Van Gaal on the Brink
After a two-week break, the show this week catches up on United’s three defeats over the past fortnight – to Wolfsburg, Bournemouth and Norwich City. Louis van Gaal is surely close to dismissal, with supporters, players and perhaps the Board having finally turned. Ed & Paul discuss a calamitous period, with José Mourinho’s sacking at Chelsea opening the door to the Portuguese manager at Old Trafford. On the last episode of the year the pod also covers United’s busy Christmas period, which includes a trip to Stoke, a home game against Chelsea, and a match with Swansea at Old Trafford. Could Mourinho’s first game in charge of United really be against his former club? Thanks for listening this year. Your support and comments are always welcome. Happy winter festival of your choosing and here’s to a successful 2016!
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sack him!!!sack him!!! i hate this man with passion
Our transfer policy is disastrous.
Our overall management is disastrous. We should all be very, very worried. We can’t get players, are getting managers not in the top tier (and who will come now?) and neophytes at the helm.
We need Mourinho. Now. Or Gurdioloa this summer. And we need smarter purchases, not the dumb ones we have made. I think Mourinho or Pep can bring in big name players. I don’t think many other names can solve the stay-away-ism at United.
Paul, the Mata experiment is over. He is crap. He has been Kagawa’d by two managers.
LVG doesn’t care about the long-term.
He bought Martial as a panic buy (nobody else available). And Lindgard only playing because he literally has no other players. If Depay wasn’t stinking it up, Lindgard never would have seen the pitch.
Season’s greetings to Reds everywhere.
Of all the top European clubs, Bayern Munich appears to be the best run, certainly from a football perspective. It is not a coincidence that the club’s key administrators are serious football people. This is quite a contrast to the state of affairs at United.
United is owned by non-football people and administered by a man whose expertise is in the commercial field. In addition, the consequence of not having a properly developed Ferguson succession plan in 2013, is still weighing heavily on the club. We have been playing catch up in the managerial stakes ever since.
United should appoint a Director of Football, an experienced football person in a role quite separate to that of first team coach. This individual would be responsible for the ongoing, stable, longer term development of the footballing side of the club.
As for the immediate situation, the best two managers around are Ancelotti and Guardiola but as usual Bayern are ahead of the game, certainly ahead of United. Ancelotti is going to Bayern and supposedly Guardiola is going from Bayern to City. Until Pep signs on the dotted line for City, United should be working hard to get him for next season. If that fails then we will be stuck with a choice between Mourinho and Giggs, both of whom are immediately available and the status quo. Hardly an inspiring situation, but then the alternatives are few.
Interesting times ahead.
Best out-tro of ANY footy podcast in this galaxy!
Agree that if we do not get at least 5 pts from the next three games, that LvG is done at United.
Still not sold on Pep, but if he is signed up for United, LvG should be let go and Giggs given reins. Like you said: it provides the post-managerial bump in performance (that Chelsea is seeing now, but will fade against United!!!). Giggs would need to get Top 4 to remain as assistant, I think….
Experiments are only good as long as no one dies… ask Marie Curie…
Can’t see a perfect solution right now.
If v Gaal can manage to win a game or two over Christmas then perhaps he will be able to hang on to his job. If not and he gets sacked, give Giggs the job until the end of the season. That way, he can be really tested and we will find out one way or another whether he is up to it. In the meantime look elsewhere such as Pep or Blanc for next season.
I’d take Mourinho over the likes of v Gaal (and Moyes before him) but he’s not my first pick but being available now is in his favour. As someone else said there aren’t many obvious options.
We’re stuck playing musical chairs again. Never in the best place when the effing music stops.
man utd got time to play lyk child they alway waste our time when it comes to buying players,SACKING LVG
Ed Woodward must be sack coz he don’t know what best for our club
personal I would be very happy if David was our CEO miss him
Thanks guys for another top pod. Couldn’t agree more on hierarchy and mourinho. Have a great Christmas!
I wish people would stop saying “250M spent” when 65M of it plays for PSG (and 45M was put back in the bank when he was sold).
I think people are too negative. OK the last two games should have been won and that would have put us 2nd and the the one against PSV. The way some people talk you would think we were in Chelsea’s position.
