[versa]

He can see the problem , I hope that he has worked out WHY it's happening. We can all see that Everton got out of jail and we didn't punish them - but why? Why didn't we punish them? I feel re-assured that fergie is putrting his finger on this issue but it would feel much better if he could say what's causing it. I wonder if he keeps that card under his chest? What do you think?

I am still figuring....

Being complacent is the obvious top suspect. But on second thought, perhaps being naive would be more apt.

0-1.... 1-2 at Anfield.

0-1.... 1-1 at Stamford Bridge.

0-1.... 1-1 at Goodison Park.

1-0.... 1-1.... 4-1.... 4-3 at Old Trafford....

Be prepared to see a greyer Fergie though. He raised the point, warned about the consequences and then we almost repeated it in our own backyard.

We just can't seem to kill off the game and deflate the opponents.

 

[RedForceRising]

I was just going to make the same point that 4-1 isn't enough.

I've gone on long enough in the match-day thread. I was so incensed by the rubbish decision-making from the forwards and unwillingness to pass at times.

Very dis-united.

Vidic giving away a free kick and Rio a penalty was just the icing on the cake really.

I hope Fergie tears in to them.

 

[Begbie]

It almost happened again, isn't it?! And this time at OT!!

1-0.... Foot off the pedal again, allowing Hull City to play.

1-1.... Suddenly you see the urgency in our players wanting the ball and closing the gaps down. The contrast was too obvious to miss and illustrated different mind sets.

2-1.... Kept going this time.

3-1.... Kept going but starting to get sloppy in final touches to add to the scoreline.

4-1.... Foot off the pedal again, getting sloppier now with passes.

4-2.... No change to the above.

4-3.... Got anxious, nervous and ill tempered. Brought in JOS to protect a very slim lead. Great relief at the final whistle.

Wtf! We are at OT!!?!?!?!?!?

Point is it is not the scoreline that matters but the mentality. Be it 1-0 or 4-1, we have to maintain the right desire and attitude to sustain the pressure (working towards scoring more) and to deny opponents from playing. One thing does lead to another....

I don't see Chelsea taking a 1-0 lead and foot off the pedal, at Stamford Bridge or not.

Who says this is not a problem?!

totally agree. I don't know whether it's arrogance or what... it's just getting out of hand now. We never did this last season - in fact we were very good at shutting teams out with just 1 goal advantages - now we're just gifting teams goals. It's not good to see.

 

[United_OG]

I was just going to make the same point that 4-1 isn't enough.


I hope Fergie tears in to them.

LMAO RFR is a cold dude!

 

[desmondo]

totally agree. I don't know whether it's arrogance or what... it's just getting out of hand now. We never did this last season - in fact we were very good at shutting teams out with just 1 goal advantages - now we're just gifting teams goals. It's not good to see.

Not good to see at all because it will cost us against better teams. I'm beginning to wonder if there's something about them being European Champions . For United it's like " we are the top european team so why don't you just lie down and give up after we score" -- for opponents it could be " right , here's a great chance to beat the euro champs"

I'm betting that other teams are starting to notice this thing now and will not be downhearted at 0-1 , they will just think " united have this habit of not being ruthless , we can get back into this" . If we are not careful it will develop into an encouragement for other teams.

Also , does anyone think that the team are thinking about how many games they might play and pacing themselves? Also , avoiding injury might be a factor?

Whatever it is , it's a habit they need to correct asap. A few clean sheets would be a start

 

[Guest]

Not good to see at all because it will cost us against better teams. I'm beginning to wonder if there's something about them being European Champions . For United it's like " we are the top european team so why don't you just lie down and give up after we score" -- for opponents it could be " right , here's a great chance to beat the euro champs"

I'm betting that other teams are starting to notice this thing now and will not be downhearted at 0-1 , they will just think " united have this habit of not being ruthless , we can get back into this" . If we are not careful it will develop into an encouragement for other teams.

Also , does anyone think that the team are thinking about how many games they might play and pacing themselves? Also , avoiding injury might be a factor?

Whatever it is , it's a habit they need to correct asap. A few clean sheets would be a start

Agree with most of your pst except the last line. We've kept plenty of clean sheets,
especially at Old Trafford. The goals we conceded today were the first goals we've
conceded at home since our first home game this season.

