The “Ole In” Brigade

[devilish]

As a proud member of the “Ole in” brigade, I’m getting tired of seeing the same lazy criticisms of us/the manager gathering likes on the Caf and Twitter.

I wanted to address them all in one place, hopefully some fellow sensible supporters will be able to add their own arguments

1) “The love for Ole is all based on nostalgia and reverence for an ex-Red”

Not true. I’ve never seen a single argument from a pro-Ole supporter saying that he should remain in the job because he is an ex-player/club legend. This argument has been made up by the anti-Ole brigade, who have then proceeded to get angry at their own argument.

2) “Utd have made their worst start/worst away record/worst this/worse that”

Could. Not. Give. A. Monkeys. Anybody who expected any more from this season, with this squad and these players was always setting themselves up for a fall. Re-adjust your expectations based on reality.

3) “Ole is a failed Cardiff manager”

So what? People need to get over this idea that the success or failure of a club begins and ends with the manager.

4) “Jose Mourinho blah blah blah”

I liked Jose but with the benefit of hindsight, he had completely lost the plot in that 3rd season. Also, the man left over a year ago...let’s stop going on about it.

5) “We’re Man Utd, we should be doing X,Y....”

Means nothing. We’re currently an irrelevant club with mediocre players run by a clown and owned by shareholders looking to make a quick dollar. We’ve no divine right to win anything or sign any player because “we’re Man Utd”

6) “Ole is a poor Coach”

No evidence for this. People are obsessed with the idea of coaching but (most) of these players are 20+....you can’t make them play slicker, faster football just by “coaching”. Same way Pep can’t coach his philosophy to certain players, difference is City have been well-run for ten years so their squad needs minor tweaks every year not major surgery.

A- It is nostalgia. How can you justify defending a manager with non existent CV, with no plan B, who had his arse spanked whenever he moved in managing non amateur football and who started the season with a smile on his face despite a non existent midfield, RW and forward line?

B- This squad isn't strong but its not as shit as many portray it to be. Mou (you know the useless guy), took it to 2nd place and won some trophies with it. Same with LVG. Managers need to operate with what they got. Blowing 120m on 2 decent but not WC defenders when you've got no midfield and forward line is bloody stupid, especially since both provide as much of an attacking threat then DDG.

C- Its important because this guy has no legacy to stand upon. He literally blew it at his first chance of real management.There's nothing to justify why he's at United apart from nepotism

D- Jose Mourinho needed to go and he's got his share of fault in it. However as said he won trophies with this side. Some of the players Ole got rid off are doing extremely well as well. Lukaku is on fire and Smalling is swiftly becoming one of the top 3 CBs in the Serie A. Ole shares part of the guilt of weakening the side. Meanwhile we handled the likes of Jones, Mata and JLingz long term contracts. How silly is that?

E- True but that mediocrity also affect management. Just tell me what the likes of Ole, Carrick, Dempsey and Mckenna had done to deserve to be at United. That's also mediocrity

F- Of course there is, he's got no plan B. Our team is only effective against teams who play attacking football. If they play defensive football then Ole is useless

 

[Flexdegea]

As far as a rebuild is concerned I'm totally with what we are doing at the moment and I plan on being patient.



The time i will become concerned is when the team clearly arent playing for him any more, and if the performances in the bigger matches drop of the way it did when Moyes and Jose got some d##king at the end. I'd be worried there.



Always said we need another 2 windows at least. The players we have at the moment is barely scraping together a solid first 11, and are clearly more suited to playing against teams who come to attack us.

The breaking down teams who sit back and defend in numbers has been a common theme going back to Jose managing us, so I'm putting most of the blame on the lack of quality players with that regard, as well as the lack of over lapping full backs. Obvs a mix of coaching and players but I'm confident we will bring in more quality that will help in the final 3rd, players who can pick a pass mid or short.

 

[Lentwood]

Previous managers, all of whom I liked and respected btw, maybe did not quite take th same approach. Understan

As a proud member of the “Ole in” brigade, I’m getting tired of seeing the same lazy criticisms of us/the manager gathering likes on the Caf and Twitter.

I wanted to address them all in one place, hopefully some fellow sensible supporters will be able to add their own arguments

1) “The love for Ole is all based on nostalgia and reverence for an ex-Red”

Not true. I’ve never seen a single argument from a pro-Ole supporter saying that he should remain in the job because he is an ex-player/club legend. This argument has been made up by the anti-Ole brigade, who have then proceeded to get angry at their own argument.

2) “Utd have made their worst start/worst away record/worst this/worse that”

Could. Not. Give. A. Monkeys. Anybody who expected any more from this season, with this squad and these players was always setting themselves up for a fall. Re-adjust your expectations based on reality.

3) “Ole is a failed Cardiff manager”

So what? People need to get over this idea that the success or failure of a club begins and ends with the manager.

4) “Jose Mourinho blah blah blah”

I liked Jose but with the benefit of hindsight, he had completely lost the plot in that 3rd season. Also, the man left over a year ago...let’s stop going on about it.

5) “We’re Man Utd, we should be doing X,Y....”

Means nothing. We’re currently an irrelevant club with mediocre players run by a clown and owned by shareholders looking to make a quick dollar. We’ve no divine right to win anything or sign any player because “we’re Man Utd”

6) “Ole is a poor Coach”

No evidence for this. People are obsessed with the idea of coaching but (most) of these players are 20+....you can’t make them play slicker, faster football just by “coaching”. Same way Pep can’t coach his philosophy to certain players, difference is City have been well-run for ten years so their squad needs minor tweaks every year not major surgery.

