Our midfield

[Daisy]

Been a complete fucking mess since Gini left and never replaced him

[Barrington Womble]

6 hours ago, 3 Stacks said:

That said, he apparently had a comment after the game where he said he couldn't play with two in midfield if we wanted to because we don't have enough attackers available at the moment. So maybe that implies he has thought about it.

 

I never really thought 4-2-3-1 made sense when we went for it in the past, but Nunez and Carvalho are suited for those kinds of roles, so who knows.

The thing is, the players are so drilled these days, any new formation would only be a temporary stop gap till other players return and we can get into those drilled positions. It's going to be a long hard season I think. 

[Bobby Hundreds]

It's just a fact there are no midfielders out there better than Henderson, Kieta, Ox and Milner  and to get a player to compete with them will cost billions! So two crocks, one who is injured a fair bit aswell and a 36 year old Milner. It's every excuse apart from the most honest one, we are a sell to buy club and we've no assets to sell.

 

 

[VladimirIlyich]

7 minutes ago, Bobby Hundreds said:

It's just a fact there are no midfielders out there better than Henderson, Kieta, Ox and Milner  and to get a player to compete with them will cost billions! So two crocks, one who is injured a fair bit aswell and a 36 year old Milner. It's every excuse apart from the most honest one, we are a sell to buy club and we've no assets to sell.

 

 

Our main asset was given a contract extension. I suspect because Klopp didnt want to have to sell his best player just to 'strengthen' the squad and there be no guarantee it would. Selling Minamino and Origi after they became an integral part of our squad rotation policy in almost our most successful season ever was a bit strange though.

[HBenn]

22 minutes ago, VladimirIlyich said:

Our main asset was given a contract extension. I suspect because Klopp didnt want to have to sell his best player just to 'strengthen' the squad and there be no guarantee it would. Selling Minamino and Origi after they became an integral part of our squad rotation policy in almost our most successful season ever was a bit strange though.

Probably was down to wages.

[HBenn]

35 minutes ago, Bobby Hundreds said:

It's just a fact there are no midfielders out there better than Henderson, Kieta, Ox and Milner  and to get a player to compete with them will cost billions! So two crocks, one who is injured a fair bit aswell and a 36 year old Milner. It's every excuse apart from the most honest one, we are a sell to buy club and we've no assets to sell.

 

 

Completely agree.

 

Waiting for the elite players is the right thing to do but unlike when we were waiting for Van Dijk we don't just need one player now. We could have brought in a player with potential while waiting. The likes of Thuram, Onana or Nunes wouldn't have cost the earth and the likes of Caicedes had to start somewhere.

 

As far as I am concerned they don't have any excuses now. If the strategy works then great but if doesn't there will be no "mitigating circumstances". They have chosen to do nothing with the midfield for 3 years and now chosen to press ahead without reinforcements.

 

They cannot then say "they are too expensive" or "we had injuries" or "the players don't want to come now". 

 

They can also forget it with this "transition phase" that seems to be seeping into the club and commentary. We didn't need to completely drop off or go through a crap phase to transition, we just needed to be more proactive on our transfers over the last few years. Utd never really went through a transition from one great team to another.

[Barrington Womble]

I hate this waiting for the right player bullshit, like we really waited for vvd. We didn't. We fucked up the transfer, to save getting done by the PL had to add 20m to the fee and wait out till January to save Southampton some face. If we hadn't fucked the transfer up, there would have been no waiting. 

 

Who else have we waited for? Keita? Origi? Big deal. There's been lots we've been told we're waiting on who never arrived, the list is almost as big as the players we've signed. There's loads of players in the world. Lots of them are good enough to play for us and improve us. We just simply don't want to spend while we have 8 midfielders on our books. 

[dockers_strike]

I dont think it's really a question of waiting for the right player. It's fucking off this 'just sign anyone' mentality.

 

It's those types of transfers that tend to be poor generally as we found out for the previous near 25 years before Klopp arrived.

[Barrington Womble]

8 minutes ago, dockers_strike said:

I dont think it's really a question of waiting for the right player. It's fucking off this 'just sign anyone' mentality.

 

It's those types of transfers that tend to be poor generally as we found out for the previous near 25 years before Klopp arrived.

And why does it need to be "anyone"? We're supposed to have the biggest dataset on footballers in the game, with an extensive scouting network to compliment it. We know everyone. It's another of our marginal gains. If we need someone at any point we should know instantly who we need to recruit. The only challenge in that is money. These don't want to spend, so they pretend they're waiting for the right guy, but it's just kicking the can down the road to hide their ambitions are being in the CL and winning is just the cherry on the cake. Klopp has said as much this week. The issue is budget, he would like a player.  

