ManU In Decline?

[sanmiguellight]

He is not a Legend - Legends are players like Ryan Giggs, Bryan Robson, Denis Law, Bobby Charlton etc, etc. Players that played for the club and not themselves. Players that had loyalty. Players that didn't agitate for a move to another club.

He was the main player behind your team winning the European Cup and the Premier League for a few years, for him not to be held in the highest regard shows how fickle and gloryhunting Man U fans are. Skybreed never cease to amaze me.

[mrtoad]

He is not a Legend - Legends are players like Ryan Giggs, Bryan Robson, Denis Law, Bobby Charlton etc, etc. Players that played for the club and not themselves. Players that had loyalty. Players that didn't agitate for a move to another club.

He was the main player behind your team winning the European Cup and the Premier League for a few years, for him not to be held in the highest regard shows how fickle and gloryhunting Man U fans are. Skybreed never cease to amaze me.

Nothing fickle about my post, more of a lack of understanding on you part. I don't doubt the unfluence that he has had on the team. He has been outstanding for United. I just don't like the way that he has conducted himself over the last 12-14 months, with all this Real Madrid nonsense. As for Skybreed, I'm not sure what you're getting at? Maybe you can explain the relevance to the post before you start insinuating BS.

[nev]

He is not a Legend - Legends are players like Ryan Giggs, Bryan Robson, Denis Law, Bobby Charlton etc, etc. Players that played for the club and not themselves. Players that had loyalty. Players that didn't agitate for a move to another club.

He was the main player behind your team winning the European Cup and the Premier League for a few years, for him not to be held in the highest regard shows how fickle and gloryhunting Man U fans are. Skybreed never cease to amaze me.

so you are saying web should hold a player who has lied to the fans untill the last minute and had penned a deal to go in dece mber with the highest regard,we appreciate what he has done but time for change.

what toady meant was he cannot be talked about the same as the legends he has stated.

good luck to him and we have done great from the transfer and he is being spotted with paris hilton and loving the party life now maybe it is all down hill for ronaldo now he has the move of his dreams

[rixalex]

. Better to get someone with a bit less magic but who you can rely on to give you 50 or 60 games a season.

Tevez, but for some reason old red nose didnt want to play him. I just hope we buy him.

I hope you do too. For a mid-table club i think he would do well.

For us he just wasn't clinical enough. His best performances were coming on as a sub. When played in the starting line up, although he usually played well, he rarely scored.

Were he on offer for a realistic price like about 15m, i would say snap him up. We can afford to pay that much for a sub who occasionally comes on to change a game. But 25m? Nope, too much. And besides which, he's made it clear that he no longer wants to play that sort of a role in the team, so unless he is guaranteed regular starts he's not going to be happy. At Man City he will be. Good luck to him.

And Alex, are you honestly saying you wouldnt want Torres??????

The guy is pure class. I think that given a good rest this summer, he will be the Leagues top scorer next season. Of course Liverpool would never let him go, but I really do think he is the complete player.

I don't disgree that he is a complete player, i disagree about his fitness. You think he'll be fresh and get through 50 or 60 games next season without missing a beat. I have my doubts. Once an injury prone player, always an injury prone player in my book. There may be exceptions, but that's usually how it goes.

[StevieH]

Bwahahaha Could you imagine it if they did though ?? Bwahahahahaha

ferguson's had a go before. i believe the quote was 'we've tried. the boy won't come here'.

which some people might construe as illegal tapping up, like. . .

[nev]

stevie before you bought torres there was talk of him comming to united and he was talked about asfirst choice to replace rudd, we didnt get him think he always wanted to go to you lot,so dont think that is illegal.

[MSingh]

Bwahahaha Could you imagine it if they did though ?? Bwahahahahaha

ferguson's had a go before. i believe the quote was 'we've tried. the boy won't come here'.

which some people might construe as illegal tapping up, like. . .

What, from you Steve or when he was at Athletico ??

