Send all your thoughts to theeditor@football365.com. Make them something not about RED MONDAY if you want.
Blue Monday
I’m still bored from last night.
Chris MUFC
Ever the contrarian, I signed up to my first ever Sky Sport package this weekend (I’ve not done any early adopting since my mini disk debacle). Children despatched to bed early, I settled in for the joys of RED MONDAY and some top class analysis from the superior pundits employed by Sky Sports.
What I got, was Ryan Giggs, shuffling uncomfortably in his suit, like a page boy at wedding who forgot to go for a wee before the ceremony, informing me that Manchester United have some tall players. Following this was the most 0-0 draw that there ever has been. Whilst I can find some fun wondering if Mourinho could clone Fellaini whether he’d play him at both the base, and tip of midfield…whilst there is some enjoyment in playing ‘spot the winger’ by starting at the opposition box and working backwards to ‘5 yards from both his own box and full back’…whilst I enjoyed telling Mohamed Sissoko (my cat) that she was no worse than the most expensive footballer in the world..I can’t help but feel the game was lacking some actual entertainment.
I’m a bit surprised. Sky have been running football for ages, I’d have thought they would have these glitches ironed out by now. Is this normal? I assumed the televised Premier League stuff was like wrestling, and the basic result and ‘story’ of the match had been planned out in advance. They’re not trying to just sell us normal, flawed, sometimes boring, competitive football __with some extra hype, are they?
Jeremy (I thought Lallana was good, before it was cool to think that) Aves
Not much to say about last night as not much really happened!
I thought both managers summed the game up perfectly __with Mourinho stating that we controlled the game technically and emotionally and Klopp admitting that Liverpool didn’t do enough to deserve the win.
I can take this type of performance at the moment as Jose appreciated that another display similar to the City game would of been out of the question. Its still very early days in his reign however I would be disappointed if he turned up at Anfield with a similar attitude next season.
Herrera was brilliant, almost as if we always had an intelligent, dynamic midfielder in our squad these past 2 seasons. Who knew?
Pogba, not so much. Mourinho needs to find a way to set this team up to get the most out of him and he has no other choice considering the fee. No doubt he is a confident boy but performances like this could be corrosive. He was the least effective midfielder during a high profile game involving both Henderson and Felliani. Not a good nights work.
Plato – MUFC (I knew by the way)
Practice for Pulisball
One positive Liverpool can take is that the match served as a great practice match for the other bus in the league visiting Anfield next week. A solid bus, a less expensive bus but a strong bus all the same. Saturday Liverpool face The Pulis Bus and the match against Utd was a perfect way to prepare for this. If Klopp has found any answers to this style of play and Liverpool win, 4 points out of 6 against the Pulis/Jose way would be an excellent return.
It will be interesting to see if (when) Jose employs similar tactics next week at the bridge. It’s fair enough to play like that away from home when you only have 1 or 2 challengers for top spot but can Jose get away with playing like that away at 6 different teams (7 including Everton?). City will be over the hills before you know it.
Jimmy (Can’t wait for next weekend already) Spain
Love for Klopp
I for on was more impressed with what I saw last night than many others I have seen in both the mailbox and round the houses of social media. Impressed with the football, no. Impressed with the game, well actually I found it to be be quite a compelling 0-0. Oddly, I was most impressed with the post-game interviews.
Klopp treated us to an explosive monologue of adrenaline soaked emotion. He was marvesslously pissed with a draw to a massive rival. I know very well why Arsene Wenger doesn’t do this, but it’s great to hear how an acceptable performance was not good enough for him.
Even better than that though, he gave away his tactics. He talked about where he hoped things would happen and where in the end they didn’t, whilst carefully not digging out individual under-performers. It was a breathless tirade akin to me reading aloud a twitter conversation between two tactics geeks if I’d been on the speed all day and night. Even Jose treated us to some tactical insight in between his standard issue sour grapes. They’ll be pleased with that.
So apologies to all of I have rekindled any Kloppmania, but he really is great value. Room full of utd and Arsenal fans were half listening intently and half pissing ourselves laughing. I think last night allayed some of my fears that a europe-less Liverpool would be a big threat, their whole package should be a right laugh though. United’s season ahead on the other hand, functional at absolute best.
James Gooner
Love for Lallana
Can United fans really justify that? The same lot that slated Van Gaal and ran him out of the job for producing an awful, uninspiring brand of football and not playing “the United Way”. I can take being beaten by a counter-attacking team but that was not counter-attacking football. It was 6-3-1, Tony Pulis, West Brom, Park the bus football. Something we can never accuse Fergie, as much as we dislike him, of never doing.
From our own point of view, the main takeaway I have from tonight is I really do not see a role for Sturridge from the start of games. Firmino offers so much more due to the team relying on movement, energy and pressing. I do think Sturridge can offer something off the bench as he is still our best finisher but starting, not for me.