Just to re-iterate and clarify something that has (inevitably) been lost as this thread has grown much quicker than I expected!

The point of my OP wasn’t to say that Ole can’t be criticised and it certainly wasn’t to defend his tenure at Man Utd either.

The point of the OP (as I actually say) was that I get sick of hearing the same lines - not going to repeat them, check the OP

By all means, criticise Ole’s tactics, criticise his game management, criticise the signings that ultimately he will have sanctioned at some level, criticise his conduct in interviews/press conferences, criticise his relationship with the players.

What I was highlighting in the OP, and I don’t know if this is the same for other posters, is that my Twitter feed is full of angry, angry people throwing every insult under the sun at Ole, usually trotting out the same lines about how he is a “puppet”, a “failed Cardiff manager” who is only in the job because he is a smiling patsy.

What I very rarely see from these people is any suggestion of what Ole SHOULD have done differently

There was near unanimous agreement that we needed a clear out. Ole has done more in that respect that any of our previous managers. Sure, I would have liked more players to leave and sure, some of the players who have left are better than what remains - but there’s only so much you can do in one window.

I also very rarely actually see much criticism of Ole’s selection or formations. We all seem to broadly agree here, maybe there are a few tweaks some would make but in the main, I think it’s fair to say most fans would broadly have picked very similar line-ups to Ole

As expected, you also always get the posters who don’t really read the OP but comment anyway. If I had a slice of turkey for every poster who put “wot so results not important mental Ole sycophant idiot” I’d be 28 stone this morning. Of course results are important but - and here’s a revelation for some of you I’m sure...despite what the media say in order to hype and sell their bloated product, the importance of any given result or any given season in the context of the overall well-being and success of a club long-term is small to insignificant. So what if we have to step backwards to go forwards? We’ve been crap for 6 years anyway! If somebody had told a Liverpool fan in 2013 they wouldn’t win a title until 2020 but at that point they would be English, European and World champions, they would have bitten your hand off, as I’m sure we all would now faced with a similar scenario. So, point being, we need to stop reacting to every results, every little bad run, every little good run.

Finally, the coaching point. Notice, I’m deliberately using the word “coaching” as I do in the OP. I keep hearing fans talk about “coaching” - which I take to mean what we do on the training pitch. When I say there’s no evidence that Ole is a poor coach, I mean that there is no strong evidence suggesting that our mediocre results are down to what’s happening (or not) on the training pitch. My argument is two-fold. One, we were equally as slow and tumescent under Jose and LvG, widely regarded as fantastic “coaches”. Two, if Ole and his team are so bad at coaching, is it then sheer luck that Ole has set teams up brilliantly to counter Liverpool, City, Chelsea (twice) and Leicester this season? Come on let’s be fair, you can’t have it both ways...if Ole is responsible for the bad games then surely he is equally responsible for the good ones. Yes counter attacking is easier than playing on the front-foot, but we still remain one of very few teams to take any points off Liverpool in a calendar year and very few win away at City.

So it’s only right that we scrutinise Ole like we would any manager, but going back to the point of the OP, let’s have some better arguments, not just the same cliches that I see plastered all over my Twitter and then repeated verbatim here. Make some suggestions, put your neck on the line and say what you would do differently.

Do I like our results this season? No. Did I expect them? Yes. Is it Ole’s fault? I genuinely don’t know. What I do know is that I like the DECISIONS Ole is making, even if I don’t always like what’s happening on the pitch. Good decisions over a long period of time is what will get us out of this mess. Bad decisions over a long period of time is what got us into it.

 

[redIndianDevil]

And that's the thing - the people who never saw what Van Gaal was trying to do will never see what Ole can atleast try shape up in the last 6 months he has left.

When Van Gaal was here he said he wanted 3 years to build a team - people got too distracted by Woodward Season 1 Galactico's of Falcao & Co that they couldn't see in to the Rashford, Martial, Lingard, TFM, debuts to Tuenzebe, CBJ thing he managed to do in half a season never mind the injuries leading to things like Smalling & Blind at CB which is still to day the best defensive partnership.

Van Gaal said that after he would build his team at United that he would want a United bred manager to take over & you can see that Ole is literally taking over the left over **** at United and trying to build a squad now.

LVG to Giggs or Ole was the original 5 year plan & unfortunately for us - 3 quarters of the fans cried and begged for their boy Jose to come after thinking that we were better than we were.

And now we are back to that. Crying because we are a big club & have forgotten how big we are or some nonsense.

Just damn build something for once & ole is useful for the next 6 months as LVG would have been for an extra damn year.

It's ridiculous to compare LvG and Ole, I supported LvG, he had the right idea but age-wise he wasn't perfect as he himself said that he took no part in coaching and delegated those tasks. Ole is not like LvG at all, Ole isn't building anything, he is just passing time and is relying completely on individual talent of players. No amount of time will be enough for Ole IMO, if you give him January and next summer, he'd buy 3-5 good players and hope something happens with better players. We need a proactive coach who makes us play a particular way(be it park the bus or possession), we need to fix long term issues like pathetic passing and movement, pressing etc.

