Re: Football Chat Thread PART II : Thu Aug 15, 2013 7:19 pm  

WireFanatic III wrote:

I see Moyesie is towing the United line already....

He's a pale imitation of Fergie at whining too.

I do think that Man United's first five league games are harder than the other top clubs. I think they are harder games than MU are used to. But Chelsea play in midweek before they travel to Old Trafford because they have to move a game to accommodate the Super Cup match against Bayern Munich. Chelsea also have that SC game to play. Arsenal have two CL qualifying matches against Fener during their opening games. Liverpool have a League Cup match to play in the midweek before playing Man United.

The Man Utd - Chelsea match is being played on a Monday night. That's their only weeknight match. Most of the other clubs are dealing with extra fixtures while United have a nice 1 match a week start.

Personally I think Moyes has been a dog dirt manager of Man Utd so far. Everything he's done so far he just looks out of his depth. I know Fergie has had whinges like these before, and Mourinho and Wenger are prone to whine if they have a run of bad fixtures, but I don't think any of them opened up a season with this kind of trash. They usually waited until they'd lost a match so they could whine to deflect attention from the defeat.

There's also the little fact that because Man United are playing Liverpool early in the season they are benefiting from the fact Suarez is banned for that game.

Re: Football Chat Thread PART II : Thu Aug 15, 2013 7:57 pm  

Dog dirt so far? He's been in charge 6 weeks, played 1 competitive game and won a trophy. If Mourinho had had a start like that already you'd have jizzed and proclaimed it the coming a footballing dynasty Guardiola could only dream of.

It's nowhere near time to judge Moyes yet.

Re: Football Chat Thread PART II : Thu Aug 15, 2013 8:21 pm  

Moyes will get the time. I think his bigger concern is where the goals are going to come from if Van Persie gets injured. I don't think I'm saying anything controversial by suggesting he needs more from elsewhere given I was reading that between them Giggs, Cleverley, Carrick, Valenica and Welbeck (four of them started on Saturday) scored scored seven league goals last year. Without another signing they're asking a lot of Zaha, Rooney and Kagawa.

Re: Football Chat Thread PART II : Thu Aug 15, 2013 8:54 pm  

carl_spackler wrote:

Dog dirt so far? He's been in charge 6 weeks, played 1 competitive game and won a trophy.

He hasn't played any competitive games.

His pre-season results have been average, including the Charity Shield.

It's not about the results, because pre-season has little meaning anyway. But virtually every interview Moyes has given he's been fumbling and making himself look daft. His handling of Rooney has been weak, saying he's the fittest he's ever been one day and the next day Rooney is on his way home because he's injured.

And having stuttered through pre-season over Rooney so far he's now decided that his last major press conference before the first game of the season is to come up with a pathetic whine that the fixture list is too hard.

If Mourinho had had a start like that already you'd have jizzed and proclaimed it the coming a footballing dynasty Guardiola could only dream of.

It's nowhere near time to judge Moyes yet.

Our pre-season results have been fine. Far superior to Man United's, but ultimately just as meaningless.

In terms of his interviews, he's barely made any effort at all and just seems to be waiting for the season to start.

Moyes and Rodgers have been dog dirt so far. Wenger has been the same old Wenger of promising buys and delivering nothing. Pellegrini just seems to have kept his head down and his side have strengthened the most.

Moyes hasn't done enough to earn the Man Utd job with his achievements with Everton. His handling of the media so far has been rabbit in the headlights stuff. Of course if he wins his first 5 games then this is rendered meaningless, but if his first 5 games offer less than 5 points and he continues to talk as he has so far he's in big trouble.

If Rooney leaves for Chelsea or Rooney sits in the reserves sulking while Man Utd's results are poor then Moyes suffers big time.

Moyes could become a great manager for Man United. That will all depend on his results. But his performance as Man United boss so far has been just about as bad as it could have been.

