Winning Mentality

[alboots101]

And like I said DD...it`s nothing really new....

For me, moving stadiums changed everything but it had to be done. I also believe that the winners in the team were sold off only to be replaced by crap or kids.

 

[TheEconomist]

And like I said DD...it`s nothing really new....

For me, moving stadiums changed everything but it had to be done. I also believe that the winners in the team were sold off only to be replaced by crap or kids.

yeah, Seriously dont know how anyone can justify losing Campbell, Lauren Pires, Viera, Gilberto, A.cole, Ljunberg, Bergkamp, Henry, (apologies to any I have forgotten, there are just too many to remember)

within the space of 2 or 3 years

Compare it to the way SAF keeps some of the older guys around to help smooth the youngsters in

It just isnt acceptable

 

[ricky1985]

How do you propose we went about rebuilding the squad with those massively high earners still at the club? Man United had the benefit of A LOT more money to call on. Which meant players like Ryan Giggs and Paul Scholes could be kept on as squad players whilst earning more than 100k a week.

Maybe you should think about the practicalities of everything the club has undertaken before blindly calling it all unacceptable.

 

[DanDare]

And like I said DD...it`s nothing really new....

For me, moving stadiums changed everything but it had to be done. I also believe that the winners in the team were sold off only to be replaced by crap or kids.

yeah, Seriously dont know how anyone can justify losing Campbell, Lauren Pires, Viera, Gilberto, A.cole, Ljunberg, Bergkamp, Henry, (apologies to any I have forgotten, there are just too many to remember)

within the space of 2 or 3 years

Compare it to the way SAF keeps some of the older guys around to help smooth the youngsters in

It just isnt acceptable

If Ferguson didn't win the Champions League he wouldn't have kept all the players he has. If We had won that Champions League final no way we would have lost half the players we have.

 

[Mastadon]

And like I said DD...it`s nothing really new....

For me, moving stadiums changed everything but it had to be done. I also believe that the winners in the team were sold off only to be replaced by crap or kids.

yeah, Seriously dont know how anyone can justify losing Campbell, Lauren Pires, Viera, Gilberto, A.cole, Ljunberg, Bergkamp, Henry, (apologies to any I have forgotten, there are just too many to remember)

within the space of 2 or 3 years

Compare it to the way SAF keeps some of the older guys around to help smooth the youngsters in

It just isnt acceptable

I dont see the comparison though MU are arguably the biggest club in the world (in terms of support certainly). Arsenal cant compete with that and certainly couldnt compete financially when these players left. Most of the players you mentioned above left because they wanted to leave or left because the club wasnt big enough for them. Who are you going to blame for that?

 

[TheEconomist]

How do you propose we went about rebuilding the squad with those massively high earners still at the club? Man United had the benefit of A LOT more money to call on. Which meant players like Ryan Giggs and Paul Scholes could be kept on as squad players whilst earning more than 100k a week.

Maybe you should think about the practicalities of everything the club has undertaken before blindly calling it all unacceptable.

First of all, as far as i know, the club made a £50m profit in one season during the period we let these players go, secondly, the reason "we cant keep" the players mentioned above is because we spend too large a percentage of our revenue retaining the services of younger players such as bentnder, denilson and diaby. Regardless of this, the board has always said that money is available, therefore the money argument is invalid, unless you know more than the board does, which im sure you dont.

maybe you should think about the practicalities of ignorantly calling someone blind?

@DanDare - ok, but thats just your theory...

 

[DanDare]

@DanDare - ok, but thats just your theory...

You think Paul "Xavi and Zidane said he's the best midfielder of his generation" Scholes would have stayed at United all this time if there hadn't been a couple of Champions League wins?

Yes it's a theory and I'm not using it as an excuse for Wenger just an explanation. It's not like its some personality difference that means Ferguson kept some of his players, it's results and perhaps wages a little bit.

 

[ricky1985]

How do you propose we went about rebuilding the squad with those massively high earners still at the club? Man United had the benefit of A LOT more money to call on. Which meant players like Ryan Giggs and Paul Scholes could be kept on as squad players whilst earning more than 100k a week.

Maybe you should think about the practicalities of everything the club has undertaken before blindly calling it all unacceptable.

First of all, as far as i know, the club made a £50m profit in one season during the period we let these players go, secondly, the reason "we cant keep" the players mentioned above is because we spend too large a percentage of our revenue retaining the services of younger players such as bentnder, denilson and diaby. Regardless of this, the board has always said that money is available, therefore the money argument is invalid, unless you know more than the board does, which im sure you dont.

maybe you should think about the practicalities of ignorantly calling someone blind?

@DanDare - ok, but thats just your theory...

Or Djourou, Fabregas, and Wilshere. That's the nature of building a squad from the bottom up with limited funds - some you win, some you lose.

So, I ask again, how do we go about rebuilding an ageing, struggling squad, when we have player after player earning huge wages not contributing enough to justify those wages?

