Manchester United Thread 25/26 - Teamtalk/Transfers/Gossip Mod Note in OP 26.09.24

Reading the comments in here pre match brought a smile to my face. Must be so conflicting for some when we win games 🤷🏻‍♂️

Yep, you’d think someone who shelled out a couple hundred quid or more to watch that dross on Monday night would understand why some people expected us to lose today.

Thinking we will likely lose ≠ wanting us to lose.

Personally I blame Bruno

If he was in Saudi we'd be pushing Arsenal and the thread would be a utopia.

Damn Bruno ruining everything :P

United were very poor against Everton for sure so how anyone could be more annoyed about coming from behind to beat a very good Crystal Palace side away from home just baffles me to be honest.

This, quite frankly, is a ridiculous take. Everton was obviously a low point. First half yesterday yes it was not good enough. The second half was much better, sharper, hard working and to come from behind and beat an in form Palace team who haven't lost at home since February is a great result and improved performance as well.

To say the team is going absolutely nowhere is completely wrong- I know you don't want Amorim but look at the squad he inherited, the players he has had to get out of the club and where we are now. Rangnick said the club needed open heart surgery- This is what that looks like. Still a lot of players to clear out, many more signings required to get back winning titles. We have definitely improved, most new signings coming on well, players like Sesko will hopefully come good after his injury set back.

We will probably need one or two January signings to get or even push for top 4- Very hard to get value in that window so may not get what we need. Personally I think if we get top 6 this season and back into Europa League that will be a good season. Very difficult to come from 15th to top 4 in one season. Fans need to be a bit more realistic and see the squad of players we have not where we think Manchester United should be.

I still reckon top 4/6 is doable, but the AFCON period could kill us. Even if I don't think Mbeumo or Amad played well yesterday, missing those two for a month, alongside Mazraoui is gonna kill us. I think Yoro has been very poor the last few games, and Mazraoui should come in for him - but he'll be off in a coupe of weeks so we simply need Yoro to get back on form.

And I don't think January business will help in this respect, really, cause even if we do someting, I don't think it will be quick enough to make a difference in most of the games the guys will miss. That isn't to say I dont think we should bother making signings - need them for the games after AFCON just as much.

Yeah you're right, the replacements for the AFCON players aren't good enough at the moment. It's positive though, the squad is in an ok place as far as a rebuild goes, no rebuild can happen in one summer, and you can't rely on Jan signings in the season they sign. I know there are accounting and money concerns, but not qualifying for europe for next season might not be a bad thing either - if they just miss out, the league is very tight so it could be down to the odd point or even GD, it could still have been a very positive season.

Not qualifying for Europe is a tough one to guage, financially.

From a PL point of view we would be working to a 85% of revenue 'max' if we are not in Europe, vs 70% if we are.

I would assume the increase in sponsorship, match day revenue, competition revenue etc would be work out better than the extra 15% allowabable, even if we factor in the increase in player wages.

Our revenue for this season is a think ment to be 650 or so.

70% of that is 455.
85% of that is 552
To match the 552 in europe, i think Revenue would need to go to 788. Would our revenues jump by 130m in europe vs out? I know Villa made 70-80million from the CL, but CL ain't that likely for us.

If it isn't the CL, I wonder are we better off not in europe at all from this perspective at least.

Yeah, and even without taking the money into consideration, I don't think United have a good enough, or stable enough squad to maintain a Europe League Thursday and League Sunday schedule for the season, even if the rebuild continues. Just look at how Place fell off in the second half yesterday (as highlighted by Amorim), I think unless it's CL and the reveue generated from it, then it's not worth finishing in the EL or ECL spots.

while accepting we would need signings and a bigger squad - would we be having an easier time of it with Zirkzee (if we wanted to keep him) and more so Mainoo - if we had more games and more of a need to rotate.

If we aren't in europe next season we will again struggle to give minutes beyond the first choices. Mainoo will be gone, imo, but you are possibly looking at issues in bringing on or developing guys like Lacey or Fletcher or Chido. Not the end of the world. but a consideration.

Is it really ridiculous to think that outliers are outliers, and that we learn far more from the normal games?

I expect a team in rebuild to have days where everything goes to **** for no real reason. It sucks, but you chalk them up and move on. That was Everton, I didn't post after it because there wasn't anything to be said.

Far worse are the trends that happen over and over, for example, a team only performing for one half and being rubbish the other, how many times have we seen that now?

We have definitely improved? Really? Those November games look like "definitely improved"?

I'll say this. Is it not interesting that after a year all we still hear is that more players are needed? We got signings like Mbuemo and that helped, but now we need more signings, and then more again after that.

If all the improvements come from new players, do we even need a manager at all? Any chance of him bringing something to the party?

Also if you think this squad doesn’t need further signings and quite a few at that you’re in dreamland.

That’s exactly it…. “you have to want to see them”.