Lallana changed the game (never thought I’d say that) due to a pedestrian midfield where Emre Can aside from his chance was poor, and the fact that Firmino was released up top and Coutinho returned to his usual spot on the left. I don’t worry too much about the performance it was decent, not great but on another day we could have won. Also if it went to Old Trafford next weekend I’d still fancy us as it would be much more open and United would be forced to come out.
On a player level, Karius still looks very nervy. You’d hope he’d overcome it in time like De Gea but we have to wait and see. I wouldn’t change him as going back to Mignolet is not the solution. Thought Matip and Lovren were excellent and stifled Zlatan aside from his one chance. Thought Henderson was good and from there on up the pitch it didn’t really change until Lallana came on.
Anyway on to West Brom after United, a similar team tactically, never thought I’d say that.
Baz, Ireland, LFC
Paul Pogba: The ridiculous statistics?
Player in an attacking role sees less of the ball than those in a defensive position. Not surprising.
Player trying to find players with penetrative passes completes less of his percentage than players trying lower-risk passing. Not surprising.
Milner was at left-back and saw more of the ball (as above). Substituted in the 86th minute, so more than slightly disingenuous.
Pogba was 0/2 on shooting (one off target, one blocked). He’s not a striker, most of his efforts are from long range, and by extension, have a low percentage chance of going in.
He lost a lot of duels, fair enough.
Pogba has zero assists this season. But, as you say, this relies on people putting the chances away.
For a comparison, here’s Roberto Firmino, who was playing in an attacking, if not completely completely similar, role. Attempted 47 passes, completion of 59%; won 50% tackles; won 20% aerial duels; 0/3 crosses completed; 1/4 take ons completed; one shot on target (a dolly); one chance created.
Pogba was playing in a more advanced role than he usually has this season. I mean, are we going to have these ‘ridiculous statistics’ every time a player is deployed in a new position? Rooney certainly seems to be making less passes since he started on the bench, eh?
Joe
Jose was just being Jose
Seeing as Jose has been somewhat lambasted for his tactics in this morning’s Mailbox I’d like to counter some of the arguments and provide a little support if I may.
It’s still early days in the Mourinho era (I hope) and its clear that he’s still trying to establish his strongest team and mould them into his own system. They are getting there slowly but surely but we’re still far from what he’ll see as his finished article. So bearing in mind how dangerous Liverpool currently look and how quickly they are putting some teams to the sword, why would Jose risk taking an absolute spanking just so he could say ‘well at least we had a bit of a go at them’? As has been evident already this season that would be playing straight into Liverpool’s hands.
Mourinho was right to err on the side of caution. It was a tricky away game, against our fiercest rivals, who were bang in form, and we’re still in the process of finding our feet. I’m with you Jose, on this occasion I’ll take a dull 0.0 and an away point at Anfield as well. Incidentally, we were only a better Zlatan header away from the perfect snatch and grab away performance and 3 points – with a little extra help from El Dave of course.
So Mark, MUFC who was ‘embarrassed’ and ‘bored’, stating that it’s ‘not why you support Man Utd’, do me a favour and get off your high horse! Yes it wasn’t pretty, but we could have quite easily taken a humbling from our fiercest rivals last night had we made a cock and balls of it tactically. I’m sure you can imagine what would have been said/written had that happened! We (including Fergie) did it 5 years ago against City and we’ll never hear the end of that particular clusterf**k – although I’m sure you were proud as punch that day eh Mark!
Away points like this matter over the course of the season and this result was exactly the sort of reason why Mourinho was brought in. The performances will come, but let’s get there with our dignity still intact. Jose was just doing what Jose does best when performances of this ilk are required – we should all know this by now.
Al Williams
Quit whinging
You’re probably going to get a few of these, but how else should Mourinho have approached this game? I didn’t want to see that many things done differently, compared to the people whinging about how embarrassing United were.
Let’s be honest. United have far less chemistry and fluency in attack than Liverpool – that’s why Liverpool have 18 league goals to our 13 so far. Look, we definitely need Martial, Rashford, Mata, Mkhitaryan and even Memphis to play with one another more, and develop as an attacking unit. But going away to a team 3 places and 3 points ahead of us, with 9 goals in their last 2 home games, while we’re in 7th, was NOT the time or place to do it.
Given all that, it would have been mental for Mourinho to try going toe to toe with Liverpool and the post-match narrative would likely (and rightly) have been that he set United up for a hiding. It’s pretty logical that we left Mata on the bench for 90 minutes and played with a defensive winger in Young on the left.
And you have to say it worked. 65% possession leading to 3 shots on target and no goals – we turned a Klopp team previously in full flow into van Gaal’s United.