In other words how do we keep Robert Pires as a squad player on top wages and then bring in a player good enough to replace him in the First XI and pay him top wages, too? And then do the same throughout the squad with Lehmann, Campbell, Lauren, Vieira, Ljungberg, Henry?

 

[AshburtonGhost]

How do you propose we went about rebuilding the squad with those massively high earners still at the club? Man United had the benefit of A LOT more money to call on. Which meant players like Ryan Giggs and Paul Scholes could be kept on as squad players whilst earning more than 100k a week.

Maybe you should think about the practicalities of everything the club has undertaken before blindly calling it all unacceptable.

Scholes and Giggs have never been paid that much by Utd.

 

[Burnwinter]

Scholes is way down the autism spectrum. Can't see him ever having left United even if they'd gone through a prolonged slump - only if Fergie moved him on.

 

[ricky1985]

Scholes and Giggs have never been paid that much by Utd.

They are on very good money and have been for years and years. Rooney earns £230,000 per week, that alone highlights Man United's advantage over us.

 

[GOONER1991]

This season, Manchester United have shown the importance of having experienced players in your team to support the youngsters.

Van Der Sar has earned them a ridiculous amount of points this season with some great saves.
Paul Scholes is often called on late in games to create when United are looking for a goal.
Ryan Giggs is just quality as ever.

Last years' Champions were Chelsea whose majority of players are 30 and over.

Who have we got to turn to when we need a goal?

Bendtner who gets put on the wing.
Chamakh who couldn't hit a barn door from a meter away.
Rosicky who is experienced granted, but is awful since returning from injury.

 

[eye4goal]

United are on a different level to us financially. We have effectively became a selling club since 2005 and for the right reasons. You cant make the profits we are making on the transfer market whilst keeping 30 year old plus players. We now have less debt than we had when we were playing at Highbury and I am sure we will reap the rewards starting next season

 

[TheEconomist]

How do you propose we went about rebuilding the squad with those massively high earners still at the club? Man United had the benefit of A LOT more money to call on. Which meant players like Ryan Giggs and Paul Scholes could be kept on as squad players whilst earning more than 100k a week.

Maybe you should think about the practicalities of everything the club has undertaken before blindly calling it all unacceptable.

First of all, as far as i know, the club made a £50m profit in one season during the period we let these players go, secondly, the reason "we cant keep" the players mentioned above is because we spend too large a percentage of our revenue retaining the services of younger players such as bentnder, denilson and diaby. Regardless of this, the board has always said that money is available, therefore the money argument is invalid, unless you know more than the board does, which im sure you dont.

maybe you should think about the practicalities of ignorantly calling someone blind?

@DanDare - ok, but thats just your theory...

Or Djourou, Fabregas, and Wilshere. That's the nature of building a squad from the bottom up with limited funds - some you win, some you lose.

So, I ask again, how do we go about rebuilding an ageing, struggling squad, when we have player after player earning huge wages not contributing enough to justify those wages?

In other words how do we keep Robert Pires as a squad player on top wages and then bring in a player good enough to replace him in the First XI and pay him top wages, too? And then do the same throughout the squad with Lehmann, Campbell, Lauren, Vieira, Ljungberg, Henry?

Im not saying keep all of them, yes some of them wanted to leave/retire , but at the same time a lot of guys were forced out/dealt with unfairly imo i.e. Pires and Gilberto, these guys werent the best players around at the time, they were on the decline, but Pires for example was a massive player for Villareal for a year or two afterwards. Look at how Giggs has been adapted to more of a central player as he has gradually lost his pace.

If i remember correctly, Pires wanted a two year deal, we wouldnt give him one because he was over the age of 30, I truly believe that the extra 3 or 4 million if that it would have added to our wage bill would have paid off massively in purely smoothing our transition and helping the new players get aquainted with the club and English football.

Its guys like Pires who know what its like to grind out results, and really perform when it matters, he was a world cup and a premiership winner, and he wasnt carried by his team like a lot of our current winners were, he was a big part of those teams, this is hypothetical but i doubt there is any way in hell we would have choked on the big occasion as many times as we have in recent years with a few of these veterans around to help the players keep their heads, the relative marginal cost of keeping a couple of these guys around would have been nothing next to the success they could have bought us, and the revenue generated from going much further in tournments

Campbell is another example, he came back to us for a while last season, and even though he wasnt here for long, and he was no where near as good as he used to be, anyone could see the influence he had on the guys around him, and the heart he had. Even if he wasnt in the team all the time i bet he motivated everyone around him at training.