 

[redIndianDevil]

The vision and plan for the team is good for me. I like our young team and our reactive counterattacking play is excellent. Our proactive buildup play on the other hand, is as limp and potent as a 70 year old. However, I've seen us play fecking awesome stuff in spurts so I can see something is there. It just comes out once every 3 to 4 games against lower opposition and the issue is finding that consistency. That will take time.

Fair enough. I hated Mourinho's vision for the club so I can understand. I guess each to their own there. But that I'm saying is, i don't think there is any manager who will guarantee better results (or even football) within the next year (apart from maybe Mourinho, but we already used that trump card) so it will be still the same story again. Eventually you'll run out of managers, like Chelsea, and then we have to hire an ex-player like they have....

Hilarious. You think Ole's park the bus and counter is good enough to give him more time but you hated Mourinho's approach?

 

[NewGlory]

Hilarious. You think Ole's park the bus and counter is good enough to give him more time but you hated Mourinho's approach?

Ole's "park the bus"?! What in hell are you watching, mate? Are you watching the games? Please double check that you have the right channel on or you are at the right stadium

 

[redIndianDevil]

Ole's "park the bus"?! What in hell are you watching, mate? Are you watching the games? Please double check that you have the right channel on or you are at the right stadium

Mourinho didn't exactly park the bus all the time, any team of our level has to attack in most of the games, against difficult matches or better opponents Ole's and Mourinho's tactics are pretty much similar and a minor difference is that Mourinho liked a lump upfront to hoof it to, Ole likes fast players on the break, the park the bus is the same in both cases.

Both Mourinho's and Ole's approach against teams that park the bus is to cry about not having better players so far.

 

[Flexdegea]

Mourinho didn't exactly park the bus all the time, any team of our level has to attack in most of the games, against difficult matches or better opponents Ole's and Mourinho's tactics are pretty much similar and a minor difference is that Mourinho liked a lump upfront to hoof it to, Ole likes fast players on the break, the park the bus is the same in both cases.

Both Mourinho's and Ole's approach against teams that park the bus is to cry about not having better players so far.

No they arent similar.......seriously you must not be watching the matches.

Park the bus you say he is?

Mourinho tactics in big away games weren't even close. He didnt even attempt to press hugh up the pitch to win breaking ball, to counter attack fast and dominate the play early. Lost count of how many games ole United have done this, spurs away, arsenal away, Chelsea away, city away to name a few.


Mourinho tactics where everyone defending in their own half, and hope to get a set piece goal or late goal, why they tended to be on the back foot early and never quite recovered.

 

[RedNed77]

Previous managers, all of whom I liked and respected btw, maybe did not quite take th same approach. Understan


Just to re-iterate and clarify something that has (inevitably) been lost as this thread has grown much quicker than I expected!

The point of my OP wasn’t to say that Ole can’t be criticised and it certainly wasn’t to defend his tenure at Man Utd either.

The point of the OP (as I actually say) was that I get sick of hearing the same lines - not going to repeat them, check the OP

By all means, criticise Ole’s tactics, criticise his game management, criticise the signings that ultimately he will have sanctioned at some level, criticise his conduct in interviews/press conferences, criticise his relationship with the players.

What I was highlighting in the OP, and I don’t know if this is the same for other posters, is that my Twitter feed is full of angry, angry people throwing every insult under the sun at Ole, usually trotting out the same lines about how he is a “puppet”, a “failed Cardiff manager” who is only in the job because he is a smiling patsy.

What I very rarely see from these people is any suggestion of what Ole SHOULD have done differently

There was near unanimous agreement that we needed a clear out. Ole has done more in that respect that any of our previous managers. Sure, I would have liked more players to leave and sure, some of the players who have left are better than what remains - but there’s only so much you can do in one window.

I also very rarely actually see much criticism of Ole’s selection or formations. We all seem to broadly agree here, maybe there are a few tweaks some would make but in the main, I think it’s fair to say most fans would broadly have picked very similar line-ups to Ole

As expected, you also always get the posters who don’t really read the OP but comment anyway. If I had a slice of turkey for every poster who put “wot so results not important mental Ole sycophant idiot” I’d be 28 stone this morning. Of course results are important but - and here’s a revelation for some of you I’m sure...despite what the media say in order to hype and sell their bloated product, the importance of any given result or any given season in the context of the overall well-being and success of a club long-term is small to insignificant. So what if we have to step backwards to go forwards? We’ve been crap for 6 years anyway! If somebody had told a Liverpool fan in 2013 they wouldn’t win a title until 2020 but at that point they would be English, European and World champions, they would have bitten your hand off, as I’m sure we all would now faced with a similar scenario. So, point being, we need to stop reacting to every results, every little bad run, every little good run.

Finally, the coaching point. Notice, I’m deliberately using the word “coaching” as I do in the OP. I keep hearing fans talk about “coaching” - which I take to mean what we do on the training pitch. When I say there’s no evidence that Ole is a poor coach, I mean that there is no strong evidence suggesting that our mediocre results are down to what’s happening (or not) on the training pitch. My argument is two-fold. One, we were equally as slow and tumescent under Jose and LvG, widely regarded as fantastic “coaches”. Two, if Ole and his team are so bad at coaching, is it then sheer luck that Ole has set teams up brilliantly to counter Liverpool, City, Chelsea (twice) and Leicester this season? Come on let’s be fair, you can’t have it both ways...if Ole is responsible for the bad games then surely he is equally responsible for the good ones. Yes counter attacking is easier than playing on the front-foot, but we still remain one of very few teams to take any points off Liverpool in a calendar year and very few win away at City.

