United linked with van Gaal in the meeja

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I think Gary just sees United as a football club not a business. Which is admirable but you just can't go taking risks like Moyes these days. It's not the 80s or the 90s. Nobody will ever get time again unless they get CL football.

He seems to think United will still be the biggest club in Britain if we're not in the CL for a few years. Yes, United will still be around but it'll be a long road back to the top. Just look at Liverpool.
 
Pexbo said:
There's a lot of things at the club that need freshening up, that is blindingly obvious but you can't just discard everything and start again. There are elements of this club that are still great and they are what we should use as foundations to build on. Having the class of 92 involved in the coaching setup is very important in my eyes as they are a fantastic group of lads who are prefect role models to the players coming through. Everyone passing them off as inexperienced is just ridiculous, you only have to listen to the testimonies of those that have worked with and under them to get an idea of how highly thought of they are as potentially great coaches.

Look to Barcelona and Guardiola to see why you should never dismiss a coach because of his age and experience.
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I really don't like this line of thinking. If a new manager comes in and recognises good coaches in the likes of Scholes and Giggs he'll find a role for them. If not, they'll have to prove themselves elsewhere. If we're going to start selecting a new manager based on whether he'll work with them or not, we're essentially giving them complete power over the manager, which is just about the worst idea I've ever heard. I want the new manager to have complete authority over staff and transfers. The only criteria we should use is his quality as a manager and his ability to handle said authority.
 
We should never hire a British manager for the sake of tradition especially when there's better candidates available. Total nonsense from Nev.
 
Pexbo said:
You really do manage to miss the point pretty much every time you read something, it's actually remarkable.

What I am saying is that they are part of the continuity in what makes United what it is. They learnt what they knew from real United people with huge character and that made them the players they are. It's hugely important that they are kept around to pass on what they were taught by the club. Van Gaal is just another manager, if he can't find a way to work with them then someone else will.
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Ah so there's a difference between Manchester United Football club and class 92 after all. That's good to know.

If you look at our history you will see that continuity is usual a recipe to disaster. Sir Matt Busby (a former City player) revolutionized United and brought concepts (like his insistence to see British clubs play in the CL) that were foreign to the game of his time. He was replaced by former Manchester United player Wilf McGuinness (zero experience in management) in a bid to bring continuity to the side. It didn't really worked out. United remained under Sir Matt shadows for many years until SAF burst into scene. SAF cynical, corporate and 'bad loser' type of attitude was a clear cut to the more gentleman's and people's club approach utilized by Sir Matt. SAF was his own man. Guess what, we started winning again.

I may understand AC Milan (Sacchi-Capello-Ancelotti) and Liverpool fans (Shankly-Paisley-Dalglish) coming out with such arguments as its part and parcel of their history. However consistency was never part of our club's success. Even during SAF time we had 8 assistant managers which is no joke.
 
Dominos said:
I assume this is some form of sarcasm but since a lot of people bring up these points (seriously) I'll answer them anyway.

Tradition is there to be broken. We used to have all British players at one point, why did we move past that? Why didn't we stubbornly refuse to have any foreign players in the team, such was the tradition of the famous Manchester United?

Every club had the tradition of British managers up til the 90s, we only managed to maintain that until now because we had Fergie. If he'd decided to leave us in 95 or whenever we'd have gone through several foreign managers by now I'd bet. I mean Sven, Van Gaal and Hitzfeld were the leading candidates to take over in 2002, thankfully our board aren't a bunch of old fashioned xenophobes.

There is no club DNA. Just what's happened in the past. We've played 433 and 4231 plenty under Ferguson. Are you telling me all these years he's been ruining the tradition of our club?
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You assume correctly.
 
