Lord Duckhunter

Fucking hell. Deciding who is better with the ball at his feet between those two, is like deciding who is funnier out of Dawn French & Miranda Hart.

Exactly. Noddy club behaviour. Mind you if we’d only lost 3-2 he might of been close to tears. What is it with the club, softness running through it and yet some lap it up. Like good little children we know our place and isn’t it lovely that Pep said some nice things about our lovely boys and Ralph. A playing squad full of Son in Laws. Alex Ferguson only said nice things about managers and sides that were no threat to Utd. I’d rather opposition managers were bemoaning our nastiness and ruthlessness, instead of being condescending. Of course Pep likes us, we know our place and show him way way too much respect. I bet he won’t like Everton or West Ham quite so much next time he faces them. Does anyone seriously believe it was anything other than a stroll in the park for city, and had they needed 9 they’d have got them.

Stephens did ok there last season, and Ramsay can’t be judged on the 9-0. He should have kept Bednarek at centre half and then filled the right back position. By shifting Bednarek he not only weakened the centre of defence, he was woeful at full back and it also seems to have affected the lad. It’s been a lose lose situation, and the manager has to be held to account for that decision. It’s all well and good bemoaning our lack of options, but it’s only one right back missing, one. You can’t tell me the manager has no responsibility for that situation. No doubt the Ralph lovers will blame the board, but I don’t believe for one minute he didn’t have some influence on decisions made in regard to that area of the pitch.

This is the attitude that leads to two 9-0’s in two seasons. It’s not a coincidence that it’s us it keeps happening to, not a coincidence that we give up more points from winning positions than anyone. When it’s acceptable to only let in 5, acceptable for the captain to duck out of the way of a free kick, and acceptable to let the opposition have a free shot every fucking time, it’s where you end up.

It’s not just last night, it’s the culmination of weeks worth of decisions. Bednarek & Vesty were a decent partnership, until he started messing with it. Bednarek hasn’t been the same since he went into full back, even when switched back to Centre half. .So I would have just left that alone weeks ago. If he doesn’t trust Ramsay (I think Poch or Puel would have done), and you need an emergency RB, then play Stephens there. That way you only disrupt one position instead of two. Armstrong was fine in CM last week, why move him, if you’re going to play him anyway. Why not give the nipper another chance (again Poch would of done imo). The excuses are mounting up and they don’t add up. Koeman drafted in Martina, Puel had Pied. Is it beyond Ralph to insist on a similar cheap stop gap, once he sanctioned the leaving of our full back cover. I do not want him sacked, and he has a fantastic opportunity in the cup to genuinely reach legendary status. But his record up to now has been pretty average. Had Mark Hughes made the decisions he’s made lately, this forum would be pretty United in its condemnation of those decisions.

Regardless of how good they are, you can still make it difficult for them. You can still tackle, still block shots, still get stuck in. Our defending was woeful. If they needed to score 9 they would have done. It’s pathetic that the majority will accept that, just because they’re better than us. They barely broke sweat, half of them didn’t even need a shower after the game.

What the “well done lad, we only lost by 3” merchants fail to understand is that it’s not particularly the result, but the manner of the defeat that upset some of us. There’s not one player who can look in the mirror and truthfully say they gave it their all. Had we lost by 7, but players were chucking themselves in the way of shots, getting stuck in, battling, and generally making it hard for them, I’d have been the first to applaud their efforts. They didn’t, they were quite happy to knock the ball about in safe areas, quite happy to only lose by 3. Fernandinho put in more tackles and fouls than our soft as shite midfield,and he was playing with a cigar in his mouth and his slippers on. It was a subservient display, propaganda football at its finest.

Noddy club mentality on show here. Let’s go to City, doff our caps and let them do what they want. Afterwards we can praise our heroes for keeping the score down to 5. Well done lads, proud of you, after all there’s such a big gap between us. Cheltenham gave them more of a game than we did, Nigel’s newly promoted side did, WBA did, but it doesn’t matter because city are soooo much better than us.

As this is the Ralph thread, maybe we should discuss his performance last night. Let’s discuss what he’s done to what was a pretty decent Centre half pairing. Vesty & Bednarek looked ok, until he started tinkering and messing around. Bednarek is now pretty shot, and there were signs Vesty is regressing back to his previous hopelessness. What about Salisu, is he really giving the bloke the best grounding in English football, chopping and changing him about. The goal keeping decisions seem bizarre, unless FF was injured last night. Was it wise to play an out of sorts Bertrand on the right? Jack Stephens was hung out to dry, played in a new position against the countries top side. If he wanted to drop Armstrong, then maybe, just maybe it was understandable, but he played Armstrong as well. Is Djneppo being managed properly, because he sure ain’t getting any better. When Managers lose the plot, they start playing players in weird positions, and make baffling decisions. If you read the comments on here, most seem to think we have a clear structure and style of play. If that’s the case then a manager of nearly 2.5 years shouldn’t really be playing so many people out of position and making inconsistent selection decisions. We have a back up full back, we have a young central midfielder, we have alternatives to Redmond, and Djneppo really needs to train on. If he’s a top manager, he needs to start showing it and start managing adversity a bit better IMO.

VAR is the idiot watching the reply.

Doubt if he’d duck out of the way of a free kick, and you never know, he might a actually stop the opposition playing through our midfield once in a while.

Oh, that’s ok then. We also got the same number of points at Old Trafford as most teams do. People keep banging on about how we played well, worried them, but gave away silly goals. We’ll both of our fucking goals were handed to us on a plate. Does anyone seriously believe City were anywhere near their best tonight? They barely broke sweat.

Spot on.

Souness hits nail on head. Had city gone for it, we could have got a real beating. Played totally wrong tactics. Concede too many goals. Yet people are bigging up a 5 against a team in third gear, evidently we played “well”. Pony . That’s noddy club mentality

Fulham 2-0 West Brom 1-1 Newcastle 2-0 Brighton 1-0 Aston Villa 2-0 Sheff Utd 1-0 West Ham 2-1

The delusion on here is unbelievable. 15 minutes of decent football, and that’s it. If city needed to score 7, they would have done. Passing a few triangles round the middle of the park when the games over, is just propaganda football. When it mattered, we were soft as shiete. The most depressing thing is our fans reaction. We got 5 put past us and people think that’s ok? We went up there with Nigel and gave them a fright, there was absolutely no danger of them losing tonight, none whatsoever. If we’re happy with that, god help us.

Against a side going through the motions. Let’s see when it’s needed, when the games on the line. Easy out there last half an hour, like a friendly

We haven’t given them a game. You’re deluded. They haven’t got out of 3rd gear all game.

That’s the time to tackle, JWP could have left one on their player, but tackled like a fairy.

People? Yeah right....

Like Prowse is as well

Stephens, Ward Prowse, Bednarek & Vesty have made zero tackles, absolutely none. Get stuck in ffs

In nets?

Sending off lol. Have they changed the rules?

Absolutely no last ditch defending, no chucking their bodies in the way, no tackles flying in, absolutely zero metal toughness yet again. Bunch of fucking fairies that do ok when it doesn’t hurt or matter.