So it’s only right that we scrutinise Ole like we would any manager, but going back to the point of the OP, let’s have some better arguments, not just the same cliches that I see plastered all over my Twitter and then repeated verbatim here. Make some suggestions, put your neck on the line and say what you would do differently.

Do I like our results this season? No. Did I expect them? Yes. Is it Ole’s fault? I genuinely don’t know. What I do know is that I like the DECISIONS Ole is making, even if I don’t always like what’s happening on the pitch. Good decisions over a long period of time is what will get us out of this mess. Bad decisions over a long period of time is what got us into it.

I’m not sure the caf does nuance. Great post though.

 

[Rafaeldagold]

No they arent similar.......seriously you must not be watching the matches.

Park the bus you say he is?

Mourinho tactics in big away games weren't even close. He didnt even attempt to press hugh up the pitch to win breaking ball, to counter attack fast and dominate the play early. Lost count of how many games ole United have done this, spurs away, arsenal away, Chelsea away, city away to name a few.


Mourinho tactics where everyone defending in their own half, and hope to get a set piece goal or late goal, why they tended to be on the back foot early and never quite recovered.

Ole’s tactics are counter attack . And that’s fine against teams who allow you to do that as they want more possession, but counter attacking isn’t a relevant or sustainable a tactic long term

 

[Massive Spanner]

Ole's "park the bus"?! What in hell are you watching, mate? Are you watching the games? Please double check that you have the right channel on or you are at the right stadium

In most games, we're way worse to watch under Ole than we ever were under Jose or LvG, and that's fecking saying something.

 

[Ish]

I’m real tired of people like the one with the above comment, wasting their own energy and everyone else’s energy by trashing Ole. If all the energy went into supporting the manager, trusting the players and trusting the process, we would be in a better position by now. All of you on here trashing things has a lousy effect on the team and fans. Spewing toxic bs tears down the club. These fans talk like they are saying all that for the greater good but guess what? It has an awfully negative effect.

The club has made the decision to stand by this manager. If you don’t like it, leave. Find another club to gloryhunt.

I wonder where we’d be if we all just blindly backed and supported Moyes. You don’t even know me, yet you’re tired of people like me and we’re gloryhunters? Righto

Might as well shut down these boards ladies and gents. Seem we can’t discuss or criticize anything.

 

[imamuppet]

You talked a lot about fallacies but I see two pretty stonking great fallacies right here in your conclusion.

Both of which are utter tosh and rooted in what we already now recognise as the complete collapse of expectations and the absence of ambition, fuelled by sentimentality, nostalgia and top red syndrome.

You do know what the word 'fallacy' means ?

Taking this into account would you care to explain what are the two fallacies in the statement you highlighted and why ?

You could have posted your opinion and said that you believe that Ole is something, something, something, which i could then understand, as that is what I have done when numbering my opinion on what items that are being peddled around by the Ole out brigade are fallacies.

But instead you have got emotionally involved without any explantion is to why what I have said is a fallacy in your eyes, not to mention you bolded one statement and started talking about two fallacies............

Yes, I can gladly accept your points regards sentimentality and nostalgia, and simply in that one sentance you have highlighted why you come across as having no understanding (along with many others) on one of the proponants that made our club what it is today.

I started supporting this club probably because of what I read as a child regarding the Busby babes and the tradegy that occured, this club was driven to great things through the great emotional and psycological strength of all those people who are Manchester United.

And you expect Manchester United supporters who have understood and have related to this mental strength and fortitude not to have a sense of nostalgia and sentimentality and just to have a will to win ?

Again, to me you are coming across as another supporter who seems not to understand many elements of the human psyche and just wish to 'win' without understanding what it takes to make 'winners' .............

Why? Why should his past with us as a player allow him extra time and patience as a manager? And especially, why is his history with Sir Alex important in any way? Working under a great manager has nothing to do with becoming one.

Well why shouldnt it ?

You dont seems to have any understanding in the dynamics of human relationships and learning by these above statements, how do you think people learn ?

And this blanket statement that 'Working with a great manager has nothing to with becoming one" are you some sort of non terrestial being that you know this as a fact ? Can you please find where I said that working with a great manager will make you one ? As that would be an absurd statement, but to not acknowledge that working with someone who is great at their job (same goes for any field) will not put you in better stead than having not worked with someone, well there is nothing else for me to discuss with you regards that particular point you have made.

My expectations this season were always low. I did not expect any achievements, I wasn't too bothered by the scores - because we were never going to have a great team this season. It was about building, and especially Solskjaer instilling a style of play that would not be perfect right now and would need more time, players and experience, but would be something to build on.

I'm not seeing that style. I'm not actually sure what his football is about other than counter attacks against the big sides. Talking about attacking football, high defence lines and pressing looks silly when you go on and sign a slow centerhalf and a right back who can't attack

Your opinion, in my opinion is lacking all the elements of someone who does not appreciate or understand the multitude of dynamics that take place at a club the size of Manchester United and the type of working environment that this creates.

Can you not see we are seeing similar patterns with regards to our last three managers, cannot you not see that there are other underlying factors that are driving this pattern.

With Ole, I believe he understands the dynamics at the club better than most, I also live in the hope that with the support of the real Manchester United people that he will find a way to negotiate round these factors.

