Man Utd man ‘equal parts pants and excellent’ as Reds ‘weren’t even bad’
Manchester United were not that bad in defeat to Fulham, while the tiresome debate between Liverpool and Arsenal fans continues.
Mail your thoughts on all subjects to theeditor@football365.com
Looking on the bright Red side
Man Utd weren’t even bad last night. They were decent actually – in parts at least.
No howlers from Onana but some decent stops. The centre-halves all had good shifts even if they still don’t operate smoothly together as a system. (Maybe De Ligt’s best game). Dalot and Mazraoui were good, especially the latter (and ok the former still has no final ball).
Bruno was immense again whatever angry Roy Keane says.
Zirkzee was equal parts pants and excellent which is kinda exactly what you want in that kind of playmaker role (ok you’d prefer nonstop great but overall you take the bad because you might get the good).
Ugarte was a nuisance. Garnacho was lively when he came on but it would be wonderful if he could finish. And Heaven – like, he didn’t do much but he just looks the part.
Less good was Eriksen who played (I think) so I’ll just leave it there. And Obi showed enough (a pulse) to indicate he’s a better option than Hoijlund who I just feel sorry for now.
Look, a striker who can finish his dinner, proper wingbacks (they already miss Dorgu) and a bit of self-belief and they’ll be grand.
Amorim’s got this.
Damian, Dublin
(My son just started supporting so I must be positive)
MORE ON MAN UTD FROM F365:
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👉 Man United crash out of the FA Cup to Fulham and it feels more mundane than magic
Laughing at Man Utd
At what point is it acceptable to bring the phrase:
“C’mon lads, it’s only Man United”
into the football lexicon? Asking for a friend.
Spoons, Lfc
…Why don’t Manchester United, the largest football club, not simply eat the smaller ones?
Alex, Blackburn
Sharing the blame around for Toon exit
I swear, it’s impossible to draw conclusions about this Newcastle side. They’ve on for three halves, off for two.
As for this cup exit, I know my ire should be directed chiefly at Anthony Gordon, who had been expertly wound up. Every grab at his arm that went unnoticed or unpunished pushed a button, and he snapped. Poor. The otherwise excellent Tino Livramento looked exhausted long before the first ninety was over. In the end, Dat Guy’s winner was his fault, but Eddie Howe erred in not replacing him with Krafth. Lewis Hall’s untimely injury proved catastrophic; with him on the pitch, Trippier would have replaced Livramento and likely finished extra time.
I know all that, but I can’t help being dissatisfied with Anthony Taylor, who let a lot of ugly stuff go when he had a great view of it, and with the offside decision on Schar’s ruled-out winner. I was convinced that the system had misidentified the time of the pass. Such is sport.
This one hurts more than usual because A] Brighton, B] the FA Cup represented such a huge opportunity for a trophy, and C] Gordon’s rush of blood weakened the team that will play against a Liverpool that already seems to have our number in the EFL Cup final. A bad day at the office, indeed.
Chris C, Toon Army DC (My son can’t understand why I can’t bring myself to hate Danny Welbeck, and frankly neither can I)
Liverpool v Arsenal blah blah blah
Tom says that it’s harder for Arsenal to find good bargains like Liverpool did because of how many people now replicate the Liverpool data-driven approach.
There is some truth to that, when anyone is successful others will copy it. However that doesn’t really make it more difficult for Arsenal to find good players, they are just not very good at doing that. Liverpool replaced an entire midfield for the same price that Arsenal spent on one midfielder, that was one year ago. In the era of everyone stealing the Liverpool model Liverpool still managed to find undervalued bargains.
Brighton do this regularly. Bournemouth seem to have done it as well. In fact teams all around Europe do it. So the idea that Arsenal can’t do what Liverpool did isn’t really true, they can. They just don’t.
Also it’s not luck when you negotiate the massive sale of a player anymore so than it was luck that Arsenal bought Henry for a pez dispenser collection. It’s good business from a club knowing what they are doing, there’s no luck involved. Liverpool, generally speaking, buy well and sell well. Southampton knew they had Liverpool over a barrel and pushed it hard as they could for Van Dijk, that’s not luck it’s good business. When Arsenal spent £70m on Pepe was that bad luck? Was it good luck signing Sol Campbell for free?
Strange outlook on transfers to say any transfer is lucky or unlucky.
Arteta is a good manager. I’m not trying to say he isn’t. What I’m saying is that after almost a decade and almost a billion quid I personally expect more than one cup and finishing second a couple of times.
Side note : I don’t usually read Stewie’s mails because they ramble quite a bit but I read through half of the last one before realising it was his. Stewie is the Donald Trump of the letters page. Absolute nonsense but it did me laugh. Hopefully he’s not as racist, sexist and rapey as Trump.
Lee
…Rich, AFC, yeah exactly that mate. There’s all manner of articles and thought pieces saying how lucky Slot was to be gifted this team. That a significant caveat would be there, should LFC get over the line, and Jurgen would deserve some credit. You could probably add to it by saying that Slot has had barely a quarter of Klopp’s injuries from last year (nor had AFCON, or players parents being kidnapped, or numerous red cards be deemed incorrectly awarded), and yet is only 4 points better off than Jurgen was in the opposing fixtures so far. And that Klopp won the league cup and Slot so far has only made the final. There’s a lot there to say the main thing Slot has achieved is keeping things going.
