Nine

Some people were actually content with taking a point deduction, so yeah..

Sloppy game so far, which suits Man United.

I used to make the argument that we were building a team specifically for the press, so players we targeted had to be physically able to do that. Our identity has since changed though, and I now agree with you. A creative midfielder ahead of Bruno could have unlocked Everton for us last night, our signings have all been made to press but we are not doing that by design now. It doesn’t make a lot of sense. We don’t have the technical or creative ability in the front of 2 of a 433 midfield to make the difference against stubborn low blocks. Teams like Everton can be relatively comfy playing us because the threat just isn’t there. If we are moving our style on to a more possession based system that is one thing, but we don’t have the personnel to evolve it yet. I think the injuries of last season pushed our evolution along to quickly, as Howe spoke of adapting and evolving and probably feels the intensity of the press we used before was becoming to much of a risk to our current squads fitness. We essentially built a squad for a style we don’t seem to want to implement now.

Ten Hag starting Maguire and Evans is so bizarre. Did he watch the Bayern game the other night? They left Upemecano 1v1 with Watkins and the pace was killing them.. so he starts Man Uniteds two slowest CBs here? I think he’s losing the plot.

I do agree with you that at times it does feel he’s overly cautious, I wanted to see more of Gordon when he signed for example. Im not sure we are there with Osula yet though, and I do think he’ll start using him sooner rather than later. Wilson will come back and likely be re injured before long so Osula will get his minutes.

I’ll trust Howes judgment on him, he sees him day in day out in training and clearly feels the lad isn’t ready. I think Howe plays the mental game with the young players pretty well, he eases them in gradually. I think people tend to forget there’s alot of pressure on players this club, a lot more than Sheffield United anyway. Some young players take time to adapt to that.

He’ll be fucking gutted that he didn’t score that pen

We also lost possession cheaply a lot, the rest of what you mentioned should be expected of a side that is allowed to play with the ball. It’s really nothing of note. We are by no means abysmal, but at the same time not good enough away to reasonably expect a top 6 finish which will disappoint most people on here. I tend not to focus on results or points, performances are what matter most and we just are not there right now.

I don’t agree, tonight was slightly better than Wolves but again it was poor. It’s not easy to score against team that sits in a low block 90% of the time, and thats Everton’s bread and butter under Dyche. But can you point out to me where we performed well tonight? We were allowed the ball and still gave up alot of possession, our attacking play was poor. I think it was very much a continuation of the trend, we score transitional goals away from home but you don’t get those against a low block. Trippiers down turn in form has taken away one of our biggest weapons, the right hand side was our best attacking outlet but we look lost without it. We honestly look like a poorly coached team away from home, I’m not speaking with emotion here either. It’s just the truth. We scraped past Wolves and did nothing of note against Everton, two of our easiest away games on paper that we’ll have all season. It’s concerning. If we don’t improve then we won’t hit the targets people are expecting of us this season, we all have faith in Howe I’m not here to question him. I just want to see improvement.

Some are always negative, it will never change. But we can’t be emotional about this, you cannot argue that there is a trend of poor away performances since last season. It will end up punishing us, a lot on here are expecting us to qualify for Europe this season and they will end up disappointed when it doesn’t happen. You don’t get top 6 playing like we do away, it’s just a fact. It’s not all doom and gloom, and it can change. We just need to get our act together on the road.

3 points would take the sting out of it a bit tonight definitely, but I’d still be here saying that our away performances are concerning. I’ve been saying it since last season, it’s a trend that has continued and it will catch up to us without improvement. We can’t blame the transfer window, it’s not necessarily a player issue. We lack structure even with Isak in the side, transitional goals are our best bet away from home but we were never going to get that against Everton. I feel like I repeat myself every week, but hopefully the next away performance is better.

I guess we’ll have to agree to disagree here, because I don’t feel that was a good performance. As I said, we were allowed a lot of the ball and never really put it together tonight. It’s not the end of the world and it was probably better than Wolves, but a better side would have killed us off tonight.

Probably, but that’s not my point. I meant that I don’t feel we perform much better with Isak in the team tonight, as the attacking phases of our play were just off it here.

People saying it was a good performance, I’m not sure id agree. We played a team that want us to have the ball so we passed the eye test as far as looking like we were in control, but in reality we were allowed the ball and didn’t do a great deal with it. It’s always a tough place for us to go but our attacking phases of play are poor, we could be doing a lot more. Obviously limited in aspects with Gordon centrally but I’m not sure we look much better with Isak tonight. A point away is alright though, but I cant help but feel even just a slightly better performance wins us that.

I think I’ll trust Howes judgement on him

We know Howes methods, he will be eased in like every other young player has been

A poor penalty, but it’s hindsight to say it was a poor decision. He wanted that penalty more than anyone.

I think Schars goal could be my favourite nufc goal ever tbh

Man United so weak in the air, you can see Porto set out to expose it from the right side

2-2 Porto

I really enjoyed that last night, can’t be arsed with all the beef between clubs and stuff. Seeing clubs like us and them enjoy mental nights in the CL is good for football overall and shows that we can play with the big boys. It’s motivating, and credit to Villas fans becuase they made some serious noise last night.

They’ve been incredible under him so far tbf, until tonight. Upemacano and Kim vs Villas pace was always going to be problems

So clutch

Neuer got done

Incredible from Duran