What I am seeing is impatience, no understanding of the constraints that are obviously in place and no understanding on the 'politics' that take place when working in an institution the size of our club in its current infastucture.

There are so many levels of interaction that you seem to be dismissing and are focusing on one aspect (style of play) in which you are expecting simple 1+1 answers to equal to 2, that is not the case and will never be in the current stucture of our club !

Do you think Ole has the level of control that SAF had ?

To me and many others the answer to that is clear, there will be reasons for some of the things that bug you, some of them may well be correct, but they are an opinion that are made 'in the dark'.

We dont have this knowledge, we are looking from the outside in.

For me its too much impatiences and too much ego, people demanding to be entertained for the own self gratification, without wanting to understand that things are not so simple

 

[Rocknrolla69er]

So the jist of this thread is your not allowed to recognise or have patience for Ole's transformation of a squad, their can be no transition period, Ole has to win 90% of our games no excuses

Very entertaining reading some mindsets on here keep it up

 

[JMack1234]

I'm Ole in by default.

I don't think he's the manager to lead us to the sunny uplands in a million years but I don't see what the point would be in replacing him at this specific moment in time. I think Poch could work wonders with this squad and if he wanted the job I'd go down to Carrington and clear out Ole's office myself.

However until that happens we may as well stick with him and hope our mentality and way of playing will win us the Europa League.

 

[Ish]

@Lentwood good post there above. I’m (well I voted) Ole out a couple months ago and I haven’t changed my vote (yet, - I say yet because I’m sure like ALL of us, we’d love to see Ole turn it around) because I don’t want to act/react in a knee jerk way. You’re obviously correct, some of the insults & venom thrown around at Ole is weird and uncalled for. But tbf to a lot of the “out” posters on here, I’ve seen tons of posts get called out for exactly that reason.

Also, a few of us might actually be marginally very similar in our thinking - what I liked about your post was that you’ve actually admitted that you’re not sure whether results and the playing style (footballing/tactical issues) issues is Ole’s fault or not and you’ve stated reasons why you’re willing to be a bit more patient. And I guess in a nutshell, that’s where we drift apart in our reasoning, which is all fair enough. Maybe you (and a few others) are more willing to give Ole time versus a few of us who can see little reason to give him the benefit of our doubt. But as long as your reasoning is legit - I agree, there’s no reason for the venom/insults sometimes thrown at him. (Though I’m not sure about Twitter as I’m not on it, but on here it doesn’t happen often, IMO).

 

[redcafe_reader]

So the jist of this thread is your not allowed to recognise or have patience for Ole's transformation of a squad, their can be no transition period, Ole has to win 90% of our games no excuses

Very entertaining reading some mindsets on here keep it up

Point me 1 single post that said Ole has to win 90% of our games no excuses in this thread.

 

[NewGlory]

In most games, we're way worse to watch under Ole than we ever were under Jose or LvG, and that's fecking saying something.

I would have to respectfully and strongly disagree. Watching LvG games was abysmal and he totally fecked up his transfers. Mourinho games were not as bad but it sucked to have the nagging feeling of watching a dumpster fire. The best part about Mourinho period was getting Ibra. Love that guy, wish we could have had him for longer and earlier. Unfortunately, he hated LvG's guts and refused to come over until we had Mourinho.

Here's a million-dollar question: what is easier to fix, weakness against lousy teams or inability to play against strong teams? And if the answer is the obvious one, why the heck are we so negative? Give the guy a chance to fix the problem. Clearly he didn't get all the players he needs in one transfer window. What is he supposed to do? Run onto the pitch in shorts and try to score an extra goal or two, when things get tough?

 

[Rocknrolla69er]

Point me 1 single post that said Ole has to win 90% of our games no excuses in this thread.

Minor details pal, you get the jist

 

[Gehrman]

So the jist of this thread is your not allowed to recognise or have patience for Ole's transformation of a squad, their can be no transition period, Ole has to win 90% of our games no excuses

Very entertaining reading some mindsets on here keep it up

I think being unable to take points of the worst teams in the league is not the same demanding a 90% win rate. It's that the results should reflect the quality of our players, wages and transfer fee's.

 

[Rocknrolla69er]

I would have to respectfully and strongly disagree. Watching LvG games was abysmal and he totally fecked up his transfers. Mourinho games were not as bad but it sucked to have the nagging feeling of watching a dumpster fire.

Here's a million-dollar question: what is easier to fix, weakness against lousy teams or inability to play against strong teams? And if the answer is the obvious one, why the heck are we so negative? Give the guy a chance to fix the problem. Clearly he didn't get all the players he needs in one transfer window. What is he supposed to do? Run onto the pitch in shorts and try to score an extra goal or two, when things get tough?

But he's had loads of time, and signed loads of players to replace the ones that have left
(Sarcasm btw)

 

[Rocknrolla69er]

I think being unable to take points of the worst teams in the league is not the same demanding a 90% win rate. It's that the results should reflect the quality of our players, wages and transfer fee's.

And the results against the stronger teams?
So now Ole should tAke responsibility for wages and transfer fees paid?

This gets better by the day hilarious

 

[NewGlory]

But he's had loads of time, and signed loads of players to replace the ones that have left
(Sarcasm btw)

Sarcasm duly noted Brace yourself for a "but he has no CV" brigade

 

[Gehrman]

And the results against the stronger teams?
So now Ole should tAke responsibility for wages and transfer fees paid?

