One step forward, two steps back, or is it two steps forward, one step back, I haven't a clue. I can't say I was that confident ahead of the game, we may have been on a wining run, but the form has been a bit hit and miss. Some reds told me after the game, that we didn't deserve to lose, which you could say about all our home defeats, my response, as it was after the other three home defeats, was that we didn't deserve to win either. And that's the point, if you can't dominate the opposition, you can lose by the odd goal as well as win by the odd goal.
For all the talk of a hole in the middle of the park, and it is there, it's the defence that has looked all at sea over the last couple of games. I wasn't very impressed with Spurs, yes they were a hard unit to break down, they defended well as a team, but they didn't threaten us that much at the back. And yet we managed to concede two goals. I'm not sure what Smalling was doing for the first goal, I would have thought the whole point of playing him at right back is to make sure we don't get done with back post headers. And the second was pretty soft as well.
We started the game as well as we have at any time this season, but for all the energy and movement, there was only really the Smalling shot that could go down as a real chance. Valencia didn't have a bad game, but he's not really producing killer balls into the box, and Smalling isn't a right back. On the other flank, I though Januzaj got better as the game went on, but Evra's legs weren't there, though for once, Lennon didn't give him as hard a time as he usually does. He did get behind him once, in the first half, but De Gea saved Evra's blushes with an excellent save.
I've got to say, I'm starting to have a problem with Moyes tactical approach, like all United fans I love wingers and width, but you can't base our whole attacking approach down the flanks. It's happened a few times this season, if we don't get any joy out wide, we seem to run out of ideas. And that's what happened yesterday. When was the last time we scored a goal from someone shooting from the edge of the box, alright it was Young, but that was like a bolt from the blue, it was so unexpected. Think back to Beckham, Scholes, Denis Irwin even. I've said it before we have too many players who don't score enough goals
Once they saw out that first twenty minutes they became reasonably confident. I feared the worst when they got that first goal, even though it came out of nowhere really. Our response was pretty limp, it took their second goal for us to really up our game. Of course then, we were all over them, but the luck wasn't with us on the day, a penalty not given, balls not bouncing right for us in the box.
I suppose the substitutions were attacking enough, but I've never liked Valencia at right back, and I definitely don't want to see him there against the better teams. Hernandez is never the best outside of the box, but at the moment his whole game has gone right off the boil. I would have Januzaj inside behind Welbeck and put Young on the right, with Rooney in midfield. Januzaj was our most creative player, play him where he can hurt the opposition most. I thought the youngster and maybe Welbeck were our best two players, but we couldn't get Welbeck on the ball enough. It was a great goal, a beautiful ball and a great finish from the man who's supposedly not a natural goalscorer.
Rooney had a very in and out game, he started well enough, but seemed to go right off the ball for a spell after the yellow card. He may have been carrying an injury, I don't know, the balls to Januzaj on the right when we were chasing the game we as good as it gets. I always feel he struggles against strong fit teams and Spurs are definitely that.
I'm afraid the truth of that matter, is we just aren't good enough at the moment, we can probably give anybody a game, but you wouldn't put money on us to actually win any of them. We missed Jones badly yesterday, either in central midfield or at the back he would have improved things. When i look at Smalling at right back, I wonder why we let Michael Keane go out on loan, because for me, he would do us a decent job there.
I suppose there will be hysterics that we should buy someone, anyone, I don't go along with that, if we can find a world class central midfielder out there, then fair enough. But I'd still sooner see youngsters, like the Keane's, Powell's and Lingard's given a go. We're going to really find out whether we have "great owners who don't intefere with the manager"as a famous man once said, over the coming months.
For all the talk of a hole in the middle of the park, and it is there, it's the defence that has looked all at sea over the last couple of games. I wasn't very impressed with Spurs, yes they were a hard unit to break down, they defended well as a team, but they didn't threaten us that much at the back. And yet we managed to concede two goals. I'm not sure what Smalling was doing for the first goal, I would have thought the whole point of playing him at right back is to make sure we don't get done with back post headers. And the second was pretty soft as well.
We started the game as well as we have at any time this season, but for all the energy and movement, there was only really the Smalling shot that could go down as a real chance. Valencia didn't have a bad game, but he's not really producing killer balls into the box, and Smalling isn't a right back. On the other flank, I though Januzaj got better as the game went on, but Evra's legs weren't there, though for once, Lennon didn't give him as hard a time as he usually does. He did get behind him once, in the first half, but De Gea saved Evra's blushes with an excellent save.
I've got to say, I'm starting to have a problem with Moyes tactical approach, like all United fans I love wingers and width, but you can't base our whole attacking approach down the flanks. It's happened a few times this season, if we don't get any joy out wide, we seem to run out of ideas. And that's what happened yesterday. When was the last time we scored a goal from someone shooting from the edge of the box, alright it was Young, but that was like a bolt from the blue, it was so unexpected. Think back to Beckham, Scholes, Denis Irwin even. I've said it before we have too many players who don't score enough goals
Once they saw out that first twenty minutes they became reasonably confident. I feared the worst when they got that first goal, even though it came out of nowhere really. Our response was pretty limp, it took their second goal for us to really up our game. Of course then, we were all over them, but the luck wasn't with us on the day, a penalty not given, balls not bouncing right for us in the box.
I suppose the substitutions were attacking enough, but I've never liked Valencia at right back, and I definitely don't want to see him there against the better teams. Hernandez is never the best outside of the box, but at the moment his whole game has gone right off the boil. I would have Januzaj inside behind Welbeck and put Young on the right, with Rooney in midfield. Januzaj was our most creative player, play him where he can hurt the opposition most. I thought the youngster and maybe Welbeck were our best two players, but we couldn't get Welbeck on the ball enough. It was a great goal, a beautiful ball and a great finish from the man who's supposedly not a natural goalscorer.
Rooney had a very in and out game, he started well enough, but seemed to go right off the ball for a spell after the yellow card. He may have been carrying an injury, I don't know, the balls to Januzaj on the right when we were chasing the game we as good as it gets. I always feel he struggles against strong fit teams and Spurs are definitely that.
I'm afraid the truth of that matter, is we just aren't good enough at the moment, we can probably give anybody a game, but you wouldn't put money on us to actually win any of them. We missed Jones badly yesterday, either in central midfield or at the back he would have improved things. When i look at Smalling at right back, I wonder why we let Michael Keane go out on loan, because for me, he would do us a decent job there.
I suppose there will be hysterics that we should buy someone, anyone, I don't go along with that, if we can find a world class central midfielder out there, then fair enough. But I'd still sooner see youngsters, like the Keane's, Powell's and Lingard's given a go. We're going to really find out whether we have "great owners who don't intefere with the manager"as a famous man once said, over the coming months.
No comments:
Post a Comment