Manchester United Thread 25/26 - Teamtalk/Transfers/Gossip Mod Note in OP 12.02.26

I do think we'll make at least 1 major signing in January, and possibly 2.

Because we're so close to top 5, the club will want to capitalise on the fact we have no European football in the run in and have a big advantage over Chelsea, Villa, Newcastle, Liverpool, Spurs and Palace.

Bruno is failing in his midfield role, because his talents aren't suited to that role. He's at his best going forward, in that 10 position, where he's clearly a threat, and a threat that causes the opposition to worry about us. They don't have to worry about Bruno in his current role, because he's somewhat neutered by it, and is more a benefit to the opposition by leaving that area of the field open.

Maybe it's wrong to say Bruno is failing in his role, it's probably far more accurate to say the role is failing Bruno, and it is.

Then the questions becomes why is Bruno's role going forward and leaving the midfield open? That's just tactical suicide. Not that I'm surprised by that, the performances and results suggest that tactical suicide is the norm at United under Amorim.

But I think we can all agree that Bruno's talents, this formation is not only not getting the best out of Bruno, it's leaving the opposition with gaps to hurt us. That's a fair double-whammy to set your best player up for.

Its an issue with the centre backs, imo. Whether workable or not I don't know.

Even at Sporting, one of the two CMs would be tasked with pushing forward in attack and becoming any option and runner around the box. The CBs stepped up into midfield. 6 attacking players, essentially) L10, R10, ST, CM, WB and then depending on the situation, a WCB, WB or or the other CM. You then have 4 players in rest defence - 316, like loads of teams play in attacking phases. Our defenders don't press up enough so that 3 ends up way too far back rather than one of them basically coming into to partner the rest defence midfielder.

I would be similar enough in my view but I am conscious that the Everton game really skews things for me... If we had won that, we'd be sitting here in 4th place, with a (tiny) bit of daylight between the chasing pack and we would be on a 9 game unbeaten streak.

Maybe it skews things too much, the comeback against Palace was a fantastic result given their home record yet all I'm thinking about is Everton.

All that said and to your point, we were sitting in 9th at HT last night, the table is way too condensed to be claiming positioning as any kind of real barometer at the moment, especially with 2 huge months ahead.

But 9 games unbeaten would have really been a huge foundation ahead of that period.... Fcuk that Everton game!

(I'm completely leaving out West Ham, a draw was very poor as well but.... fcuk that Everton game)

Jesus yeh how could I have forgotten about MDL 🤦🏻‍♂️

Also the talk of buying players for Amorims system is mostly nonsense imo. Like regardless of manager be it John Caulfield or Pep - Onana, Antony, Hojlund all needed changing hence Lammens, Mbeumo and Sesko arriving. Regardless of system or manager we need midfielders that doesn't change until we actually buy bloody midfielders.

Not backing Amorim because you think a new manager might turn Ugarte into Casemiro, Mainoo into Bruno and Fletcher into his dad is lunacy. The signings needed are signings that improve the squad, that benefits any manager.

I just want to point out that comparing Bruno and Scholes on assists is a waste of time.

Scholes was the playmaker. The pass before the assist often. Only in his younger days and a small enough period around 2002 was he further up the pitch.

His best role was always further back. It's pointless comparing stats for them.

You wouldn't compare Modric to Kaka in stats?

I would also throw an honourable mention for Lammens - not because he has been exceptional per se but because he joined last minute, no pre-season, and has fitted in seamlessly. No big mistakes, reliable, and a solid 7/10 which is excellent considering what he was thrown into imo

I'm not sure of the concept that we don't buy a LWB because Amorim might be gone in the summer.

The impression I got was that the club management aka INEOS were fans of the 3 at the back concept which is why they chased Tuchel, De Zerbi (plays 3 at the back with Marseille and then Amorim as the targets.

If he does go, I'd still expect them to look for a similar style manager, with the difference being that even if they favour a 3421 etc, they'll have the flexibility and willingness to adapt in the shorter term.

Unlike Ruben "no plan B" Amorim.

Hence Glasner being the likely candidate I'd expect.

Vincent Kompany leading Burnley to an incompetent slaughtering of a season then getting himself the Bayern gig after is fairly hilarious transformation and showed just how daft the tiki-taka obsession had gotten.

This is why stats do very little for me and I base my opinion on actually watching players play

Looking to what they have and playing to their strengths? Sounds interesting.

You touched on it yourself Bruno plays a hug variance style of football nothing wrong with that per say a team needs risk takers but he has never really learned to dial it in, especially since moving into the middle, again not really his fault as he isn't a midfielder but it doesn't or shouldn't absolve him from any critisism.

Bruno is or at least was prone to dropping absolute awful performances at times, something someone like scholes rarely would but for then he would pop up with a goal or an assist an it would be forgotten about, someone mentioned Keane's critisism last year and it was at a time when Bruno had a period of bad games but also no goals or assists the critisism was valid but then Bruno went on a run of delivering again and upped his performances and people say keano looked silly but the criticism was valid for what went on previous.

And while united are lucky to have Bruno and his goals and assists, I think bruno has been lucky to have united too he has got to be a star player at a big club, pretty much the singular creative outlet since he joined without needing to be super consistent in terms of overall performances.

He deserves all the praise for games last night but those games don't erase games like the final against Spurs were he couldn't make simple passes and many others throughout his united career.

I think That's essentially it some people are just happy with his goals and assists and others tend to look at overall game and can lead to big differences on opinions.

For me I get a bit frustrated at Bruno at times because if he could cut out the silly errors and the overly fancy **** he would elevate his game to another level a much more consistent one without losing much of his upside