Champions League exit will benefit Man Utd…

Keep your mails coming to [email protected]

Positives for United
Let me start by saying I’ll probably get hammered for this but here it goes – Tuesday night’s Manchester United result is not a disaster. Is it disappointing? Yes, absolutely. But it’s not a disaster.

The tactics were clearly wrong from the start. Especially against such a dynamic team as Leipzig. The defense was a disaster and has been for a while. Aaron Wan-Bissaka in particular had a complete nightmare. As did Luke Shaw. Playing Matic and McTominay also put us behind the eight ball. I would have much rather seen van de beek in place of one of them from the start.

But the truth is that we would have been hammered in the next round. We would be having the same conversation three months from now when we get drubbed by Bayern Munich in the knockouts. We were never going to win the champions league. The Europa league offers a much more realistic and fitting setting for this current iteration of United to get back into the champions league (than winning the champions league outright. Securing a league position in the top four is another proposition entirely). For anyone who brings up the lost money as a result of bowing out of the champions league, get a hold of yourself. We don’t watch football to keep tabs on balance sheets. For those types there’s not much I can do for you. You are better off served watching the stock market or joining an accounting firm.

Positives I’d like to take from it – The United games we are seeing are thrilling. It has been quite some time since I’ve been this entertained by a United team (good and bad). There are certainly a lot of people who wouldn’t agree with this but I’ll take the 3-2 losses in exchange for entertainment. I think for most of us who have been around long enough we’ve seen United compete at the top and we know we are nowhere near that level right now. That is disappointing. But that is also going to take time in a strategy overhaul. Having seen the draws that Van Gaal and Mourinho brought to the side I’m legitimately enjoying watching United games. I don’t want this to come off as a lack of ambition because in the sporting realm, there’s nothing I want more than United to get back to the top. Nothing. But realistically we are a good ways off of that. Could a different manager get a different result in that game last night? Yes possibly. But we’ve done all that, recently I might add. United’s problems run much deeper than the manager and the dugout. I agree that Ole is probably more of a symptom than the actual disease. But there’s no question that Ole has United playing a much better brand of football than those previous managers post SAF.

It’s a sad indictment of the current United situation that the Europa league is more our level. But the fact of the matter is that it is. I also think that most of our squad would be better served playing those Thursday night games. We are still a few players off. We need some truly class players in. And probably a few out (Pogba. Definitely Pogba). It’s perfectly okay and reasonable to rue missed opportunities and last night was one of them. So was Istanbul a few weeks ago. But we go again. Get behind your team. Get behind your manager. Glory Glory Man United. Massive game at the weekend.
Seth (Birmingham, AL, USA)


F365 Says: This is Man Utd. They are often sh*t


Irritating Rash
Rashford on Tuesday night, and when he isn’t in scoring form, is more frustrating than Martial and early-United Nani. And as wasteful as Sterling was when he first broke on the scene (It’s amazing what good coaching can do). He was as culpable as any of the attacking players for the horror show last night, and seems to go for glory more than anyone when United are chasing the game. I still wouldn’t trust him to finish off a one-on-one chance if he has time to think.

Yes, he is clearly is a good person off the field, but how much more immunity from criticism will his philanthropy afford him when he remains an enigma? Jason Roberts and Shaun Goater both have MBE’s for their off-field endeavours, not on-field excellence, too.
Brian (the amount of times Maguire’s lack of spatial awareness has been exposed in Europe is alarming), Wexford

 

No competition
Not too long ago I sent a long email talking about the delusion of utd fans and how Liverpool fans understood this more than most because we used to be those fans (can argue we still are). It didn’t go down to well with most utd fans here outright rejected it as the ramblings of a rival fan.

I was being sincere in the email, it wasn’t intended to mock, I was genuinely helping you see what everyone could but you couldn’t.

And now the page is filled with letters saying all the things I said you would say and feel. The hard part is done, you’ve all woken up and realised that your team is not good enough, that ole isn’t good enough and that you were deluding yourselves (don’t take it as an insult because again I was trying to help). The hard part is done, you’ve ripped the gauze off.

Don’t allow yourselves to be deluded again, accept the team you are now, so that you can move towards being the team you should be. Im not a bitter Liverpool fan, I want united and arsenal to the teams they were because winning only means something with adequate competition and right now, pickings are real slim.
Lee

 

Liverpool and VAR
What is it about Liverpool and VAR this season?

The penalty for Midjtyland was exactly how VAR should be working. The offside decision for them and our disallowed goal showed the uglier side of it.

The VAR probably thought the offside call was marginal so he didn’t draw lines or waste four minutes painstakingly deciding which frame the ball was played in. He gave the benefit of the doubt to the attacking side and then assessed whether Kelleher made a foul or not. That’s exactly what we want from VAR in my opinion; it didn’t slow the game down and it was generally clear what was going on.

The second call was a bit rubbish because he seems to determine it was offside by a rogue heel which took ages to figure out and nobody had any idea which phase he was checking for offside. For me I think that should’ve been benefit of the doubt for the attackers again and thus the goal should’ve stood. Finally I couldn’t really understand how they thought Mané had hand balled it for our second. I though you didn’t get called for handballs in the case of ricochets so this left me a bit confused.