On the note of Cesc, Wilshere and Djourou, We all new and these guys would be massive, I remember 5 years or so ago, people would come on here while watching reserve/CC games just to see Cesc play because he was so highly regarded, the same is true of wilshere, yes he might have only had his "breaththrough" this year, but honestly, we've all known about his talent since he was about 16 or 17. Compare that with Diaby, Denilson and others, these guys have been here for several years now, and have clearly stagnated in their progression, Diaby for example is 25 years old, and people are still talking about his "potential", the top top players like Wilshere and Cesc are younger, yet far ahead of him. Of course no ones perfect, and Wenger, like any other manager makes poor judgements regarding signings from time to time, thats an occupational hazard, where Wenger falls short is persisting too long with these players who should be reaching their prime, but clearly arent ready yet, where other managers would recognise their mistakes and cut their losses( I saw losses, but really, im sure we would still make a profit from guys like Denilson and Diaby), this in turn frees up space on the payroll for some of the Arsenal veterans, who make up for their lack of influence on the pitch through their influence in the dressing room

 

[ricky1985]

Mate, we all would have loved the Invincibles to stay longer, I guarantee you Wenger would have wanted them to as well, but it was a very tricky situation we found ourselves in financially, and committing further to new long-term contracts, on massive wages (which is what it would have taken to keep them) just wasn't doable whilst we were trying at the same time to recruit and rebuild the squad.

Wenger did the best he could in a difficult situation, and when you think of the turnover of players, alongside the money spent, you realise just how difficult an undertaking it has been to break up and ageing and underperforming squad, and rebuild from scratch with a relatively small budget. Signing top players and paying top wages wasn't the most efficient way to move forward, we had to take an almost scatter gun approach - signing the best talents our scouting system could identify, as early as possible, spreading the budget over a greater number, giving us a better chance of success.

 

[Kroket]

This season, Manchester United have shown the importance of having experienced players in your team to support the youngsters.

Van Der Sar has earned them a ridiculous amount of points this season with some great saves.
Paul Scholes is often called on late in games to create when United are looking for a goal.
Ryan Giggs is just quality as ever.

Last years' Champions were Chelsea whose majority of players are 30 and over.

Who have we got to turn to when we need a goal?

Bendtner who gets put on the wing.
Chamakh who couldn't hit a barn door from a meter away.
Rosicky who is experienced granted, but is awful since returning from injury.

Judging from this post you seem to imply we're lacking ability, not experience.

 

[Y va marquer]

I watched an interview with the jockey (and dedicated Arsenal fan) AP McCoy on Football Focus on Saturday.
I don't remember word for word how he replied, but when asked what it is that drives him and makes him what he is he said "fear".

Not the fear that he is not good enough, because he does believe he can win every race, but fear that somewhere in the field someone might be better than him.

It's not something that I would have immediately associated with a "winning mentality" but given that it came from somebody who has won so much it was worth noting.

I wonder if this applies more in individual as opposed to team sport?

 

[DanDare]

I watched an interview with the jockey (and dedicated Arsenal fan) AP McCoy on Football Focus on Saturday.
I don't remember word for word how he replied, but when asked what it is that drives him and makes him what he is he said "fear".

Not the fear that he is not good enough, because he does believe he can win every race, but fear that somewhere in the field someone might be better than him.

It's not something that I would have immediately associated with a "winning mentality" but given that it came from somebody who has won so much it was worth noting.

I wonder if this applies more in individual as opposed to team sport?

Paradoxical statement.

 

[Y va marquer]

I watched an interview with the jockey (and dedicated Arsenal fan) AP McCoy on Football Focus on Saturday.I don't remember word for word how he replied, but when asked what it is that drives him and makes him what he is he said "fear".

Not the fear that he is not good enough, because he does believe he can win every race, but fear that somewhere in the field someone might be better than him.

It's not something that I would have immediately associated with a "winning mentality" but given that it came from somebody who has won so much it was worth noting.

I wonder if this applies more in individual as opposed to team sport?

Paradoxical statement.

Yes, it does seem slightly confused.

What I understood it to mean is that he believes he's good enough to win every race but he does not say he's the best.
You're only the best if you keep winning.

He is confident, he knows he has the talent, the ability and all that's needed to win but he can never rest easy, in any given race he fears somebody else might just perform better and he cannot let that happen.
That's what drives him.

Think about our recent games against Sunderland, WBA, Blackburn.
We had, in terms of talent, all the means to win those matches but did we believe in ourselves?
It seemed to me that we did not, and that the fear that we showed was grounded in a loss of confidence in our ability to defend or score goals.
That's the difference in the mentality, McCoy has unshakeable faith in his ability but knows nothing short of total commitment will bring him victory and even at that it's not guaranteed.

We have endured huge hits to our confidence recently so even when totally committed the fear of losing seems to inhibit us.

There was no sense of " we know what we're doing and we're not going to let Blackburn get the better of us" it was more a case of "it's not working, why is it not working, what do we do now?"

The game against Blackpool will have helped our confidence in that we won and scored great goals.
It won't have done huge amounts for the confidence of our defence though as we were rattled on quite a few occasions.

Hopefully we'll see progression and more solidity in the game against Liverpool.

 

[DanDare]

I really see this as Wenger's biggest failing. Perhaps its a symptom of a poorly working philosphy or maybe it's what's making his philosophy not work.

Either way he has failed to instill within these players the right mentality to win the league.

We don't seem to be mentally in the right place. Sometimes it's concentration and simple knowing of roles. Other times the fear of losing seems to crush us and paradoxically causes us to lose.