Godfather said:
What is it with ex United players going full retard after their playing career? Neville is a freaking embarrassment in all that. I really hope we get LVG just to shut him up. So much bullshit spouted in such a short period of time and that on Twitter really is ridiculous.
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I'd put a hell of a lot more weight in Gary Nevilles opinions than yours.
"retard"
Fecking hell, such morons here.
 
devilish said:
I may understand AC Milan (Sacchi-Capello-Ancelotti) and Liverpool fans (Shankly-Paisley-Dalglish) coming out with such arguments as its part and parcel of their history. However consistency was never part of our club's success. Even during SAF time we had 8 assistant managers which is no joke.
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8 Assistant managers in 25 years? Most clubs have more than double that number managers alone in the last 25 years, that's perfectly good consistency and even more so when you consider that Phelan, McClair and Solskjaer have all been important coaches for us and are all ex players.



As for this talk of 4-4-2 being outdated. There's no such thing as "outdated" tactics in football, merely in fashion. It comes down to quality of players, if we had two quality wingers with two quality centremids capable of playing in a two then that would be the best formation for us and it'd be up to other teams to figure out the best formation to play against us. That's how tactics work and that's why fashionable formations change so often.
 
sullydnl said:
Didn't Ancelotti play 4-4-2 against Bayern last week? Certainly looked like it.
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They play a very good version of it. As others have said, 442 isn't outdated. It comes down to the actual tactics in those formations, and the players.
 
sullydnl said:
Didn't Ancelotti play 4-4-2 against Bayern last week? Certainly looked like it.
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Ancelotti played 21st Century 4-4-2. Nev thinks we should be playing 1998 4-4-2 with our wingers running down the byline and crossing it in without fail.
 
sullydnl said:
Didn't Ancelotti play 4-4-2 against Bayern last week? Certainly looked like it.
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Yeah, Ancelotti's gone for 4-4-2 on a lot of occasions this season. There are lots of teams that press in a 4-4-2 shape (Barcelona and Borussia Dortmund, for example). Atlético Madrid play with a 4-4-2 system in a manner like no other team. They are arguably the best side in the world at pressing teams and forcing them to the wings. It depends on how you play the system with the personnel available to you. Just because it failed for Moyes - and that was largely down to his own limitations - doesn't mean it's not going to work for us any more. IMO it's nonsense to suggest it's "outdated" since it's clearly working in modern football at the highest level possible.
 
Pexbo said:
8 Assistant managers in 25 years? Most clubs have more than double that number managers alone in the last 25 years, that's perfectly good consistency and even more so when you consider that Phelan, McClair and Solskjaer have all been important coaches for us and are all ex players.



As for this talk of 4-4-2 being outdated. There's no such thing as "outdated" tactics in football, merely in fashion. It comes down to quality of players, if we had two quality wingers with two quality centremids capable of playing in a two then that would be the best formation for us and it'd be up to other teams to figure out the best formation to play against us. That's how tactics work and that's why fashionable formations change so often.
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Good point, the reason certain formations come into the limelight is because of the personel in that team and the likelihood your opposition will play a formation that suits you.

Realistically no team plays a set formation that is as rigid as you play 4-2-3-1 stay in those positions and you'll win. I think we all know on these boards that there's an attacking formation, a defensive Formation a "we just defended a corner" formation.

Manchester United have always played 4-4-2 allowing for the odd funky one here or there. Its hilarious how many times sky, itv, BT get players positions so wrong because they only think of the starting line up and the conventions of players.

How many times have you seen "and Kagawa on the left" when in actual fact hes more of an inside attacker, almost a striker. He flits from playing behind the striker/wing/deep right, support for right wing (similarly with Young).

Which is why it's surprising to see people use formation as an argument for or against managers and oppositions. "Van Gaal likes to plat 4-3-3" sure he does but it's far far from conventional.
 
Pexbo said:
8 Assistant managers in 25 years? Most clubs have more than double that number managers alone in the last 25 years, that's perfectly good consistency and even more so when you consider that Phelan, McClair and Solskjaer have all been important coaches for us and are all ex players.



As for this talk of 4-4-2 being outdated. There's no such thing as "outdated" tactics in football, merely in fashion. It comes down to quality of players, if we had two quality wingers with two quality centremids capable of playing in a two then that would be the best formation for us and it'd be up to other teams to figure out the best formation to play against us. That's how tactics work and that's why fashionable formations change so often.
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Its nice to see you ignoring the rest of the post, anyway.

