transfer market failure

i think we have one of the best squads in the league.

Our two goalkeepers VDS and Foster are of the highest quality and our backline of:
Neville, Rio, Brown, Heinze with O'shea, Vidic, Pique, Evra and Sylvestre as substitues is in my opinion the best in the league.

Our midifeld has ronaldo, giggs, scholes and park all of whom are great performers and with o'shea, fletcher, jones and smith waiting for their chance the situation isn't as bad as it seems.

Up front considering ruud leaves we have rooney, saha, ole, rossi and smith. Sure we could do with a target man up front but even if we don't sign a forward we have scholes giggs and ronaldo who can play the supporting striker role if need be.

I realise most of the discontent comes from the fact that ferguson is not keeping to his words when he said that all transfer activity would be done before the world cup and then said it would be done after the results of the italian scandal. But our squad is full of promise and has a very low average age. We need a midfielder who isn't afraid of a tackle and runs box to box but to say that we are a bad team is disillusioned.
The facts are that there is hope for the future and the end of the transfer window isn't for a few more weeks so lets not be pessimistic and look forward to the new campaign with optimism

I'm sorry, but our midfield is absolutely shoddy. We don't have a top-class defensive midfielder anywhere in that list. Giggs and Scholes are getting old, and they'll need replacing sooner rather than later. None of O'Shea, Jones, Fletcher or Smith (who will be used as a striker, says SAF) would get in to either Chelsea, Arsenal's, or Liverpool's midfield. Neither would Park, come to think of it.

VDS is fine at the back, but will need a good understudy. Foster has been performing well, which is nice. But we still need a third keeper. Keeper is one position where you most definitely do not want to be caught short.

Ole is 33, and has missed nearly two seasons with injury. As much as he is a legend, he can't be counted on to drag us out of a potential striker crisis, not for a whole season at least. Smith needs to get back from injury and to full fitness, and while it's good to see him back ahead of schedule, he needs games before he can be relied upon. Rossi needs to be given the chance to prove himself, and hopefully he gets that. Saha needs to ensure that he doesn't have injury issues anymore. Amongst those 5, only Rooney would get into other top-class teams.

Well Concerning the keeper situation if u saw the celtic game last night i'm sure u will agree with fergie evaluation that foster will be an england number 1 one day.
And we have luke steele in case both VDS and foster are unavailable which is very very unlikely


The point about who would get into other teams is a moot one since apart from chelsea arsenal, liverpool and utd would only have a couple players that would make it anyways.
I know arsenal would love to have our backline and if u compare rooney, saha, rossi, smith and ole to fowler, bellamy, crouch and sinnima pongolle which would u prefer???? I don't hear anybody sayin liverpool have a striker crisis.
And like i mentioned earlier giggs, scholes and ronaldo can play behind a lone striker. So up front there is no emergency even if ole and smith are coming back from injuries.

Onto the midfield, on the right ronaldo is class and better than any right midfielder in the premeirship in my opinion. Giggs can still play on the left while park and richardson is an adequate replacement on the wings. Central midfield we have scholes who looks like he is back to his best and in the other slot we have either fletcher or o'shea. sure there aren't marquee names but thats the beauty of united, that unknown players will become great one day. For the people that are criticising o'shea remember the end of last season when we were pushing chelsea and had a run of 8 or 9 consequetive wins, who was playing in CM o'shea and giggs. Yet now he is deemed not good enough for united???
Fletcher will improve and mature. CM is a position where you are on the spotlight throughout the game and his shortcomings might be magnified. He now has one full season under his belt, and will only get better.
Our kids just beat a near full strenght celtic at parkhead 3-0 so it can't be that bad. All we need is a little luck and a little faith.

KingSingh you are leaving in dream land, Celtic are brutal! Richardson could not beat an egg! Our midfield is terrible END OF STORY any of chelsea, l'pool and arsenal frist choice midfield would walk into ours. Remeber the FA Cup when Liverpool made fools out os us in midfeilddid we even get a shot on targert.

Would you trust Foster or Steele in goal against Barcelona in the Champions league! No way! I could have played in goal against Celtic last night after ten pints and still kept a clean sheet!!!!