And yes, should you need to pivot this to be all about Arsenal, if Slot was then unable to get any material success after half a decades significant investment in reshaping the team, that would be frowned on, and further retrospective attention would be given to how much credit should be given to his one success in his first year, even if it’s an impressive as achievement as outwitting Frank Lampard.
Tom G
Ten Hag > Arteta?
‘And yeah, Ten Hag did better to turn his spending into silverware. Whatever else you think of him, he managed to ride a true injury crisis to still win the FA Cup. What’s Arteta’s excuse again?’
You have to mentally ill to think this way. Ten Hag was hanging on to his job for ages and got sacked because he did terribly. If he was doing how Arteta is doing, he would still be manager of Man United. Do you not realize this? Arteta quite clearly is doing a better job and doesn’t have to spend as much money.
Dion Byrne
What constitutes a Big Club?
Being from a generation where Big Clubs were those whose names instantly conjure images that will last a whole lot longer than short term Big Clubs can possibly dream of, I did like the idea that City are a Big Club.
There can be no doubt whatsoever that prior to being bought and bestowed upon unimaginable wealth, City have been successful over the past decade however you’d be hard pushed to have anyone aged over…14….who think City are a big club. To many they remain a comedy club who have won the lottery (or cheated).
It’s the same with Chelsea. No doubt they used their incomparable (at the time) wealth to completely destabilise football by inflating transfer fees, agents fees and….quite possibly, cheated. Most people of my age (mid-40’s) still think of them as a decent enough club but no more no less.
Big clubs, and I hate to say this, would feature Arsenal before either of the aforementioned, and I’m a Spurs fan saying this.
The fact that Arsenal cheated their way up the divisions only reiterates that cheaters do prosper (might be the best part of 100 years but grudges can be tough to shake 😂).
The worlds biggest clubs are, and will always be: Barcelona, Real – not even Atletico get a look in here, Bayern, Liverpool, Man Utd, Juventus, AC and Inter Milan, Ajax…and…at a push Benfica but that is digging deep into the past. There are plenty of great clubs with illustrious histories but the top table remains as it did 30 years ago.
Sadly football is just a bit ‘meh’ these days…and the sepia tinted glasses of days of yore are very much on – but I do miss them. Even when Spurs where a bit naff, loitering in and around 12th to 14th.
Oh.
Dan Mallerman
Palace Ed sanguine over Mateta
For a few reasons, I have a different perspective on the Jean-Philippe Mateta incident to others. Maybe it’s because I’m a Palace fan, maybe it’s because I’m less prone to outrage than other people.
There is a lot to unpack here so let’s see if we can cover it all. A high ball is played forwards. Liam Roberts realises that Jake Cooper won’t get there before Mateta, and rushes out to clear the ball. However, he misjudges the height of the ball and when he arrives, he has to jump to kick the ball. His follow through connects with Mateta, who is still closing down, on his ear, at high force. A clear red card.
However, where I differ from a lot of commenters is that I’m not going to call Roberts a thug. I don’t think he meant to injure or assault Mateta; if that was his intention then there would have been far more subtle ways to do that, and ways that were far more likely to be effective than the follow through of a high clearance. It should be enough for it to be a horrific accident and punish it on those grounds.
Let’s talk about the punishment. Lots of people, including Keith Hackett for some reason, are calling for a more severe punishment for this incident. Again, I disagree there. A player given a red card for a leg breaker tackle is banned for three games. I don’t actually think what Roberts did was worse than one of those, so a standard three game suspension is appropriate.
There are only two reasons why a more severe punishment should be given: if there are too many examples of the offence or if the perpetrator is a repeat offender. Well, there aren’t loads of goalkeepers attempting to decapitate opponents, and as for Roberts, this was his 129th professional game and just his second red card, so neither main reason for increased sanction applies.
I have some sympathy for Michael Oliver, possibly putting me in a minority of one. The answer to why he reacted how he did is probably that it happened really quickly and then he couldn’t believe what he’d seen. From his position behind Mateta, it looked like contact with the upper body and not immediately like solely a head contact. If that is what he thought, then it makes sense he played advantage.
Then, once it became apparent it was a head injury, his priority was getting medical assistance for Mateta. The chances are the VAR said they would review the incident while Oliver took care of things on the field. As we know, the on field referee has to go through the charade of checking the monitor before going with the VAR’s decision.
It was a very difficult situation to manage and I don’t think it’s fair to assume that the officials would not also be affected by what they saw. The best thing they could do was take a moment to make sure they got the decision right. Brandishing a red card immediately wasn’t going to make the medical staff attending to Mateta work faster, and would probably have inflamed the situation for the other players. Instead, taking the time afforded them by the medical staff to let everything cool down. That prevented anyone else from either team overreacting and getting themselves a red card.
Millwall fans should not have chanted “let him die”. Palace fans should not have chanted it either. I wonder if it brought back memories for Glenn Murray, on pundit duty for the BBC – in Palace’s promotion season he got injured in the playoff semifinal against Brighton, and was subjected to the same chant from the classy Albion fans who had sung his name gleefully the season before. Millwall are being investigated by the FA for their fans’ homophobia towards Ben Chilwell. What were we saying about repeat offenders?
Thankfully, Mateta’s injury does not seem to be as serious as it first appeared. If he needs to miss the next game, Palace have Ipswich Town, a fixture that they should have enough quality to win without him provided they match that with enough application.
Ed
Succinct
That Millwall manager’s a twat eh.
Finlay x