 

[antdevil78]

to think now if we had beaten everton we would be 3pts off the pace with a game in hand, I hope these early games where leads have been lost dont come back to haunt us come may

We are just gonna get into our stride and then the World Club Championship is gonna break it up again which is my main worry at minute. Need to establish some regularity and consistency in our game which usually results in our ability to roll off needed results at will.

 

[moondog]

It is a disturbing attitude culminating in a disturbing lack of effort - and its been there all season. We have yet to play a solid 90 minutes- not one. As well, we all remember how important goal difference was as chelski mounted their late charge last season....it definitely had an impact.

We are 12 down now.....

But, in spite of all this, we are in a reasonably good position (thank you spurs!). My biased view - if we work at least as hard as our opposition (and I mean any opposition) we will win. That is not happening.

As for parkhead and the emirates: ITS TIME TO WORK FOR 90 MINUTES UNITED!

 

[Jazz 16]

Im not sure this is the right thread to bring this up but since everyone else is,
Ill fire ahead. Goal difference is NOT that important imo. I think the league has
only come down to GD only a handful of times. Obviously its nice to have the
extra cushion of the 'point' but its rarely needed if we are being honest.
Just cos we havent scored more goals than Chelsea doesnt mean we arent
going well. Too many people seemed p1ssed off with yesterday's result. We won ffs.
GD rant over.

 

[spellbound]

Im not sure this is the right thread to bring this up but since everyone else is,
Ill fire ahead. Goal difference is NOT that important imo. I think the league has
only come down to GD only a handful of times. Obviously its nice to have the
extra cushion of the 'point' but its rarely needed if we are being honest.
Just cos we havent scored more goals than Chelsea doesnt mean we arent
going well. Too many people seemed p1ssed off with yesterday's result. We won ffs.
GD rant over.

I agree with you Jazz but dont you think it would have been a different champion if Chelsea had been the team with the better goal difference before the last game last season?

Priority is to win the games and by winning the game the goal difference will look good in the newspapers too.

 

[trikam patel]

Great thread, i think with chelsea doing what we did last season, we ned to get atleast 3 - 6 goals. This team is capable of that, the way chelsea are scoring goals, united need to start bagging them in.

Like fergy said last season, a better goal difference is an important point.

This thread is about making sure we get a win by scoring 2 goals to make sure, i think we need atleast 3 or 4 because of goal difference.

 

[Jazz 16]

I agree with you Jazz but dont you think it would have been a different champion if Chelsea had been the team with the better goal difference before the last game last season?

Priority is to win the games and by winning the game the goal difference will look good in the newspapers too.

Who knows? We won by 2 points in the end so I guess it didnt matter in the end.
Lots of goals does look great (who doesnt love tons of goals?)
but points are far more important. Even if we won every game this season
4-3 we would win the league and we would have to be happy with that.

 

[moondog]

Im not sure this is the right thread to bring this up but since everyone else is,
Ill fire ahead. Goal difference is NOT that important imo. I think the league has
only come down to GD only a handful of times. Obviously its nice to have the
extra cushion of the 'point' but its rarely needed if we are being honest.
Just cos we havent scored more goals than Chelsea doesnt mean we arent
going well. Too many people seemed p1ssed off with yesterday's result. We won ffs.
GD rant over.

???????????

Jazz, you could argue with some conviction that goal difference actually won us the league last year.

I was watching both the United and chelski games (as you may have been) on the final Sunday last year - once we went up 0-2 (with Chelski was winning at the time) it was obvious as the news went around the bridge that United would win the title. The chelski players basically stopped trying and allowed Bolton to tie the score in injury time.

There are your two points.

GD is especially important psychologically when you are coming from behind.

 

[Jazz 16]

???????????

Jazz, you could argue with some conviction that goal difference actually won us the league last year.

I was watching both the United and chelski games (as you may have been) on the final Sunday last year - once we went up 0-2 (with Chelski was winning at the time) it was obvious as the news went around the bridge that United would win the title. The chelski players basically stopped trying and allowed Bolton to tie the score in injury time.

There are your two points.

GD is especially important psychologically when you are coming from behind.

Ok Id agree to some extent that GD is important, but not how most of you are making out.
Its NOT the be all and end all. Yes its nice to score loads and have a great GD,
but its the points on the table that matter the most. Thats the point Im trying to make.