[StevieH]

stevie before you bought torres there was talk of him comming to united and he was talked about asfirst choice to replace rudd, we didnt get him think he always wanted to go to you lot,so dont think that is illegal.

sorry nev, i was talking about when ferguson had a go at getting gerrard rather than torres.

united were in for torres yeah but ferguson decided not to go for him as he didn't think he had the physical game to make it in england.

[sanmiguellight]

Nothing fickle about my post, more of a lack of understanding on you part. I don't doubt the unfluence that he has had on the team. He has been outstanding for United. I just don't like the way that he has conducted himself over the last 12-14 months, with all this Real Madrid nonsense. As for Skybreed, I'm not sure what you're getting at? Maybe you can explain the relevance to the post before you start insinuating BS.

On the pitch over the last 24 months he's been ManU's best player by far, top scorer again this season despite missing early season not a bad way to conduct yourself, though it would appear him and ManU have been dealing with Real for a year or so, but Beckham was loyal to ManU look at how he was treat. ...... As for the skysports comment, this article in the Mail sums up that way of thinking.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/article-1...eserve-him.html

Cristiano Ronaldo, it turns out, was rubbish. Glad we cleared that up. It was easy to be waylaid into thinking differently.

I mean, what with three consecutive Premier League titles, man-of-the-match performance in a victorious FA Cup final, two League Cups, a Champions League trophy, the Club World Cup, FIFA World Player of the Year award, two Footballer of the Year awards, two PFA Players' Player of the Year awards, Ballon D'Or, European Golden Shoe, PFA Young Player of the Year, Portuguese Player of the Year and 67 goals in two seasons.

It was easy to misguidedly imagine he could actually play a bit. Apparently not. Apparently he was a preening peacock, a narcissist, a cheat, a liar, a burden to his team-mates and few tears will be shed at his departure.

He was vain, selfish, unreliable and did not do it in big matches. The only surprise, all things considered, is that it took £80million to spirit him away from Old Trafford because, by the sounds of it, Sir Alex Ferguson should have driven him to Madrid for a crisp fiver and a bag of salted almonds some years ago.

Goodbye and good riddance would appear to be the consensus.

And yet he must have been doing something right, because there were 21 matches in the last two seasons in which a goal, or goals, from Ronaldo influenced the outcome, and in that time he scored 37 per cent of all Manchester United's goals in the Premier League.

Indeed, going into the final day of this last campaign, widely reported to have been a disappointment, he was still joint top league scorer.

Ferguson then rested him against Hull City while Nicolas Anelka played, and scored, for Chelsea at Sunderland, beating Ronaldo by one. Anelka did have a head start, though, considering Ronaldo did not even feature from the beginning of a league match for United until September 27.

It is not just Ronaldo's final year in English football that is being re-imagined as a failure. His influence on United's revival is also airily diminished. The fact is that until United found a midfield player to match Frank Lampard's 20-plus goals a season at Chelsea, they were not in touch.

It could equally be argued that Steven Gerrard's impact for Liverpool would have been similarly decisive this time had Ronaldo not kept pace.

Football has changed. The goalscoring burden is no longer on the strikers alone. It was Ronaldo's emergence as a prolific match-winner to supplant United's forward line that altered the dynamic of the Premier League. To dismiss his involvement as the odd good game, or the fortunate bounty of his selfish streak, is to forget the hold Chelsea had on English football when Jose Mourinho was first in charge.

United could not get near them until Ronaldo came good. On April 29, 2006, Chelsea won a second consecutive league title by demolishing United 3-0. The next season Ronaldo found another 10 goals from somewhere and the balance of power swung to Old Trafford.

The positive reaction to his departure is almost wantonly bizarre with many joining Gordon Brown, the Prime Minister - and there is the warning, straightaway - in predicting that United will emerge stronger, as if losing the World Player of the Year is going to make your club more appealing to the best players.

Is it not logical; players who previously felt they were at the best, the strongest, club in the world, might now have second thoughts. It is no surprise that within 24 hours of the bid for Ronaldo being accepted, unsettling rumours around Nemanja Vidic resurfaced. The odds on Carlos Tevez leaving increased, too.

Ronaldo altered the way English football was perceived, and redefined Manchester United's place in it, and no amount of revisionism should cloud that.