[VERBAL DIARRHEA]

They don’t want to spend as Barry says, we will already struggle to get top four after three games. Sad state of affairs unless previously highly injury prone players suddenly become Steve Austin, not the wrestler,although he would feel at home in his knee braces.

[Carra_is_legend]

41 minutes ago, Barrington Womble said:

I hate this waiting for the right player bullshit, like we really waited for vvd. We didn't. We fucked up the transfer, to save getting done by the PL had to add 20m to the fee and wait out till January to save Southampton some face. If we hadn't fucked the transfer up, there would have been no waiting. 

 

Who else have we waited for? Keita? Origi? Big deal. There's been lots we've been told we're waiting on who never arrived, the list is almost as big as the players we've signed. There's loads of players in the world. Lots of them are good enough to play for us and improve us. We just simply don't want to spend while we have 8 midfielders on our books. 

That is exactly it. Which is why Milner shouldn't have got a new contract, Keita should have left 2 years ago or at least last summer. Ox should have left last summer. We would have probably had 2 new midfielders by now had we done all that, it would have probably given more game time for Jones to see if he is going to cut it or not. 

[Barrington Womble]

22 minutes ago, VERBAL DIARRHEA said:

They don’t want to spend as Barry says, we will already struggle to get top four after three games. Sad state of affairs unless previously highly injury prone players suddenly become Steve Austin, not the wrestler,although he would feel at home in his knee braces.

We'll probably be ok over the season. We have enough midfielders to get us 4th. We won't have this many players injured all season and we'll put runs together because we haven't become shit over night. And that is why we won't buy anyone, we have enough for 4th unless this injury crisis lasts 6 months and not 6 weeks. 

[HBenn]

51 minutes ago, Barrington Womble said:

And why does it need to be "anyone"? We're supposed to have the biggest dataset on footballers in the game, with an extensive scouting network to compliment it. We know everyone. It's another of our marginal gains. If we need someone at any point we should know instantly who we need to recruit. The only challenge in that is money. These don't want to spend, so they pretend they're waiting for the right guy, but it's just kicking the can down the road to hide their ambitions are being in the CL and winning is just the cherry on the cake. Klopp has said as much this week. The issue is budget, he would like a player.  

100%. They conveniently forget that now. Probably use the "Lijnders line of signing only elite players while developing youngsters line to justify it"

 

Isn't that what all clubs look to do?

[HBenn]

11 minutes ago, Barrington Womble said:

We'll probably be ok over the season. We have enough midfielders to get us 4th. We won't have this many players injured all season and we'll put runs together because we haven't become shit over night. And that is why we won't buy anyone, we have enough for 4th unless this injury crisis lasts 6 months and not 6 weeks. 

I am just waiting for the "Balgazi's form for the cup upsetters convinced the club to pull the £80m Barella bid they were about to make as they didn't want someone to block his path"

[VERBAL DIARRHEA]

28 minutes ago, Barrington Womble said:

We'll probably be ok over the season. We have enough midfielders to get us 4th. We won't have this many players injured all season and we'll put runs together because we haven't become shit over night. And that is why we won't buy anyone, we have enough for 4th unless this injury crisis lasts 6 months and not 6 weeks. 

World Cup could be saviour or a curse.

[Joey8FrogsLegs]

20 hours ago, waddy78 said:

As captain he should set an example so to speak both on and off the field (he certainly does off the field) leadership is more than getting stuck in but personally I think the captain sets the standards and if its true he's not winning his battles then I'm not sure what else he brings ? As a production manager myself I'm a firm believer in not asking someone to do something I wouldn't do myself how can Henderson tell Thiago (when fit) Harvey, Fabinho Ox or Keita or whoever is along side him to get stuck in win your duels when he's not himself? I'd be interested  to see what his stats were when we won the league or the season before when we missed out by 1pt and won the CL.

He avoids 50-50 challenges more or less completely, both on the ground and in the air. Lots of stats will prove this, and for those not fond of stats the so called eye test will show the same. Look through any match you like and check.

 

 

[Carra_is_legend]

1 hour ago, Barrington Womble said:

We'll probably be ok over the season. We have enough midfielders to get us 4th. We won't have this many players injured all season and we'll put runs together because we haven't become shit over night. And that is why we won't buy anyone, we have enough for 4th unless this injury crisis lasts 6 months and not 6 weeks. 

Yep, and that means FSG target is met. Big tick in the box and this time next year we will have some Del boy from Echo saying we are waiting for the right player.

 

4th is no longer a foregone conclusion though, it can all change very very quickly with Spurs, Arsenal and Chelsea on the horizon. United will continue to spend and if not this year they might challenge next year. 