This gets better by the day hilarious

Yeah Ole is praised for beating City and Spurs this season, though they have both been below their standards this soon too, and critized for being unable to beat much lesser teams. It's not rocket science.

No one is saying there hasn't been positives. It's the fact that the negatives outweigh the positives that's the problem.

 

[el3mel]

I would have to respectfully and strongly disagree. Watching LvG games was abysmal and he totally fecked up his transfers. Mourinho games were not as bad but it sucked to have the nagging feeling of watching a dumpster fire. The best part about Mourinho period was getting Ibra. Love that guy, wish we could have had him for longer and earlier. Unfortunately, he hated LvG's guts and refused to come over until we had Mourinho.

Here's a million-dollar question: what is easier to fix, weakness against lousy teams or inability to play against strong teams? And if the answer is the obvious one, why the heck are we so negative? Give the guy a chance to fix the problem. Clearly he didn't get all the players he needs in one transfer window. What is he supposed to do? Run onto the pitch in shorts and try to score an extra goal or two, when things get tough?

In PL playing against smaller teams is far harder due to how defensive they are and LVG himself proved that, being good in big games while crap against small teams, just like now, so no, the answer to your question isn't that obvious.

And honestly enough of this "non backed" thing. 80m for a defender and a 50m for a fullback, 150m in one summer, far more than enough money to finish 4th ahead of a Chelsea team who was in similar situation or even worse, or fecking Leicester who sold us their defender. No big club can guarantee a manager 5-6 players in each window.

 

[NewGlory]

In PL playing against smaller teams is far harder due to how defensive they are

Wow! Just wow!

You know, it's really ironic to watch how so many people have bought into this b.s. narrative of "we can't play against defensive teams". Please tell me - if all it takes to win over Ole's United is to give us possession then why are we so successful against top 6 teams? Why are they not using this tactic against us? Clearly, Caf posters have figured it out for a while, what's taking Pep or Klopp or Mourinho to figure it out? Are they too "embarrassed" to play defensively with us? Is that really it? Especially Mourinho who has never felt self-conscious to play defensively and win a game, against anybody? Or are they choosing a losing tactics on purpose? Do they not care for winning? Really?

Just think about that and maybe you will see that the reality is a bit more complicated.

And honestly enough of this "non backed" thing. 80m for a defender and a 50m for a fullback, 150m in one summer, far more than enough money to finish 4th ahead of a Chelsea team who was in similar situation or even worse, or fecking Leicester who sold us their defender. No big club can guarantee a manager 5-6 players in each window.

You said it yourself – no club can guarantee a manager 5-6 players in a single window. And our team was too crappy. We will need several transfer windows to fix at least major of our problems. And it is exacerbated by the fact that our recruitment sucks + Woodward is a pretty shitty negotiator. Neither of which is Ole's fault.

 

[Zen86]

Point number 5. You do realise it was Ole that come in with all the sound bites such as ‘‘we are Man United’’, ‘’we will play the United way’’ etc and said we have good players.

Reality has caught up with him and he is now writing off the season before Christmas.

I love this argument. As if it wouldn’t have been managerial suicide to do it any other way.

 

[Rocknrolla69er]

Yeah Ole is praised for beating City and Spurs this season, though they have both been below their standards this soon too, and critized for being unable to beat much lesser teams. It's not rocket science.

No one is saying there hasn't been positives. It's the fact that the negatives outweigh the positives that's the problem.

So then if I said Ole has inherited a squad that has limited capabilities until he's been allowed to work on it further, and only then he may solve the current squads limitations, what would your thoughts be?

 

[Massive Spanner]

I would have to respectfully and strongly disagree. Watching LvG games was abysmal and he totally fecked up his transfers. Mourinho games were not as bad but it sucked to have the nagging feeling of watching a dumpster fire. The best part about Mourinho period was getting Ibra. Love that guy, wish we could have had him for longer and earlier. Unfortunately, he hated LvG's guts and refused to come over until we had Mourinho.

Here's a million-dollar question: what is easier to fix, weakness against lousy teams or inability to play against strong teams? And if the answer is the obvious one, why the heck are we so negative? Give the guy a chance to fix the problem. Clearly he didn't get all the players he needs in one transfer window. What is he supposed to do? Run onto the pitch in shorts and try to score an extra goal or two, when things get tough?

We were awful against Watford, newcastle and the ilk, absolutely awful, soul draining football. no style, no plan, nothing. LvG was a borefest too but at least he had some sort of style of football he was implementing, it just wasn't a good one. We don't even have that under Ole. We can sit back against the good teams and punish them with our pace and that's basically it.

I actually don't think it's an obvious answer at all. Lots of mid table sides are good at upping their game against superior teams, just look at Wolves last season. LvG was also great in the big games and struggled against the minnows and he couldn't figure it out, so what makes you think Ole can?

It's getting tiring arguing this now. If it wasn't Ole and if another manager had been doing a job like this with us for the last year then I'm pretty sure we'd all be unanimously egging them out of the club for doing such a piss poor job, but it is Ole and many fans, yourself included, will come up with any possible excuse to absolve him from blame because he's a club legend and you're desperate for him to succeed. And that's fine, I get it, it's a really romantic appointment and it wold be incredible if he actually had success, but it's not going to happen. He's a bad, bad, bad manager at this level, and the sooner people accept he's not the one for us, the better.

