The old Man Utd Thread

[Guest]

Di Maria would be a straight swap for Young. I'd rather see the money spent elsewhere though if it is towards £75m

[feltmonkey]

What, as left wingback?

£60m plus for a wingback? Besides, we have Shaw there and we paid £30m for him.

Regarding matters on the pitch, we've not been very impressive today, have we?

[Nicky]

Blackett's looked decent.

[Liamness]

Where exactly is Januzaj playing? Central midfield? I'm a bit concerned that Van Gaal doesn't seem to know what to do with him so far, I know we haven't got much of a squad atm but he shouldn't be playing so far back.

[Ravern]

Di Maria would play in the middle.

£75m is madness. That could have got you Kroos, Cesc and Rakitic with a few million in change.

[Liamness]

I'm fine with Lee Cattermole outmuscling our midfielders, I'm not okay with him actually appearing more skilled than them though.

[Nicky]

both cleverley and fletcher were rubbish today.

[4ndo]

I'm bored of all our players, sell them all please!

[Liamness]

Agreed, they have been absolute toilet. Mind you, after his goal Mata hasn't really done much either.

[Guest]

1-1 then. What a(nother) fucking joke. Just imagine us going up against a half decent team like this.

If we spend £75 million on a player that we don't really need when other positions are desperate to be filled, I won't know whether to laugh or cry.

[feltmonkey]

Considering we are overloaded with number tens, it's surprising how hopeless we looked at unlocking the Sunderland defence. So many sideways and backwards passes from promising positions.

Januzaj looked terrible in central midfield. His play was characterised by indecision. When he plays further forward you don't see that.

[Liamness]

Strange decision to play him there because you need vision and a range of passing to play in central midfield. He is at his best when running at people or exchanging short passes, so really there is no reason to suspect he has the attributes to play further back. I suppose there was no-one else. We could've moved Jones forward and switched our system, but that would've left us very exposed at the back, given the inexperience of Keane and Blackett.

[Mr Do 71]

Fletcher just hasn't got it anymore.

[feltmonkey]

on the positive side, Jones and Blackett played well. Young wasn't too bad. Valencia looks a decent wingback.

Fletch and Cleverly were anonymous in midfield, and kept giving the ball away under no pressure. RVP and Mata were really poor.

[Nicky]

i wonder whether LVG was dropping any sort of hints in his post match interview with cunt Jeff Shreeves..

paraphrasing "...yes i like messi and vidal also" when asked if di maria was a player he'd like to sign,

now ignore the messi name drop, but of all the other players he could name instead, he mentioned vidal.

WHERES THAT PIPE SMOKING SMILEY?

[feltmonkey]

Or possibly he's saying we're as likely to sign Di Maria and Vidal as we are to sign Messi.

[Graham S]

Bloke quits job to run Man U twitter feed. Has breakdown.

http://www.theladbible.com/articles/lad-quits-job-to-start-a-twitter-account-ends-up-having-a-meltdown

[DC Lemon]

I left a well paid job to start a twitter account where I could break news to united fans.

I obviously don't know enough about Twitter, but how was that ever supposed to end well?

[ckny]

Graham posting a link from 'The Lad Bible' is all sorts of wrong.

[Nicky]

https://twitter.com/XabiAlonso/status/503596660719882240

[Rockboy]

Cleverley and Fletcher were dreadful today, which I think was the root of the problem. They were slow in possession, and gave it away too often, and when they finally got the ball to the forward players Sunderland were all set behind the ball. Valencia looked the most dangerous and I was screaming for him to go past his man, and the first time he did? Goal. Then for some reason he decided not to do it again, and instead pass it inside to the midfield. I don't know if it's because he's thinking about his defensive duties or just a lack of confidence, but it's so frustrating to watch.

I thought defensively we were generally ok, again I think the midfield two being so poor put extra pressure on them at times and that led to some indecision. Blackett has really impressed me, I think he could go on to be a top player. I'm wondering whether we even need to sign a centre back, as that will just mean he ends up sitting on the bench. I think we should just stick with him, and with Evans and Smalling hopefully back fit soon, plus Jones and Keane I think we'll be fine. We are lacking leadership there though, and I wonder had Evans been there if he would have made sure Valencia wasn't mismatched marking Rodwell for their goal. If we play these youngsters though, we're just going to have to accept that they will make mistakes, and hopefully learn from them.