The idea that United are better off without him, or that he can be easily replaced, is too far-fetched even for a sport that is right now looking back on Freddy Shepherd's time at Newcastle as some golden age and wondering again whether David Beckham could play holding midfield for England against strong opposition.

The latest development is that Ronaldo will be replaced by Luis Antonio Valencia of Wigan Athletic. And had Valencia not scored fewer goals in the entirety of last season than Ronaldo did in the four days between October 29 and November 1, they could be twins.

As for Ronaldo, judging by the reaction, he is better off at Real Madrid. We didn't deserve him anyway, that useless 67-goal, best footballer you'll ever see at your ground, mate, peacock

[mrtoad]

Well done Sanmig, you've managed to attribute an opinion on me that I had never expressed. If you can clarify where I said he was rubbish then I'll buy you a bag of sweets.

I have read that artical and I agree with most of it. As for Beckham, it was a shame ehat happened. Maybe he may be the short term replacement.

Some of the comments that have been made in the press have been BS. United will not be able to replace him as an individual, he has been exceptional and he will be missed, but there is no point keeping a player at a club if he doesn't want to be there. That has obviously been the case. I wish him well, done a great job for United but he's managed to have left a sour taste in the mouth with the way he has left.

[sanmiguellight]

Well done Sanmig, you've managed to attribute an opinion on me that I had never expressed. If you can clarify where I said he was rubbish then I'll buy you a bag of sweets.

Im thinking the first line of that article about Ronaldo being rubbish was Mr Samuel being facetious, but if you arrived on planet earth last week and only read about Ronaldo on webforums you would probably form that opinion by whats been written.

[mrtoad]

Well done Sanmig, you've managed to attribute an opinion on me that I had never expressed. If you can clarify where I said he was rubbish then I'll buy you a bag of sweets.

Im thinking the first line of that article about Ronaldo being rubbish was Mr Samuel being facetious, but if you arrived on planet earth last week and only read about Ronaldo on webforums you would probably form that opinion by whats been written.

Well there has certainly been a lot of rubbish written about him. The Premier League will certainly be a lot poorer without him. Be interesting to see that prat Platini starts going on about now that Madrid are splashing all the cash.

[StevieH]

Well there has certainly been a lot of rubbish written about him. The Premier League will certainly be a lot poorer without him. Be interesting to see that prat Platini starts going on about now that Madrid are splashing all the cash.

don't agree with that at all. it's a much nicer place without his histrionics and selfishness, however good a player he was.

[mrbojangles]

Well there has certainly been a lot of rubbish written about him. The Premier League will certainly be a lot poorer without him. Be interesting to see that prat Platini starts going on about now that Madrid are splashing all the cash.

don't agree with that at all. it's a much nicer place without his histrionics and selfishness, however good a player he was.

I'll miss him. Cos, whenever I watched him play, I was always hoping someone would break his leg.

United fans might have forgiven him for getting Rooney sent off but I certainly haven't forgotten about it.

[mrtoad]

Well there has certainly been a lot of rubbish written about him. The Premier League will certainly be a lot poorer without him. Be interesting to see that prat Platini starts going on about now that Madrid are splashing all the cash.

don't agree with that at all. it's a much nicer place without his histrionics and selfishness, however good a player he was.

Stevie, all of you other lot will miss him, after all he's been a central figure of hate for the opposition for the last few years.

[sanmiguellight]

Be interesting to see that prat Platini starts going on about now that Madrid are splashing all the cash.

I think UEfA or the top clubs would only try to do anything if a team like Man City done what they were threatening to do last year ie buy everyone as this would ruffle the feathers of the top teams, but even then nothing could realistically happen as we're under EU law. The only thing that could be done is share Champs League money out more evenly to create competition.

I read somewhere last week that Real only owe 25% of what theyre worth, whereas ManU/Liverpool owe 75-80% of what theyre worth ..... now everyone knows the fans are buying the club for the Americans but it still doesnt alter the fact that in the present situation English teams have far more debt then any others.