 

[Gehrman]

So then if I said Ole has inherited a squad that has limited capabilities until he's been allowed to work on it further, and only then he may solve the current squads limitations, what would your thoughts be?

I would disagree that our Squad is so limited that it cannnot consistenly outperform much lesser teams head to head. Ole inherited a Squad that finished 2nd 6 months earlier and has over 1 year of coaching it and selling and buying players. I don't think our squad is amazing, but it should be good enough to not consistently lose points to much much lesser teams.

 

[Lentwood]

@Lentwood good post there above. I’m (well I voted) Ole out a couple months ago and I haven’t changed my vote (yet, - I say yet because I’m sure like ALL of us, we’d love to see Ole turn it around) because I don’t want to act/react in a knee jerk way. You’re obviously correct, some of the insults & venom thrown around at Ole is weird and uncalled for. But tbf to a lot of the “out” posters on here, I’ve seen tons of posts get called out for exactly that reason.

Also, a few of us might actually be marginally very similar in our thinking - what I liked about your post was that you’ve actually admitted that you’re not sure whether results and the playing style (footballing/tactical issues) issues is Ole’s fault or not and you’ve stated reasons why you’re willing to be a bit more patient. And I guess in a nutshell, that’s where we drift apart in our reasoning, which is all fair enough. Maybe you (and a few others) are more willing to give Ole time versus a few of us who can see little reason to give him the benefit of our doubt. But as long as your reasoning is legit - I agree, there’s no reason for the venom/insults sometimes thrown at him. (Though I’m not sure about Twitter as I’m not on it, but on here it doesn’t happen often, IMO).

Yeah agree nothing at all wrong with not being convinced by Ole as a tactician/coach/manager but the insults are totally unnecessary, ex player or not.

 

[Rocknrolla69er]

Sarcasm duly noted Brace yourself for a "but he has no CV" brigade

Don't get me wrong it's a hard watch at times, but were clearly a club in transition, I just think it's hugely unfair slaughtering Ole, and putting all the short comings at his door, personally I think our recruitment strategy/processes are diabolical, I think Ole has been slightly naive with regards to the trusting the board to replace players which I think they've failed hugely at. But that doesn't wash with some. Some of performances have been fab, some terrible, we've a patched up, unbalanced squad so no matter who our coach this would have happened in my eyes unless a coach out there can turn Lingaard, Young, Matic, Mata, Periera, Martial, Fred, Lindelof, Shaw into consistently performing top four level players, when all your backup is is unproven fresh out the academy youngsters, something tells me even Pep and Klopp would struggle at that.

 

[el3mel]

Wow! Just wow!

You know, it's really ironic to watch how so many people have bought into this b.s. narrative of "we can't play against defensive teams". Please tell me - if all it takes to win over Ole's United is to give us possession then why are we so successful against top 6 teams? Why are they not using this tactic against us? Clearly, Caf posters have figured it out for a while, what's taking Pep or Klopp or Mourinho to figure it out? Are they too "embarrassed" to play defensively with us? Is that really it? Especially Mourinho who has never felt self-conscious to play defensively and win a game, against anybody? Or are they choosing a losing tactics on purpose? Do they not care for winning? Really?

Just think about that and maybe you will see that the reality is a bit more complicated.



You said it yourself – no club can guarantee a manager 5-6 players in a single window. And our team was too crappy. We will need several transfer windows to fix at least major of our problems. And it is exacerbated by the fact that our recruitment sucks + Woodward is a pretty shitty negotiator. Neither of which is Ole's fault.

Crazy how after watching a full half of a season of us there's still someone who denies us being crap in each small game. We won 6 games in 18 matches, only 2 of them are against small teams, Norwich and Brighton, while the other 4 wins are against Chelsea, Spurs, City and Leicester. We had a 8% win rate whenever we had more possession of the ball against a team. Last 17 matches against teams we had more possession against we won, guess what, one time only! While drawing 8 and losing 8, but you come on and say it's a BS narrative. OK.

Anyway, yes, big managers don't change their styles completely for just one game, especially when they have a certain philosophy of play like Pep or Klopp. I have seen Pep loses loads of big matches because he insists on playing his own philosophy even if failed
Playing big games in PL isn't that hard imo, as I said, LVG was winning these games while losing and drawing against almost all other small teams in the league. We used to defeat Liverpool away then lose to Southampton on our own pitch the next game under him, very similar to us now, so yes, playing against small teams in PL is far harder, and it's pretty hard to achieve a consistency in breaking down their defense, unlike say LA Liga in which all teams try to be offensive and there are loads of space, the majority of teams in PL prefer to set back and play compact. Ultimately it's the results against small teams that determine where you end in the table, not against big teams, whose games usually depend on certain aspects and you can do well in them while being defensive.

No the team wasn't crappy. The team he inherited was the reason he was hired thanks to the honeymoon period in which they showed they are good enough to play proper football and at least, at least finish 4th. We spent 150m in a summer, brought 2 of the most expensive defenders in the world and league. 150m is far more than enough money to finish 4th ahead of a Chelsea team who lost their best player, hired another rookie manager like us and had a transfer ban, or Leicester who were below mid-table last season and sold us their main defender, as long as this 150m was spent correctly, something that Ole failed miserably in. No one is asking for a title challenge, but he was given far more than enough money to finish 4th, and the team he inherited proved they were pretty much capable of that, shown by how they finished 2nd the previous season then by the honeymoon period when Ole was appointed. If that squad was degraded to the degree that it can't even stay in 5th for 2 weeks in a row after a 150m spent in one summer, whose responsibility is that? Of course the manager supposed to be "rebuilding" and "improving" the team, that after summer we are in a far worse state in terms of squad option than what he actually inherited, proven by the results we had the season before he got the job and by the results he himself got once appointed as a caretaker.