What did we learn about Liverpool today? Very little. Origi really doesn’t score many goals anymore. He actually rarely even gets in a position where he might. I feel bad for Minamino. Literally nothing he tries works.
Minty, LFC

Millwall and racism
I know it has been a few days, and Millwall fans respected the most recent efforts of anti-racism messaging after being begged by their club, and match officials have decided to take up the mantle. United have lost, Liverpool will have played and Madrid are out/scraped through. If permitted, I would like to say why I believe that the booing was racist, despite all that has been written to defend them.

Firstly, to look at the gesture itself. That gesture – kneeling for racial equality – was made famous long before this summer, unsurprisingly in a sporting event. Kaepernick did it to protest police brutality, and it became a symbol of racial protest. It gained wider recognition this year after an unarmed black man was murdered by a police officer who, sadly ironically, knelt on his neck. The symbol was used throughout a summer of protest and racial unrest, but at its core, it still symbolizes an anti-racist message. It has been adopted by Black Lives Matters, as much as the ‘raised fist’ was adopted by the Black Power movement, and used famously, again, during a sporting event.

Now whether or not the Millwall fans agree with BLM, or whether they’re anti-statue toppling, or anti-Marxist or whatever excuse is being used, they chose to boo during a symbol of anti-racism, which was being used at the time to promote anti-racist messages and support of racial equality.

A similar analogy I have seen is the use of the poppy in sport, an inherently political symbol. I am personally against the poppy, and don’t support it. Now, I understand what it symbolizes to many, what it means to you and what you believe it to mean for people; but I don’t agree. To me, it symbolizes support for British occupation and murder of my country and my people. But I am also educated and respectful enough to know that in that moment of silence, the meaning it is being used for is to mourn and commemorate loved ones who have died in battle. Rightly or wrongly there doesn’t matter, that moment is about respect, that symbol is, too many, about love. I would never boo during it; I would never disrespect those who chose to celebrate it.

What the Millwall fans did when they booed the taking a knee is boo the idea of anti-racism. In that moment, that symbol was used to promote racial equality and those fans shit all over it. Whether through a lack of education, respect or empathy, or whether it was racially motivated, the Millwall fans committed a racist act by disrespecting an anti-racist message. All the other noise that has been said to defend it, to politicize the message and denounce the ideology is just that; noise. Excuses to defend an action you condone, against a message to disagree with.

Maybe it’s a moot point, especially after Tuesday night. Millwall changed their approach, they implored their fans for respect, and it was given. As many have said, the knee is just a gesture, at the end of the day, it is pointless without tangible action to support it. Otherwise it is empty, a façade to show you care, but doing nothing of real substance. Hopefully, PSG & Basaksehir showed us a glimpse of how to move forward. To not only not tolerate it, but to actively refuse to participate in a match, an organization or a society that does not grant you the equality in which you deserve, as we all do.

But then again, maybe the world is all a bit Man United-y, equally shite and good; a contradiction unto itself. A whirlwind of positivity and negativity, ups and downs. Ruled by ruthless capitalism and incompetent yesterday-men, making money hand over fist but failing at its core purpose. Headless, toothless and all a bit pointless. Until that next moment of pure euphoria and that hope starts again . . .
A pontificating (white) Irishman

 

Barnes defence
Lots of people, including John Barnes I see, are defending the words of the 4th official last night on the basis of “If he was the only black guy in a group of white people, what’s the problem – it’s the easiest way to identify him”.

I’ve just one issue with this, and it’s that the statement is manifestly false – Webo was not the only black person on the Istanbul bench at the time!!! I can’t seem to find a team sheet to check exact numbers, but at very least, Demba Ba was on the bench, hence why he was able to overhear what was said!!!

So it seems that saying “the black one” wouldn’t have been as helpful for identification purposes as these people are making out, and thus there was zero need to use it!!!
Paul (Spurs) T.Wells

 

…I read f365 for close to 10 years now. I’ve been working with a UK native Liverpool fan and being sort of a fan myself he directed me to you guys. And I’ve been enjoying it ever since. I rarely though read the Mailbox section and I never comment on any site – I’m of the self-centred view that nobody cares what others have to say.

Yesterday evening I was enjoying Leipzig against United when the commentator said that the PSG game was interrupted. Always happy to watch a good fight (that’s what I instantly assumed it was about) I switched channels. Eventually I got in a fight with my girlfriend because apparently she couldn’t see the racism in the incidents there.

Now obviously I was interested to see how f365 would cover the issues. You have the piece on Barnes’ view which starts with “John Barnes has defended the Romanian fourth official at the centre of the racism controversy…” Why it isn’t signed? Then you have Will Ford writing the Early Winner piece, the trigger for this text.

I’m not even sure if it’s worth stating the obvious. I think people would really understand what racism (or any discrimination for that matter) is only when they are capable of showing some empathy in relation to the people they are addressing, speaking about or writing about. Because it’s goddamn sad when the top line of a text on racism starts with “the Romanian fourth official”. How is the fact that the fourth official is Romanian relevant for the message you are delivering? How is this label actually different from “the black guy” label? Mind you, all four officials were Romanians.

I’ve been called a thief, I’ve been called a gypsy and now I’ll be labelled a racist because I was born in Romania and some people find it appropriate to identify others by their skin colour and other by their nationality – both nondistinctive and totally irrelevant in the respective contexts.

Thank you, Will Ford, for writing about Pierre Webo and Sebastian Coltescu and not about a black manager and a Romanian fourth official. And thanks to whomever invested time in reading this and even more so in understanding the view of the labelled.

Cheers,
the Romanian reader.

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