 

[moondog]

Ok Id agree to some extent that GD is important, but not how most of you are making out.
Its NOT the be all and end all. Yes its nice to score loads and have a great GD,
but its the points on the table that matter the most. Thats the point Im trying to make.

You're right....it's really only worth 1/2 of a point.

 

[RedForceRising]

Im not sure this is the right thread to bring this up but since everyone else is,
Ill fire ahead. Goal difference is NOT that important imo. I think the league has
only come down to GD only a handful of times. Obviously its nice to have the
extra cushion of the 'point' but its rarely needed if we are being honest.
Just cos we havent scored more goals than Chelsea doesnt mean we arent
going well. Too many people seemed p1ssed off with yesterday's result. We won ffs.
GD rant over.

Er... I'm just going to echo what moondog said.

We were less than 20 minutes away from needing the better goal difference to clinch the league.

it's important and it also builds a team's confidence.

Last season we scored the most and conceded the least, but this season our defence has been porous on occasion.

The steely determination and confidence from the back 5 is not what it was last season.

 

[desmondo]

Ok Id agree to some extent that GD is important, but not how most of you are making out.
Its NOT the be all and end all. Yes its nice to score loads and have a great GD,
but its the points on the table that matter the most. Thats the point Im trying to make.

It's not about goal difference really , it's about moving from 1-0 to 2-0 in games and killing games off. Last season Chelsea dropped points because they didn't kill some teams off with a second goal (eg wigan at home) , this cost them the title. They couldn't get that second goal.

It's not the 6-0 games that bother me , it's the 1-0 up games that end up being 1-1 (eg everton) . These are the games and results that DESTROY title challenges. Not all games can be killed off , but many can , and everton should have been 3 points - and the 2 points dropped will look much worse in april - guaranteed.

The recent Hull game is yet another example , we must learn how to kick teams in the b***ks hard and be ruthless. We need to practice this mentality at home in every game so that when we go away (like arsenal) we are ready for the kill. I'm very interested to see what happens at the emirates - especially if we go 1-0 up - "we want 2 , we want 2" should be the cheer from the terraces.

 

[desmondo]

Er... I'm just going to echo what moondog said.

We were less than 20 minutes away from needing the better goal difference to clinch the league.

it's important and it also builds a team's confidence.

Last season we scored the most and conceded the least, but this season our defence has been porous on occasion.

The steely determination and confidence from the back 5 is not what it was last season.

The steely determination and confidence from the back 5 is not what it was last season.

I'm not convinced thats the problem , I think it's a team that started to think it's better than it is and that all it needs is 1-0 and it's game over.

 

[CROoney]

I DON'T THINBK IT HAS ANYTHING TO DO WITH OUR DEFENCE.. sorry for caps - i thinks it is amixture of few things

1.beginning of the season form - as a united fan you surely know that every season it's the same old talk...some of us are questioning what's wrong and some of us are posting that " cool down , don't panic "threads...
it's just us - we are known to be slow starters and i think that considering our schedule we've been quite good actually...so far...

2.away matches - away matches have been our achilles tendion for the last couple of seasons imo...not so much because of the results but becasue of the way we play...instead of showing who's the boss and smashing teams with 3-4 goals margain we seem to play well for some period and then end up defndeing for most of the 2nd half

 

[desmondo]

I DON'T THINBK IT HAS ANYTHING TO DO WITH OUR DEFENCE.. sorry for caps - i thinks it is amixture of few things

1.beginning of the season form - as a united fan you surely know that every season it's the same old talk...some of us are questioning what's wrong and some of us are posting that " cool down , don't panic "threads...
it's just us - we are known to be slow starters and i think that considering our schedule we've been quite good actually...so far...

2.away matches - away matches have been our achilles tendion for the last couple of seasons imo...not so much because of the results but becasue of the way we play...instead of showing who's the boss and smashing teams with 3-4 goals margain we seem to play well for some period and then end up defndeing for most of the 2nd half

I agree. Arsenal are vulnerable right now and we have to take advantage imo. I think if we commit to the game and believe we can score twice we will be a terrible handful for them. I think we have a great chance of getting 3 points at the emirates so I will be dissappointed with a indecisive performance. But I fear that's what might happen.