SAF was unique. He was a quality manager who was happy staying at one club. That's a unique combination. Usually quality managers tend to move clubs even when they are successful. Guardiola and Sacchi are perfect examples of managers who left the club they loved to seek experiences elsewhere.

However dont think that SAF was not about change. The man transformed United from a sleeping giant and the people's club to the football giant and corporate business we see today. Once he signed with us he transformed the very foundations of the club (right to the youth academy) and shown the door to so many popular players of that time. SAF didn't stop there. Throughout the years he was never shy of selling top quality players at their prime. His first quality side which had the ability to stream roll anyone in the EPL was dismantled (Hughes, Kanchelskis, Ince) way before its expiry date to give space to the class of 92. This was a decision that was so revolutionary that nearly all critics turned against it and it impacted United even in the stock exchange. Actually I believe that SAF's 'worst years' were when he mellowed and played safe as opposed to when he took crazy decisions like for example replacing two English international regulars with two 18 years olds one from Wales and the other from Portugal.

And Id love to know where I have mentioned 4-4-2. If you ask me, we shouldnt play 4-4-2 because we simply do not have the quality personnel to do so AND those players who can actually contribute in making us play that way at the highest level are simply too costly/not available (Vidal and Ronaldo for example).
 
Pexbo said:
8 Assistant managers in 25 years? Most clubs have more than double that number managers alone in the last 25 years, that's perfectly good consistency and even more so when you consider that Phelan, McClair and Solskjaer have all been important coaches for us and are all ex players.



As for this talk of 4-4-2 being outdated. There's no such thing as "outdated" tactics in football, merely in fashion. It comes down to quality of players, if we had two quality wingers with two quality centremids capable of playing in a two then that would be the best formation for us and it'd be up to other teams to figure out the best formation to play against us. That's how tactics work and that's why fashionable formations change so often.
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After our treble year I think playing 4-4-2 is what denied us another CL title immediately after, if we had the pragmatism that we adopted from 07-11 then I'm certain that we'd at least have picked up another CL or two at the turn of the century with the team we had then . Of course it could be down to the Stam debacle or the fact that Juan Serba didn't quite work out but the ease with which Real Madrid picked us apart in 2000 at Old Trafford tells me otherwise .
 
Kaos said:
Another club? We're United and we do things the United way.

4-4-2, British Managers, The Prophetic Class of 92...its all in our DNA and to deny that would be to deny everything our club stands for. YWNA.
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Ronaldo's Mum Eh? said:
Gary Neville thinks 4-4-2 is relevant in world football.

He's so outdated it's not even funny.
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Real Madrid playing 4-4-2 again tonight. Thats Ancelotti off your manager list :lol::lol:

Ah, football hipsters. So full of shit.
 
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Prepare your Welcome text to LvG Woody, because Ancelotti is going nowhere!
 
The Mourinho, Ancelotti and Guardiola boat sailed last summer when all those managers were available and we signed Moyes.
 
Escobar said:
Yeah but this is a new 4-4-2, one that works ;)
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Well, I keep reading on here that formations are more important than players. Maybe just maybe if you are playing top players in positions they are most comfortable with you can make any reasonable formation work.
 
charleysurf said:
Well, I keep reading on here that formations are more important than players. Maybe just maybe if you are playing top players in positions they are most comfortable with you can make any reasonable formation work.
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Thank god the Caf has nothing to say when it comes to new Managers, formations, tactics, half time tea etc...
 
I get the impression the weekly manager's press conference thread won't be short of posts next season if he arrives
 
I should say, though I'm all for Giggs getting the job I'd be just as happy with LVG. Not to knock the man. The main thing is to do better next season whoever is in charge. Tika Taka footballs maybe getting royally fecked by Madrid tonight but the fact still remains - we need to keep the ball better. The best of both worlds

Both would look to attack teams and I like LVG's character and his desire to improve players. Too many players stagnate or don't reach their potential
 
I'm really not convinced Van Gaal is going to be good for us but I genuinely can't think of any better candidates who'll be available.
 
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