Man Utd - Now a small time club in Manchester

Didn't Liverpool fans also protest against the owners, not once but twice? Is that because, like Man U fans, they know deep down that Liverpool is also turning into a small time club now and will shortly be overtaken by their own noisy neighbours in blue?

 

So if both are better clubs why is one in 4th and the other 6th? And are you only bitter because they didn't do it the other way around and field the weaker team against Liverpool thus giving them an easy win.

And sure the EL isn't good enough but to say they are nowhere near anything major is totally wrong. It's a couple of players short of challenging but that's certainly not a million miles away

 

DDG was number 1 until he went away for the Birth of his kid. Greenwood has been a regular starter even when his form dropped due to things going on in his personal life. Telles has started 19 games, tbh it would have been even more if it wasn't for his arrival having kicked Shaw into the form of his career (plus he had Covid). Bailly has started 16 despite spending a lot of the season injured. Axel would have most likely played more but he has had injury issues for much of the season, remember Ole when he had a full complement of CB's picked him to play away at PSG. Matic has started 21 matches.

Should also be noted that if it wasn't for injuries most likely either Cavani (18 starts despite injuries and the Suspension)or Martial (27 starts despite a 3 match ban and then injury) would have played. And James (17 starts despite a few injuries this season) is also out injured. I would also add Williams played 25 games last season, his appearances have been a bit more limited this season but that's because we have switched him to his natural right (he only broke though on the Left because Laird also plays Left Back and as the two best FB's in United u23's he was switched so they could both play) and AWB is a bit like Bruno and doesn't need his fitness managed as much as Shaw.

The simple fact is if they had really wanted to throw it there was a much weaker squad that could have been played. For example, starting Hugill (16 goals in 27 youth level games) or McNeil (24 in 21 games for the u18) up top rather than Greenwood to reward them for their form in the youth setup and we could have given all the 1st team players on the bench a full night off and put in other u23's. It was on paper the easier of the two games to win and with having played a more second string in the Roma 2nd leg as it was basically a tie we won in the first leg the one that schedule-wise was the 1 of the 3 games that made the most sense to rest players (Otherwise we would have had to play a 2nd string against Villa and then again against Liverpool. Playing 1 weaker team is better than playing 2)

 

The Stadium is far from a Dump. Yes there are some more modern ones and there are some improvements and fixes that are certainly needed but they are in this difficult situation with the ground. They have wanted to extend it for a while but logistically its a nightmare. Adding a 3rd their to the Sir Bobby Charlton stand so ist 3 tiers all the way around is an obvious choice but it backs out on to the railway and then houses behind that. The club did buy up most of the houses around 2010 but dealing with British Rail is a nightmare of red tape and excessive safety standards (To highlight what its like dealing with British Rail. I moved back up north in 2007 and there was a single lane bridge over the railway just down the road from me which causes traffic to backup on both sides. Plans had been in place since 2000 to redevelop the bridge and make it 2 lanes but getting BR to signoff was a nightmare and it hadn't started. Do you want to know when they signed off and work started? 2019. That's 19 years and a fairly simple bridge construction took them NINE MONTHS). Estimates to add a 3rd tier come in at around £300million and would likely require us to move out of OT for up to 2 years, especially as they would most likely want to do any other work at the same time. And where exactly do United move to? Supposedly even if City agreed to ground share the police are against it so where else locally is viable? The next 3 biggest grounds in the Manchester region are Ewood park (42% of OT's capacity), Rebook Stadium or whatever it is currently called (38%) and Wigans (33%). I guess Prestons Deepdale isn't a million miles away but at 31% of the capacity that's still really small. It's not like we are a London club and can move into Wembley. There isn't even a Rugby ground with good capacity like London has with Twickenham. Maybe OT Cricket ground might be an option but would they be fine with football being played on the pitch and is it suitable for a football pitch anyway?

It would be a massive waste of money to redevelop the existing structure only to then decide its viable to expand the ground or maybe being forced to move away (Which as Salford are finding without moving out of the area finding the land for even a new training complex let alone a new ground is nigh on impossible). TBH what is really needed is a second national stadium up north that like Wembley can host a variety of different sports (and maybe share England home games) and if a northern team needs to move out of their ground for a bit could be a more viable option than moving to London for a year or two but that's unlikely to happen