 

What I don't get with FSG cunts is, amount of money from CL is dependent on the league position, 1st placed team (City this year) gets the most, followed by us, 4th gets the least. I don't know how much the difference is but its a classic case of spend more to earn more. 

[an tha]

Get the closest two we can get to Hendo and Wijnaldum of about 3/4 years ago and we will be boss again....

[etho]

Aren't we playing cl every week until the world cup? Zero chance of getting and keeping everyone fit with that schedule

[VladimirIlyich]

2 hours ago, Joey8FrogsLegs said:

He avoids 50-50 challenges more or less completely, both on the ground and in the air. Lots of stats will prove this, and for those not fond of stats the so called eye test will show the same. Look through any match you like and check.

 

 

I often wonder if this is a combination of being sent off against City under Rodgers and my opinion that he's been carrying an injury or series of them for the past 18 months or so.Hard tackling doesent exist in the modern game now though so I often wonder why it matters to people other than as another way of criticising Hendo.

[stringvest]

46 minutes ago, VladimirIlyich said:

I often wonder if this is a combination of being sent off against City under Rodgers and my opinion that he's been carrying an injury or series of them for the past 18 months or so.Hard tackling doesent exist in the modern game now though so I often wonder why it matters to people other than as another way of criticising Hendo.

Haha!  It isn’t another way.  It is the essence of way.  It’s the only problem I have with him.  The lack of bottle, and in particular the way he pulls the wool over people eyes. Make myself available to receive a throw in? No sir.  I don’t want to receive the ball under pressure.  I’ll hide behind players so the ball can’t get to me.  Similar when receiving passes.  It’s been happening for years yet people are fooled by running and pointing.  No one wants to see him put the sort of crunching ball winning tackling that Thiago does, but tackling does not have to be hard.  It does actually have to exist though.  Get in harms way occasionally ffs. 

[Carvalho Diablo]

Henderson was responsible for both goals on Monday imo, each highlighting a different weakness in his game.

 

The first, he just didn't even see Fernandez running in behind him, no game awareness whatsoever, then he didn't have the pace to recover.

 

The second goal, he just bottled the interception / tackle on the halfway line, just completely shit out of it. Embarrassing.

 

Both instances highlights why Henderson cannot play as a 6.

 

If he's to play further forwards, as an 8,then that's a whole other kettle of fish...

[TheHowieLama]

If he could just carry the fish - he doesn't have to tune it.

[Moo]

1 hour ago, stringvest said:

Haha!  It isn’t another way.  It is the essence of way.  It’s the only problem I have with him.  The lack of bottle, and in particular the way he pulls the wool over people eyes. Make myself available to receive a throw in? No sir.  I don’t want to receive the ball under pressure.  I’ll hide behind players so the ball can’t get to me.  Similar when receiving passes.  It’s been happening for years yet people are fooled by running and pointing.  No one wants to see him put the sort of crunching ball winning tackling that Thiago does, but tackling does not have to be hard.  It does actually have to exist though.  Get in harms way occasionally ffs. 

I think exactly the same about Thiago, it's funny what we notice when we're closely watching a player we don't like isn't it?  Not having a go, just sharing an opinion.  They're like arseholes.

[Barrington Womble]

5 hours ago, VERBAL DIARRHEA said:

World Cup could be saviour or a curse.

I think that's the same for everyone. I don't think you can worry about it too much, just focus on the lads who aren't there, how you rest them and get them ready. And as the players who are there come back fit or injured from the world l cup, just react to that. And if there's big injuries, there's a January window if your club gives a fuck (or do nothing if you're waiting for the right player)

4 hours ago, Joey8FrogsLegs said:

He avoids 50-50 challenges more or less completely, both on the ground and in the air. Lots of stats will prove this, and for those not fond of stats the so called eye test will show the same. Look through any match you like and check.

 

 

So as someone who gets depressed by stats (not that they don't have value), it's been easy to see for some time, Henderson is physically not the player he was. I don't agree with a lot of what @stringvest says about him (or at least years ago), but right now he's not right and hasn't been for a while. You can see it in how he approaches the ball, how desperate he is to get it out if his feet because he doesn't want kicking. At his best, Henderson is a cracking player. Not elite level but a really good footballer and a genuine grown up in the team. He hasn't been that for a while, and you don't need any stats to see that. 

 

But to defend him, from the little I hear, for around a year he's been playing through pain. And just gets on with it. Maybe he could recover a little more if twats like keita could do the same. 

3 hours ago, etho said:

Aren't we playing cl every week until the world cup? Zero chance of getting and keeping everyone fit with that schedule

It's the same as any season, 6 games, but instead of being done early as we stop in november..but the premier League I think will be at 19 games at the break, which were normally at around new year and not mid November. So it will be tough for those out of Europe too who aren't used to playing twice a week.