Manchester United need more cohesion, creativity and togetherness as a team, correct?
Right, said Fred. (Sorry, couldn’t pass that up).
Seriously though, the Brazilian midfielder, who suffered through a rough first season at United last year, is probably on point with a few things that he had to say in a very candid interview with Ale Oliveira (embedded below):
“Many things. We are missing a little creativity,” said Fred when asked what United need to do to catch up to fellow northwest England giants/main rivals Manchester City and Liverpool.
“We need to improve in everything. The togetherness within the team. [There is] vanity within the group. We need to focus on the same objectives.”
“When everyone has the same objectives in their minds, we start moving forwards. But one player just wants to play well or another to score a goal himself, it is more difficult to make forward passes.
United currently sit 8th in the table, the lowest of the four Premier League clubs in the Manchester-Liverpool region. They’re a whopping 38 points behind Liverpool, 16 behind City. They’re now even looking up at Everton, who not too long ago were in a real relegation scrap. That is absolutely unacceptable at United, especially so given all the money that’s been spent on player acquisition in recent years.
While these comments made by Fred will no doubt cause a stir, it does, at least partially, explain why a team with so much high priced talent is underachieving so badly. That, and the fact that the roster itself is rather disjointed from having so much managerial turnover and the fact that each manager brought in players suited to his systems, so it doesn’t exactly all coalesce well together.
So who’s to blame? Jose Mourinho was a frequent scapegoat, but he’s long gone. Paul Pogba is another person who sees the fingers pointed at him, but he’s been out injured most of the season, so you really can’t blame him too much.
Manager Ole Gunnar Solskjaer? After all he is in charger, but Fred actually backed the Norwegian as the man to lead the club.
“He’s a good person and a good trainer,” said the midfield man who has been pressed into regular first team action this season due to injuries to Pogba and Scott McTominay.
“He is a young manager, and will grow and improve. He will help us.”
Paul M. Banks runs The Sports Bank.net, which is partnered with News Now. Banks, the author of “No, I Can’t Get You Free Tickets: Lessons Learned From a Life in the Sports Media Industry,” regularly appears on WGN CLTV and co-hosts the “Let’s Get Weird, Sports” podcast on SB Nation.
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