasions when it seemed certain Kagawa would start and he didnt. I dont expect it TBH, Kagawa obviously makes Moyes feel defensively vulnerable.
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Aye, probably worried that Ribery will take him round the back end.
 
KiD MoYeS said:
Our shape wasn't definite in the first leg but Kagawa replaced Giggs in the centre, did he not?
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Yeah, that's what I thought. Certainly seemed like he was lying deeper than Fellaini for a lot of the second half.

Tbh our shape was hard to figure out in the 1st leg.
 
Inexcusable not to start Kagawa really.

He may not have set the PL alight but he's consistently performed well in Europe this season and in recent weeks has also started showing that sort of form domestically.

It's also perfectly set up for him with Bayern lacking their two most physically imposing CMs, seeing as his biggest weakness has been getting brushed off the ball. Then you consider his record against Bayern in a Dortmund shirt...

The only way I can see Kagawa not playing would be if we go 433 with three from Carrick, Fletcher, Jones and Cleverley in midfield and Roo/Young/Valencia up front. That would be a desperately disappointing team selection though. Completely flying in the face of recent form.
 
People are quickly realising this perceived defensive fragility is complete nonsense and in fact he is rarely caught out of position and works well off the ball. In recently weeks the stats back this up aswell. Not only that his good ball retention prevents opposition possession, indirectly helping defensively too.
 
ivaldo said:
People are quickly realising this perceived defensive fragility is complete nonsense and in fact he is rarely caught out of position and works well off the ball. In recently weeks the stats back this up aswell. Not only that his good ball retention prevents opposition possession, indirectly helping defensively too.
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Key point, for me. Against a side we'll see little of the ball it's important to maintain as much possession as possible when we're in control of the ball. Kagawa, in my opinion, is our best player regarding ball retention, he rarely gives it away. He's clinical, yet simple.
 
KiD MoYeS said:
Key point, for me. Against a side we'll see little of the ball it's important to maintain as much possession as possible when we're in control of the ball. Kagawa, in my opinion, is our best player regarding ball retention, he rarely gives it away. He's clinical, yet simple.
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He rarely passes the ball to the opposition but he definitely used to have a bad habit of frequenrly giving the ball away by getting brushed off the ball and/or tackled.

Seems to be happening a lot less recently though. Which is good.
 
Fair enough, was just taking your point about keeping possession being key and running with it. Would be handy to have multiple players all good at keeping possession, but then I guess we do risk looking too lightweight. FWIW I wouldnt play Clev either.
 
Adebesi said:
Fair enough, was just taking your point about keeping possession being key and running with it. Would be handy to have multiple players all good at keeping possession, but then I guess we do risk looking too lightweight. FWIW I wouldnt play Clev either.
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Kagawa, as he will play a more offensive role, is an affordable addition to the eleven. I'm not sure we'd get away with Cleverley, an average player with good ball retention, in the focal point of the pitch.
 
I think he will start, I mean we have a few injuries do we not ?? Also, a few players are not 100% it seems.
 
Pogue Mahone said:
Inexcusable not to start Kagawa really.

He may not have set the PL alight but he's consistently performed well in Europe this season and in recent weeks has also started showing that sort of form domestically.

It's also perfectly set up for him with Bayern lacking their two most physically imposing CMs, seeing as his biggest weakness has been getting brushed off the ball. Then you consider his record against Bayern in a Dortmund shirt...

The only way I can see Kagawa not playing would be if we go 433 with three from Carrick, Fletcher, Jones and Cleverley in midfield and Roo/Young/Valencia up front. That would be a desperately disappointing team selection though. Completely flying in the face of recent form.
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Re the last part, with Welbeck in instead of Young I am fine with 433. Close the midfield and play/pray on counter attacks.
 
He has been dispossessed less per game than Rooney and Januzaj and if we want to critique anybody for that it is Mata who gets dispossessed two times more often than Kagawa.

I think he is great in general at keeping the ball but does have the odd brain-fart where he passes an opponent casually or gets pushed off the ball way too easily. But I see those things happen by Mata even more regularly since he came here to put it in perspective.
 
Amar__ said:
Re the last part, with Welbeck in instead of Young I am fine with 433. Close the midfield and play/pray on counter attacks.
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The problem with that is our players do not have a lot of experience playing that system and seem uncomfortable when playing it. It backfired spectacularly for us when we tried it against City, and then we abandoned it and went with our regular setup. A lot of the time the players did not seem to have a clue as to what their role was. That was fairly recently, and I would not want to take that risk in such an important and huge game.

Stick with what we know, and just try our best. If they put in the effort they did in the first leg, that would be enough for me.
 
Annahnomoss said:
He has been dispossessed less per game than Rooney and Januzaj and if we want to critique anybody for that it is Mata who gets dispossessed two times more often than Kagawa.

I think he is great in general at keeping the ball but does have the odd brain-fart where he passes an opponent casually or gets pushed off the ball way too easily. But I see those things happen by Mata even more regularly since he came here to put it in perspective.
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Agreed, Kagawa is very good at keeping the ball.

In his early games for us he got outmuscled a lot but that's hardly happened in recent times.
 
Ace of Spades said:
The problem with that is our players do not have a lot of experience playing that system and seem uncomfortable when playing it. It backfired spectacularly for us when we tried it against City, and then we abandoned it and went with our regular setup. A lot of the time the players did not seem to have a clue as to what their role was. That was fairly recently, and I would not want to take that risk in such an important and huge game.

Stick with what we know, and just try our best. If they put in the effort they did in the first leg, that would be enough for me.
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Good point, but I don't think we fell apart against City because of system but because we shat our pants at the start(half of our teams lost the ball after slipping in first 15 minutes). We started playing better when we moved Cleverley wide, but I think that we were becoming better with minutes passing by anyway.
Against Bayern we will be lost with the ball no matter which formation we play, so I think that's why is better that at least we look better defensively.
 
Shamwow said:
Agreed, Kagawa is very good at keeping the ball.

In his early games for us he got outmuscled a lot but that's hardly happened in recent times.
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Although I'm sure he's worked hard on building strength, I feel a lack of short passing options meant he had to retain the ball much longer than he would've liked, meaning he was dispossessed a little more, with a slight change in structure and personnel (Mata in particular) this has lessened as of late. I'm not saying this was exclusively the reason but I'm sure it contributed it.
 
Adebesi said:
So would you play Cleverley based on similar logic?
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Cleverley is a fair bit worse at showing for the ball when we're struggling to keep possession. He's fine at keeping things moving when the other team lets us have it, but at darting around to offer another option to the man in possession, keeping it in tight spaces and actually getting a move going, he's not been great, especially this season.
 
Biggest game of his United career so far. This is the game where the biggest stars show their worth and I hope Kagawa can show us that he is much better than just a squad player.
 
After watching the Dortmund game last night it was easy to imagine why Kagawa would shine in that team, with their movement and interchanging short passing.
 
I think same as last time against Bayern, somewhere between centre midfield, attacking midfielder and left midfielder :lol:
 
He's got through so much work tonight. Great first half.
 
The Norwegian commentators are creaming themselves over Kagawa's intense defensive work.

But I also thought he was our best man offensively. He was there when Rooney chose to shoot instead of taking the obvious pass. He was the one who won the ball and played it to Rooney before the disallowed goal. And he also took part in another "attack".
 
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