kurtsimonw

Man child of a coach. Hope he stays forever.

I care much more about beating the Eagles than draft position. Really pleased with that.

3 hours ago, ozvillafan said:

8th, 8th, 5th and 2nd

... and they want him out?

True - they might not win it this year and might not finish as high as 2nd - but is Arteta really that bad?

Yes.

2 minutes ago, foreveryoung said:

A

He actually may have signed him to raise the profile of the club, he was the pin up boy when he left us, oh and also for the English quota ofcourse. 

Yeah I suppose the extra they paid is probably worth it in a commercial sense.

I do think it's mad that people wouldn't have him back. He would not only be the best player in the team, but it would be by a fairly big distance. 

28 minutes ago, stewiek2 said:

Pep has paid £100m for one of the most exciting talents in football at the time, only to turn him into a Eunuch.

Pep could've spent much less on a player with the same productivity from that position in his system.

But Pepe never signed Grealish to play for City. He signed him so he wasn't playing for someone else.

3 hours ago, tinker said:

There's a common theme to the bad decisions and it's nothing to do with videos.....

That's a bingo! Monkeys, typewriters and Shakespeare comes to mind. Just by having more people look at it means we're likely to see more correct decisions overall.

I wouldn't necessarily say coincidental. 

The biggest blame lies with MON for underachieving with a relative fortune at the time. Not geting top 4 completely ruined us. The emergence of City also meant that top 4 felt more of a closed shop, and then they signed our best players.

But I dislike City more for their success being built on cheating rather than anything else. Always have time to hate on Spurs, Newcastle and to an extent Leeds. 3 clubs who have almost always been irrelevant in the grand scheme of things but think they're Real Madrid.

The full 90 minutes of complete incompetence by the referee in our game last night is the reason VAR exists and will continue to do so. He got so many things wrong, you'd think he was doing it on purpose.

9 hours ago, mikeyp102 said:

That’s because of the “Liverpool” name. They got massive money for youth players and rejects ( from the likes of Bournemouth), which only maybe City would near. 

They also have to pay over the odds because of that name too.

6 minutes ago, Mantis said:

Sunderland trying to play Emeryball when they just don't have the players lol.

Signs of a shit manager, very Remi Garde.

8 hours ago, Mic09 said:

Sure, they spent peanuts. 

172m this summer, 142m last summer.

Don't buy into this "plop don't spend" narrative please. 

Like I said, since Klopp took over, their net spend is closer to Bournemouth than it is Spurs.

Even if people want to go by just spend, which ignores the need to sell to faciliate purchases in the first place, they're 6th in that time - a good half a billion of the Manchester clubs and Chelsea. We have a higher net spend despite spending 3 years out of the PL.

6 hours ago, DJBOB said:

 

I would challenge everyone to re-think the concept of high line = high press.

 

I think you were misunderstanding what I was saying, potentially. We're definitely not a high press team, I was suggesting that we often don't even press at all, which allows the opposition unopposed balls over the top, United had a lot of success as a result. I'm not even saying I'd like us to press as a team, definitely not. A one man 'press' to te ball is enough disruption at times, even if there's no intent to win it back but half heartedly cose someone down and make them think.

5 hours ago, Mic09 said:

If Pep run Liverpool, I'd hazard a guess they'd be more successful. 

No chance.

Liverpool's net spend in Klopp's time is closer to Bournemouth than it is Spurs, let alone the likes of City and Chelsea.

Pep's continually complainin that he "only" has £150m worth of player on he bench, he wouldn't have lasted 5 seconds at Liverpool.

3 hours ago, Zatman said:

He was also world class at the role for over a decade

Neuer is probably the closest. He just let in, comparatively, a lot more soft goals.

11 minutes ago, villa89 said:

This reminds me when clubs sign Johnny Foreign Name as their star summer signing. He plays rubbish, manager makes excuses for him like he needs to settle, preseason, language, injury blah blah and then before you know it he's off on loan to Trabzonspor and leaves the club for a nominal fee 6 months later. 

So far Heck seems to be causing problems not fixing them. 

Digne, Bailey and others were written off early too.

Sometimes it's just about seeing what happens, but everyone has to have an opinion from day 1. Nothing wrong with that, but it ultimately doesn't mean much either.