Ronaldo yes is the most talented but with a poor end product plus he wants to leave and we all know he will sooner later. I think Lennon could do a better job (but we wont be signing him)

I hate to see the team involving into a poor side and drifting away from the top of the league but its all down to one thing MONEY. There is none.

I jusy hope I am proved wrong............

Looking at Celtic, they've been absolutely dire in their preseason - they've only won one game against Everton out of seven, I believe. And our preseason has seen us struggle twice against Kaizer Chiefs as well.

As much as we'd love to think Steele is a good backup, I don't think he has turned out to be the player that most thought he would be when he was signed for United. He seems to have stopped in terms of development, or at least slowed considerably. Foster is an able deputy, but aside from him, we don't really have much.

Ronaldo may be the most talented, maybe. Problem is he isn't a real midfielder - he may well be the best winger in the Premiership, but even that's debatable until he gets his end product sorted. He doesn't do enough defensive work, and that's leaving Gary Neville to do more. Beckham used to track back and do some defensive work, at least.

Scholes should be given a starting spot, sure. But he's growing older and before long he needs to be phased out of the team. Maybe not this season, but one or two later. Fletcher is no ball-winner and having him in the middle next to Scholes would be tantamount to asking other midfields to waltz on right through. We all know Scholes can't tackle.

O'Shea and Giggs in the middle was only a stop gap solution and if we begin the season with them in there, it won't be long before they are found out and we start losing the battle there again. O'Shea is our new Phil Neville - filling in wherever, but never good enough to maintain a starting spot.

we have two top class keepers. If anybody can name liverpool, arsenal's and chelseas third choice keepers at the top of their head i will be very impressed. Point is two quality keepers are enough for a premeirship and european campaign since injuries and suspensions to keepers are very rare. Thecase i am sure u didn't see the game last night cause foster made some top drawer saves. And i'd prefer him over dudek, alumina or an other second choice keeper in the league.

Ronaldo will only get better. He isn't perfect but under fergie he will improve every year and that is a scary prospect for opposition fans.

scholes will get us at least ten goals this season if he avoids a major injury. I'm sure of that. giggs and park can share time on the left and i don't see any problems there.

Which leaves us with one spot left to be filled by either fletcher or oshea. Sure every united fan would love a mascherano or gattuso there but right now we have fletcher and o'shea. Not world class by any means but they are solid and dependable. Plus if scholes is in the team they will have no attacking duties and can concentrate on protecting the back four.

I like to remember phil neville as the guy who played viera out of the park whenever we played arsenal so if o'shea can play like that this season we will be fine

Liverpool - Carson or Kirkland, though Kirkland has been told he has no future at the club and can find another (I believe).

Arsenal - Mart Poom.

Chelsea - Henrique Hilario, who they signed this summer because they only had Cudicini as backup (fantastic backup, might I add).

If you asked me, I'd rather have Dudek than Foster. Dudek is proven at the highest level. Admittedly he does make mistakes, but then we did have Barthez who was our No. 1 for a few seasons.

Ronaldo will get better...if his attitude is right, which is hard to gauge right now because of his supposed desire to move to Real or somewhere in Spain. Hopefully the inevitable backlash that he's going to get throughout England will spur him on to improve, like Becks did after '98. If he doesn't, it's time for him to move on then.

Scholes absolutely needs to avoid injury. But how often has he in the past few seasons? He's getting older, slower, and can run less each year. And he's getting more prone to injuries. Considering his blurred vision will apparently never go away (so it's been suggested), it may be hard to rely on him very much.

Fletcher is hardly solid as a defensive midfielder. He could never, ever dominate games like Keane or even Vieira could, or even Gattuso and perhaps Mascherano. He doesn't have either the pace or the strength to get into proper positions quick or challenge for the ball properly, nor can he tackle very well either! O'Shea is an option, but he also lacks the ability to dominate games. He's a defender and always will be. Without a guarentee that we can count on Scholes for an entire season then we're pretty short in this department.

It's fine to remember Phil Neville as the one who played Vieira off the park when we played Arsenal, but as far as I can remember, that was only once.