IF United actually had a high-functioning attack like City, Arsenal or Liverpool themselves, I would have been far more frustrated with the way we set out to play last night. Having said that, I would have liked to have seen us make some tweaks during the match like pushing Fellaini further up in midfield for Rashford and Pogba to play off the second ball (something van Gaal, to his credit, did with great success in big matches for a short stretch before mysteriously abandoning that tactic and formation altogether).
But most of the criticisms in the morning mailbox should be not aimed at our showing in this game, but at the fact that we just haven’t yet built a team worthy of trusting in our whole range of attacking qualities when going away to one of the better Liverpool teams of the last 25 years. with all the money spent, I can understand that and I’m disappointed that we have not played like a coherent, consistent team since Fergie left.
Like most United fans, I’ve been really critical of the team plenty of times over the last few years. But on days like this, I can’t help but feel like whoever the United manager is just can’t win because “Fergie would’ve done it differently” (as if Fergie never set a team up to ‘do a job’ away to better opposition). Fergie himself famously changed the way he treated such games after getting walloped 4-0 at the Nou Camp in 1994. Mourinho had a game plan for an away game against a team that is more dangerous than his own team at present, and it was reasonably successful.
Let’s move on. The focus should be on doing better in games with less at stake, so we get to the point where we actually have the quality as a team to assert our attacking dominance on a game of this magnitude.
Karthik MUFC
Televise entertainment, not ‘standout fixtures’
It seems harsh to have a pop at Mourinho for masterminding a creditable point at Anfield but the general punter does feel cheated by a dour display from United.
Liverpool v United is one of the stand out fixtures of the calendar. It’s a clash between England’s two most successful teams and is accordingly deemed worthy of television coverage on the paid for channels, while the BBC even moved MOTD2 for it.
It’s supposed to be a stand out fixture but with Mourinho it was never going to happen. Arsenal v Chelsea is supposed to a be a top clash but Mourinho’s Chelsea tended to travel to the Emirates in recent times in search of a goal less draw and succeeded.
So while it may go against tradition, how about choosing the matches to televise by making an educated guess about how entertaining it will be?
When United start to see cash levels dwindling due to TV bosses not wanting to screen United’s Mourinho, I’m sure they’ll act.
There’s a free match involving United this week and I’m still not sure I’ll bother tuning in.
Graham Simons, Gooner, Norf London
In their defence
In the list of “defensive attackers” featured two Crystal Palace wingers, and also featured the line “it’s clearly a piece of p#ss being a Palace full-back”. It’s worth pointing out that Palace’s starting left-back, Pape Souare, was injured in a car accident, so they have been platooning Martin Kelly and Zeki Fryers, so it’s no wonder whichever of Andros Townsend and Wilfried Zaha is playing on the left wing at any given moment (they interchange with each other and Jason Puncheon) puts in a real shift defensively. On the other side, Joel Ward likes to defend to the inside, so it requires the right winger to defend out wide.
There is also the possibility that the ball is being channelled wide, particularly in the early phases, because of the genuine goalscoring threat of Christian Benteke (unless you force him to take a penalty), or of Puncheon – who going into this round of fixtures had created the most chances of anyone in the Premier League – winning the ball and teeing him up.
Also, as the team’s attacking threats, who like to dribble the ball, it makes sense for both wingers to be tenacious in defence, winning possession from an opponent away from their defensive position and exploiting the space. Townsend scored an impressive goal doing exactly that when the Eagles beat Stoke City.
Ed Quoththeraven (by my count it’s 342 days since James McClean last got himself in hot water)
Colin
While two managers with, erm, larger than life personalities were duking it out at Anfield, another was defending his professional reputation yesterday.
In January 2014, when Jason Puncheon found Row Z against Tottenham Hotspur. Neil Warnock, then between jobs, commented on the miss on Talksport, saying he wouldn’t have trusted Puncheon to take the penalty. Puncheon reacted angrily, tweeting his disagreement with Warnock, and then criticising him in a series of tweets that were hastily deleted, but not before the FA saw fit to fine Puncheon £15,000 for bringing the game into disrepute.
Yesterday, the FA’s Chairman and Director of Strategy were questioned by the Parliamentary Culture, Media and Sport committee about a number of things, including the allegations made by Puncheon. They included the accusation that the current Cardiff boss had previously arranged “extra wages and appearance bonuses to make sure they pay him to get into the team or on the bench”. Warnock denies all the allegations, although it’s also worth pointing out he was not the focus of the questions; instead the committee wanted to know why the only action the FA took was to fine Puncheon, rather than carrying out any sort of investigation into the accusations he was making about Colin’s actions. The committee were especially interested in this sort of thing since the Daily Telegraph’s Football For Sale investigation, and without mentioning too much, if you look in the right place you can draw a parallel between these allegations and those against one of the eight managers mentioned by Football For Sale.
The whole thing’s just a bit odd, really. Just when Football For Sale had gone quiet, just when football people thought it was safe to go back in the water, it gives us a bit more.
Ed Quoththeraven