The football hasn’t been great but I agree with Gary Neville when he says we are a player or two short of playing like Barca. We are dominating games but not winning.
The positives to me are:
1) Young squad. Memphis, Martial, Lingard, Januzaj & Shaw are great for the future. Add to that Wilson, Pereira, Varela. How can anyone say Van Gaal isn’t looking to the future.
2) Half the first team are new this season so I expect them to improve in the second half season and next season.
3) The emergence of Lingard this season.
4) The bravery of getting a player who was unknown to most people but who is now regarded as Europe’s finest young talent.
Negatives are:
1) Rooney isn’t good enough any more and Fellaini never was.
2) Mata isn’t suited to the hustle and bustle of games like against Norwich. He’s not fast enough, strong enough, can’t tackle and get knocked off the ball and robbed too much. He needs space which he only gets against better teams who attack.
3) We hardly ever shoot from outside the box. Utd have one goal from outside the box in 2015 (so far). If you dominate possession you need to get past the opposition at the edge of the box. Is that because Van Gaal tells them not to or because they can’t? Do they practice in training? We don’t score from free kicks either. Rooney used to be fantastic. Memphis was as PSV.
4) We are hopeless crossing and from corners. We has 11 corners against Norwich (they had zero) but none was effective. Do they practice? Is there a plan like cross to the near post, nod on to Felliani at the back post? We had one good corner against Liverpool which you could see was practiced before.
5) The big one for me is a lack of effort, passion and aggression. Just look at how many time the opposition easily wins an aerial challenge. Half the time it’s a free header. It beats me how Fellaini can fail to win an aerial battle. How many times do you see a crunching tackle? That second goal against Norwich where they went straight through Rooney and Carrick would never have happened with Keane, Robson or Ince on the pitch. Players need to get stuck in and start winning 50/50 balls.
6) Team selection and subs. This is the worst thing about Van Gaal, right back to taking Di Maria off early last season when Rooney apparently had a go a Van Gaal for doing it. His choices are odd sometimes.
7) Loaning Januzaj and especially Wilson. When you need goals you need attackers. I don’t blame him for selling Hernandez and Van Persie. I would even play Wilson on the right up front. He’s fast and he could cut in on his left foot.
“How can anyone say Van Gaal isn’t looking to the future.”
Because he isn’t. Martial is ONLY at United because LVG panic-bought him. There is no way he or anyone else at United picked him up thinking he would be our first choice striker. Januzai was sent on loan. Wilson was sent on loan. Pereira and Varela never play. Lindgard, as I already said, is ONLY playing because Depay has stunk it up (and Depay was LVG’s “big” signing).
The rest of your comments are laughable given the above.
He got a player “unknown” to most people because he could not get anyone else (Muller, Ramos, Pedro, etc.). Do you really think he would have given a crap about Martial and the “future” if any one of those players had been signed? But the transfer and loan policy was a shambles. And lest we all forget, at the same time he banked on Rooney getting him 25 goals this season. That’s all LVG and his decisionmaking. Plain and simple.
Lingard usually plays on the right instead of Mata. Depay plays on the left.
The best 11 for Utd in my opinion has only got Schweinsteiger over 26.
DDG, Shaw, Smalling, Jones, Darmian, Schneiderlin, Schweinsteiger, Herrera, Memphis, Martial, Lingard.
7 of those Van Gaal has bought. These are players who will peak when the next manager comes in.
Don’t agree about Lingard – he missed a shit-load of chances in his last three starts. If anything, he’s an AshleyBloodyYoung clone. Not good enough.
I agree he’s missed chances but so has Martial, Rooney, Fellaini etc. He’s young and pretty quick. Hopefully his goal scoring will improve.
It was interesting to see Alan Shearer on MOTD last repeat my 5th point comparing the effort and desire of Stoke and Utd players.
great as usual from you guys ….
Merry Christmas!!
United has some decent players but v Gaal’s methods are not getting the best out of them. I expect United to improve under the next manager and then we will be arguing over how much credit should be given to v Gaal for that improvement.
Bore Draw Offer….