5 minutes ago, rodders129 said:

Do you reckon Jack would get back in this Villa team? If so, where would Emery play him?

He would play the Ramsey role. Somewhat similar players and Jack is just better.

4 minutes ago, OutByEaster? said:

I very much doubt we're behind any of those clubs today.

It was just taken from here which is about the most recent I could find. I'm sure relegation has likely affected Leeds/Leicester, but I suppose my point is we shouldn't be remotely close to these. Everton is even worse given their struggled and being the defacto number 2 club in their smaller city.

As to your wider point, I agree that it feels a bit too soon to judge. I guess we'll see when the 23/24 accounts are out and see how they compare to 22/23.

Just now, Stevo985 said:

He's the best goalkeeper in the world

Think he's the best I've ever seen, personally.

8 minutes ago, dubliner said:

I think you could be right. At least I can't think of any off the top of my head.
 

We're the only team not tohave a penalty against us this season.

Had 4 against him last season, saved 1, conceded 3. The save was in August, against Zaha, who then score the rebound. Most recent pen was Spurs consolation at the back end of last season.

He's not wrong about revenue. I've seen a few "If revenue is all you care about..", unfortunately that's modern football. We won't be able to sustain any meaningful level of competition until that's rectified. No disrespect to the clubs, but being behind Leicester, Leeds and Everton is a travesty and shows the general issues we're having on that front.

On 02/01/2024 at 20:40, villa4europe said:

Main thing for me for those 2 teams is not having rodri and Bernardo Silva in there, easily the best 2 midfielders in the league, palmer being in there is laughable, so bad that you instantly put that opinion in the bin 

Some have suggested Rodri has missed too many games which is a bit mad, he hasn't missed that many and the games he has missed have only proved to show how crucial he is.

16 hours ago, TRO said:

To play the highline, with success, you have to negate the ball over the top, and we all know the kind of approach, that requires......and Standing off, is not it.

I do agree with this. As successful as the high line and general approach has been, standing off is what gives the opposition the very small window where successful chances can be created.

Beating a high line with the ball being short enough that Emi doesn't just lap it up is hard enough. A bit more pressing essentially makes it impossible.

21 minutes ago, villa4europe said:

maybe I'm wrong then, this liverpool team with their best manager in the world, best RB in the world, best CB in the world, best GK in the world, best striker in the world, best left back in the league, team littered with world class players winning 4 trophies in 7 years hasnt underachieved....

...maybe they're just overrated...

 

I mean, VvD was probably the best CB in the World for 2 years and they won the league and the title (Whilst also getting 97 points the season they didn't win the league), then his standard dropped quite a lot. Liverpool haven't had the best striker in the league since Suarez and Trent has never really been close.until probably this season.

I also think in the other positions (RCB an the whole midfield) Liverpool have been very weak and filled with workman like squad fillers. Meanwhile City have probably had 7 of the best XI in the entire PL every year.

On 02/01/2024 at 12:29, Stevo985 said:

Also Martinez has a positive xPSxG-GA of 1.8. That means he's saved more shots than expected. As a comparison Arsenal's is -4.7 and Man City's is -2.3

Emi is..

1st for defensive actions outsidethe penalty area
3rd for claiming crosses 
+2.3 in PSxG

He's undoubtedly one of the best.

Goals conceded and clean sheets are a really basic stick to beat GKers on 'lesser' teams. Ederson is a good counter example, crap keeper but plays on a team that always has the ball, thus concedes less/gets more clean sheets so people think he's decent.

I think sometimes it's more due to the situation of the league. OGS win rate (54.17%) is close to Moyes (52.94%), while EtH (58.89%) is up near SAF (59.67%) and above Jose (58.33%).

In terms of points per game.

SAF - 2.02 
Jose - 1.97
EtH - 1.89
OGS - 1.85
Moyes - 1.76 

OGS is also the only post-war United manager to be in charge for multiple seasons and not win anything. Obviously stats can show what you want and context is important. But overall I stick to my guns that EtH is 'fine'. I think the squad is pretty crap, and he's part to blame for that, but I also think 3rd was overachieving last season. EtH tends to get more negative press simply because his teams never draw, so naturally they lose more games and that's a crisis at United.

I'm also friends with 2 Cardiff fans, both of whom consider him one of the least liked people in the clubs history.