I think Di Maria will be a great signing for us, some much needed pace and trickery to unlock defences. I think we need a top quality central midfielder now to partner Herrera, and once the likes of RVP and Januzaj are match fit (both look like they are struggling at the moment) I think things will start to improve.

[LiMuBai]

[johnj]

I'm glad Moyes at least must be getting soem satisfaction from this.

[Liamness]

I'm not sure why he would. Yes this proves that the squad he inherited was crap. But he also made zero progress with them over the season, probably actually taking them backwards. He also at least inherited a team with belief that had come off the back of winning a title; Van Gaal not only has to improve our play, but also build the team's confidence back up.

@Graham_S The fact that it was a 'Man U' twitter feed suggests it was a joke from the get-go.

Here's my attempt to fit Di Maria into an XI that might, within the realms of reason, be possible by our next game.

Rooney

Januzaj Mata Di Maria

Herrera De Jong

Rojo Rafael

Smalling Jones

De Gea

In the long run I think this is a better formation for us than the 3-4-1-2, for the following reasons:

• It does not require the two midfielders to be dynamic, box-to-box types. One can sit and protect the defence, so Carrick, Fellaini and Fletcher are more suited to this system.
• It seems more suited to the likes of Januzaj and Kagawa, who could play in any of the roles behind the striker. In our current system it's hard to see them contributing much.
• It is simply more attacking.
• Shaw and Rafael are really fullbacks, not wingbacks.

On the negative side, it means we can't play Van Persie and Rooney together. Also against better teams Mata probably would need to be exchanged for a player who can track back more, or we could switch to the 3-4-1-2. Blackett, who has looked good, probably wouldn't play much in this system. It's also hard to see Young getting a game either.

[feltmonkey]

i notice you've signed De Jong there. is that going to happen?

i like the line-up and formation, i wonder if Rooney is better than RVP up front though. also, it would be a shame to condemn Blackett back to the reserves. and Smalling and Jones don't look a CB partnership to me. isn't Smalling injured now anyway? and for that matter, is Raphael still injured? is he still building his fitness after the injury that lead to him leaving the tour?

the squad is more set up for that kind of formation though. you could rotate the likes of Kagawa, Valencia, and Welbeck into the wide positions and switch Mata out for a third midfielder.

[Liamness]

Jones and Evans if he's fit. Jones and someone, anyway.

There are rumours that we're in for De Jong, not that this means anything of course. I think if we are interested it will be a relatively simple capture, he only has a year left on his contract, and AC Milan don't seem to be turning many offers down. I don't really care about him having played for City, tbh I was surprised when they sold him, he was annoyingly good for them. He would be a great option, at least in the short term, to partner Herrera. Alternatively we could struggle along for another month until Carrick will (probably) be back, but I think it would be useful to have a genuinely dynamic midfielder in the squad, especially one that already knows our manager and English football.

Actually given that Di Maria is Argentinian, he would probably face the same permit wait that Rojo has. So if we are going to have a formation switch, it probably wouldn't be for one or two games anyway.

[oli]

I read somewhere Di Maria has an Italian passport so a work permit wouldn't be an issue, if that's true.

[spork]

Carragher and Neville both saying the Di Maria is exactly what we need, emphasising that he'll offer us lots of energy and pace going forward as well tons of assists. Hard to disagree with that if I'm honest although there is obviously the fact that we already have Rooney, Van Persie, Mata, Kagawa, Welbeck, Hernandez, Januzaj all fighting for those places already.

While we do obviously need a new CM to play with Herrera and a top defender, I can't help but feel that Di Maria would give us a similar lift to what Arsenal had when they bought Ozil.

[Gabzy]

Deal has been agreed and announced for Di Maria - £59.7M.

I'm excited! Hoping he'll bring some much needed energy, pace and creativity to our forward play. We still need a CM but this is a positive signing.

[Mr Do 71]

Deal has been agreed and announced for Di Maria - £59.7M.

I'm excited! Hoping he'll bring some much needed energy, pace and creativity to our forward play. We still need a CM but this is a positive signing.