Re: Football Chat Thread PART II : Fri Aug 16, 2013 5:12 am  

I don't think the issue is so much what Moyes has to say, as whether Fergie is prepared to keep his trap shut, both inside the club and to the media. Making him a director did seem like an attempt to repeat the mistakes of the post Busby era.

As far as the fixtures are concerned, I don't think they've been fixed to stymie United, but I was amused at the PL's response that they are random. They're not as pre-planned as Super League, with the Easter derbies, but there always seems to be a pattern to them. The "Super Sundays" which feature at nicely spaced intervals for the benefit of Sky. I seem to remember the PL responding to a complaint about too much travelling at Christmas and New Year by saying that they "arranged" the holiday fixtures to minimise travelling whilst avoiding derbies at the request of the police.

Re: Football Chat Thread PART II : Fri Aug 16, 2013 8:30 am  

Fergie started all this mess with Rooney by revealing he'd asked for a move near the end of last season. For that he was completely to blame, but I haven't seen anything from since the end of the season so I think it's wrong to be blaming him for Moyes cacking it up so bad.

Hasn't Fergie had surgery? I think that was one of the reasons he retired.

Even if Fergie has been speaking to the press and making things worse, I still think Moyes has been awful with what he's done. He has struggled with Rooney nearly as much as Rodgers has struggled with Suarez. Unless Rooney is being as difficult as Suarez there's simply no reason for things to be as murky as they are right now. Moyes made things worse with his comments that they needed Rooney in case anything happened to RVP.

A mark of Man Utd last season was their ability to come from behind when they were playing poorly. That's why they won the title last season IMO. You write them off at your peril. But in terms of Moyes's start as MU boss, I think he's been pretty much as bad as it was possible to be. Moyes has been a PL boss for 10 years, he simply has no excuse for being as bad as he's been.

Of course United could win their opening 3 fixtures playing well and this awful start will be forgotten. Rooney could stay at Man Utd and play an important part of them winning the title. But Moyes so far has a huge touch of the AVB's at Chelsea about him.

Re: Football Chat Thread PART II : Fri Aug 16, 2013 12:11 pm  

carl_spackler wrote:

He's been in charge 6 weeks, played 1 competitive game and won a trophy.

Ah, so the Community Shield is now being classed as a trophy and the match is being classed as "competitive". When the d**k measurers come out comparing trophy wins, it's funny how everyone says "why do you class the community shield in there. It's not a proper trophy".

So, if you want to be pedantic, then technically Moyes hasn't won a trophy yet.

carl_spackler wrote:

If Mourinho had had a start like that already you'd have jizzed and proclaimed it the coming a footballing dynasty Guardiola could only dream of.

Even though LGJM has his affections for the Special One, I doubt he is really bothered if Chelsea had won the community shield.

carl_spackler wrote:

It's nowhere near time to judge Moyes yet.

Of course it is. He should be judged the moment he took over at the club. It's not all about the football side of things, it's also about how he conducts himself away from the football pitch and at the moment, he's not exactly covering himself in glory. I wonder if he's rang Paul Lambert yet to see what he feels about Man Utd's "worst ever first 3 or so PL fixtures in 20 years". I mean, it's not as if Arsenal away, Chelsea away and Liverpool at home is a walk in the park now, is it?

I did notice however that he's not complained about the run in; Hull (H), Everton (A), Norwich (H), Sunderland (H), Southampton (A).

Re: Football Chat Thread PART II : Fri Aug 16, 2013 4:56 pm  

Swansea have got Man United, Tottenham, Arsenal and Liverpool before the end of September. They've also got a 2 leg Europa League qualification match.

I wonder if Laudrup cried to the PL complaining about it.

[TimperleySaint]

Re: Football Chat Thread PART II : Sat Aug 17, 2013 7:10 pm  

Moyes out!!

Re: Football Chat Thread PART II : Sat Aug 17, 2013 7:17 pm  

Not liking the news channels having the goals/incidents on already, even before games have finished! Makes MOTD feel pointless as you don't watch it for the punditry, do ya?