Even if ManU were to get bought out whoever is going to be spending best part of a billion quid on them is going to want to make a return on that investment ... so from that point of view ManU, Liverpool will never be able to compete with Barca or Real in the transfer market as from what i can see all money they make gets reinvested into the club.

Edited June 16, 2009 by sanmiguellight

[mrbojangles]

Especially for Redrus

So, United have sold 2 of their best players and brought in an injured midget as cover. They finished Champions last year but won't win it again. Tell me Red's, are you in decline again

[redrus]

Especially for Redrus

So, United have sold 2 of their best players and brought in an injured midget as cover. They finished Champions last year but won't win it again. Tell me Red's, are you in decline again

Like a pantomime villain it returns from the Bitter depths............ Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo shout the good people of the audience................. Never, as they throw back the bitter sweets thrown from the stage.

UNITED UNITED UNITED

redrus

[LeungKen]

Can I order one for you Red ?

[mrbojangles]

Ooooh, that's lower than a Snakes belly that ken. Fortunately it will only be valid for about another 10 months

[redrus]

Ooooh, that's lower than a Snakes belly that ken. Fortunately it will only be valid for about another 10 months

Till the next one comes out.....

redrus

[mrbojangles]

Ooooh, that's lower than a Snakes belly that ken. Fortunately it will only be valid for about another 10 months

Till the next one comes out.....

Hang on chaps. This is the United in decline thread. Not the City on the rise thread. Ooooooh, that's just given me an idea

[redrus]

Ooooh, that's lower than a Snakes belly that ken. Fortunately it will only be valid for about another 10 months

Till the next one comes out.....

Hang on chaps. This is the United in decline thread. Not the City on the rise thread. Ooooooh, that's just given me an idea

Oi, at least neeeeeeerly win something before you get ideas above Villa's station......

redrus

[mrbojangles]

Yeah your right Red, I was getting a little giddy there

[JacknDanny]

I wont use the words 'in decline', but I do think they will need a year or 2 to be challenging for the league and Champions League.

Probably the same for City

But the bookies are offering 10/1 United finish out of the top 4!! Thats good value IMHO.

[redrus]

I wont use the words 'in decline', but I do think they will need a year or 2 to be challenging for the league and Champions League.

Probably the same for City

But the bookies are offering 10/1 United finish out of the top 4!! Thats good value IMHO.

You're are joking on every count there, really.....?

I honestly think we'll win the league again this year. I don't think you'll win it, at all....

10-1, to finish out of the top four..... Please....

redrus

[mrtoad]

I wont use the words 'in decline', but I do think they will need a year or 2 to be challenging for the league and Champions League.

Probably the same for City

But the bookies are offering 10/1 United finish out of the top 4!! Thats good value IMHO.

Well, we could have a beer bet on this.

[JacknDanny]

I wont use the words 'in decline', but I do think they will need a year or 2 to be challenging for the league and Champions League.

Probably the same for City

But the bookies are offering 10/1 United finish out of the top 4!! Thats good value IMHO.

Well, we could have a beer bet on this.

I will take it all day long, mate.

I am not greedy, forget 10/1, discount at 8/1. So out of the top 4, thats 8 beers you owe me, top 4, I owe you 1

[JacknDanny]

I wont use the words 'in decline', but I do think they will need a year or 2 to be challenging for the league and Champions League.

Probably the same for City

But the bookies are offering 10/1 United finish out of the top 4!! Thats good value IMHO.

You're are joking on every count there, really.....?

I honestly think we'll win the league again this year. I don't think you'll win it, at all....

10-1, to finish out of the top four..... Please....

redrus

United probably will finish 3rd.

But the point I am making is that at 10/1............... thats huge.

Lost their best player. Giggs/Scholes/ Neville past it

Berbatov never had it

I honestly think that next season is going to be rebuilding.

I think City will finish 5th, a lot closer to you guys than you are thinking

[mrbojangles]

I was having a conversation with a United fan in the bar coffee shop the other day. He was going on and on about United winning the league again and how sh1t we are. So I offered him a bet that City would finish no lower than 4 places below United, bearing in mind our plan is for 6th. He wouldn't have it.

Edited July 22, 2009 by mrbojangles