 

[DLE]

I wonder where we’d be if we all just blindly backed and supported Moyes. You don’t even know me, yet you’re tired of people like me and we’re gloryhunters? Righto

Might as well shut down these boards ladies and gents. Seem we can’t discuss or criticize anything.

Great logic. Obviously you have never been part of a team or culture where you support each other and build to decrease weaknesses and build strength.

On great teams, you have tolerance and patience. You believe in the process. You support each other. You don’t just keep firing people in order to find the holy grail. Awful attitude, only tearing things apart. The club doesn’t need gloryhunters like that.

 

[Rocknrolla69er]

I would disagree that our Squad is so limited that it cannnot consistenly outperform much lesser teams head to head. Ole inherited a Squad that finished 2nd 6 months earlier and has over 1 year of coaching it and selling and buying players. I don't think our squad is amazing, but it should be good enough to not consistently lose points to much much lesser teams.

So your basically ignoring the fact Lukaku has been sold and not replaced as well as Herrera, Fellaini, Sanchez and pretty much Smalling as well as Pogba, Bailly and Martial missing huge chunks with injury, The squad is limited in its creativity/scoring chances it's plain to see, players age, lose form and deteriorate, So in two transfer windows you think the recruitment team only attaining 3 players is enough? Despite all mentioned you think this squad has a lot of quality ?

 

[NewGlory]

Don't get me wrong it's a hard watch at times, but were clearly a club in transition, I just think it's hugely unfair slaughtering Ole, and putting all the short comings at his door, personally I think our recruitment strategy/processes are diabolical, I think Ole has been slightly naive with regards to the trusting the board to replace players which I think they've failed hugely at. But that doesn't wash with some. Some of performances have been fab, some terrible, we've a patched up, unbalanced squad so no matter who our coach this would have happened in my eyes unless a coach out there can turn Lingaard, Young, Matic, Mata, Periera, Martial, Fred, Lindelof, Shaw into consistently performing top four level players, when all your backup is is unproven fresh out the academy youngsters, something tells me even Pep and Klopp would struggle at that.

100%

 

[DLE]

I would disagree that our Squad is so limited that it cannnot consistenly outperform much lesser teams head to head. Ole inherited a Squad that finished 2nd 6 months earlier and has over 1 year of coaching it and selling and buying players. I don't think our squad is amazing, but it should be good enough to not consistently lose points to much much lesser teams.

The players are good enough but they are young. They lack the experience, give these players more experience. With time they will start believing they can be the best in Europeand it will be magnificent.

 

[Flexdegea]

Ole’s tactics are counter attack . And that’s fine against teams who allow you to do that as they want more possession, but counter attacking isn’t a relevant or sustainable a tactic long term

No one claimed it was. You stated something that I was thought was obvious.


I was responding to a poster who claimed Ole was park the bus like Jose..........arent even close to same tactics except maybe in simple terms 'counter attack', but even then I would just class jose park the bus


Seriously, Ole a lot of time particularly away from home against terms excepted to try and dominate ball he tends to press high up the pitch and commit bodies to the attack when they win breaking ball. With jose was the complete opposite tactics.

Credit to him it's worked brilliantly so far. His record pretty solid in that regard.

 

[Gehrman]

So your basically ignoring the fact Lukaku has been sold and not replaced as well as Herrera, Fellaini, Sanchez and pretty much Smalling as well as Pogba, Bailly and Martial missing huge chunks with injury, The squad is limited in its creativity/scoring chances it's plain to see, players age, lose form and deteriorate, So in two transfer windows you think the recruitment team only attaining 3 players is enough? Despite all mentioned you think this squad has a lot of quality ?

Well it was OGS who sold/loaned all of those players, it was his decision, though perhaps, you can't blame for matching Herrera contract demands. I think it's fair to put some of the blame on injuries, but it is also OGS who thinned the squad, and don't you think all the other teams have injury problems as well?

What I'm saying is, I think we are better than 8th place. I don't think OGS will be sacked now, but if results don't improve the rest of season, I don't feel we have any reason to back him as a our manager going forward.

 

[NewGlory]

Anyway, yes, big managers don't change their styles completely for just one game, especially when they have a certain philosophy of play like Pep or Klopp.

OK, you keep believing that, but that doesn't answer the question about Mourinho or Lampard. Clearly and obviously Mourinho is not above adapting his play for a specific opponent, he's done it consistently and nobody ever faulted him for being afraid to play defensively. So, how exactly did we beat the Special One, kind sir? Was Mourinho unaware of what . all of the Ole Out brigade seems to know? That all it takes to beat United is to play us defensively? Somebody should have told him

What I'm saying is, I think we are better than 8th place. I don't think OGS will be sacked now, but if results don't improve the rest of season, I don't feel we have any reason to back him as a our manager going forward.

And we won't. He doesn't have some magical, blind faith of Woodward that gives him immunity. He would have been sacked already had he not won over City and Spurs. He is given some leniency due to rebuild, but he is expected to show progress.