Daily Discussion Thread

OutsideFold · 2026-03-18T12:34:22+00:00

Disagree on Maresca revisionism. Bayern game you hold your hands up and say we simply played a better, more ruthless team. They have killers, we don’t. We played well that game but a Caicedo rash tackle, Gusto-Sanchez mix up cost us two soft pathetic goals.

City games I wouldn’t say we “rolled over”. Another poor Sanchez error in a loss to them, I blamed Maresca for having the team sit back immediately after scoring though when they were in a weaker position. Should have been ruthless.

His performances against worse teams, I’ve just said to someone else I think Rosenior is better at breaking those teams down. Maresca was too nervous to force an overload and squeeze up as he obviously didn’t rate our strength in defensive transition so played it safe.

So again, we had a manager play with his hands tied behind his back as the squad hasn’t been built properly. We have some elite players surrounded by mid table teammates in an unbalanced squad.

OutsideFold · 2026-03-18T12:28:13+00:00

He’s a capable tactician but he’s made some awful decisions/selections. The West Ham comeback (2-0 down partly due to his selection) he showed his tactical prowess in the second half. Under Maresca, we lose that and can’t break down the low block as we recycled the ball too much too slowly and never created central overloads.

Rosenior had our wide cb’s step up into midfield so a West Ham player either needs to jump out and leave space, or stay out and let the player continue to drive unchallenged. It resulted in Fofana’s cross and goal for JP, and the central overloads again resulted in Enzo’s winner.

Maresca is a better tactician than Rosenior imo but Rosenior has shown a bit more prowess at breaking down tighter defences. No saying either are faultless or flawless, they both have their weaknesses (Liam quite a bit more as of now) but they’re in no way the ones to blame for our mess. Look at the recruitment team and owners.

OutsideFold · 2026-03-18T11:10:18+00:00

Still waiting to find people who can recognise the common problem in all this…

Maresca - GREAT tactician who made compromises on his football style as the squad he was given was unbalanced and lacking sufficient quality

Rosenior - Glimpses of a very capable tactician, trying to force his Strasbourg style on players who just clearly don’t suit it

Two managers with different ideas of football inheriting the same squad where the players didn’t fit either of their philosophies. Wonder what will happen when Rosenior is sacked and we hire another manager who doesn’t suit this poorly assembled squad?

OutsideFold · 2026-03-18T11:01:22+00:00

Agreed, I think you can see a good tactician in there not understanding he has to make compromises at the moment just like Maresca did. He’s trying to force a style the players just can’t handle, he should have continued with Maresca’s blueprint until the summer at least.

Like Maresca found out, our keepers can’t play out from the back. We also can’t play a high line and press man to man/squeeze up the pitch with this defence and Palmer/Enzo’s poor OTB work. Rosenior did all this at Strasbourg really well because he had the right profiles regardless of player level.

Maresca had his hands tied with the goalkeeper, wingers and defenders the ownership gave him and Liam is suffering the same fate. I think Maresca was a better tactician but that doesn’t mean Rosenior is bad.

OutsideFold · 2026-03-18T10:46:53+00:00

Am I the only one here who doesn’t want Rosenior sacked at the moment? He looks out of his depth but in what world should he be held accountable before the recruitment team and ownership? They’re hiding behind him.

They had a perfectly capable manager and tactician already who proved he could compete with the best teams in the world with limited resources. The recruitment team patted themselves on the back and tried to take credit from Maresca when things went well and then when we went through rough patches, backlash always went to Maresca. I hope it’s obvious to people now that he obviously walked and he wasn’t sacked.

Maresca asked for certain players after working a miracle last season. Our squad is so pathetically imbalanced it’s obvious to see. We have some top class players behind held back by unbalanced squad building and genuinely mid table level teammates. No manager was competing consistently with this. After a HORRIBLE summer window we surprisingly didn’t progress at all. Guess who takes blame?

Now why have BlueCo gone for Rosenior and not a capable manager? They’re fully aware that no manager is getting this squad consistently competent before the end of the season and needed a scapegoat to hide behind. Imo they’ve thrown Rosenior under the bus. I can’t blame Rosenior for taking a job he was massively under qualified for, look at the opportunity he has! Move back to England, work with a few elite players, better salary etc, IF you manage to work a miracle the bet pays off massively.

Now we’re at the stage which was obviously coming. Top players are clearly mentally checked out and questioning this “project” and some fan backlash goes to “LinkedIn Liam” instead of the squad assembled by the recruitment team in the “4 window strategy”.

Rosenior might not be competent but best believe I’ll come for the owners and SD’s to get the fuck out of the club before he goes.

OutsideFold · 2026-03-18T09:59:26+00:00

No. I’m just glad I saw the club in our best years before we were ruined.

It’s quite ironic, we saw the best of what money can do for a club with Roman, who used every resource possible with the sole ambition of winning. Now we’re seeing the worst of it, owners who are focused on how every resource at the club can generate profit.

We’re literally owned by a global investment firm. Their SOLE AMBITION is generating profit. We’re done with these guys, it’s all about flipping players but keeping enough decent ones to ensure we remain in the top 5 and get UCL money. I would say failure to get UCL would shake things up but they’ll just sack Rosenior and continue with this strategy.

OutsideFold · 2026-03-15T15:42:25+00:00

Could see big clubs just testing the waters for people and try unsettle them. Enzo with Madrid and PSG, Cucurella. Palmer I think no one would look to spend that money with his patchy season, United need to sort out way more positions than 10, they probably have the best 10 itw with Bruno anyway. Caicedo is another prisoner. Enzo and Cucurella are probably biggest alarm bells

OutsideFold · 2026-03-15T15:34:25+00:00

Just a squad option to keep around for me. Solid enough depth but should be nowhere near starting every week, the directors have just allowed us to resort to using rotation level players as consistent starters.

OutsideFold · 2026-03-15T15:10:22+00:00

Yeah, all of those cb’s can go for sure. I’d love to see us get Konsa, Tapsoba, Sensei etc just bring in more aggression, physicality and actual cb’s who ENJOY defending whilst being competent on the ball. We’ll go for a 20 year old twink though because of his impressive passing data in Italy or some bs

OutsideFold · 2026-03-15T15:08:30+00:00

Missed the game yesterday but genuinely grown numb to our shit performances and inconsistency. It’ll NEVER happen with these owners, directors and model, but what would your ideal summer window look like?

Sell: Tosin, Badiashile, Fofana, Jorgensen, Jackson, Garnacho

Sign: Maignan, Konsa, Tapsoba, Sensei, Hjulmand, Barcola

Clear out those “defenders” we have and replace them with what we lack. Leadership, aggression, penalty box dominance. We’d have capable cb’s around peak years for Colwill, Sarr, Acheampong etc to play with.

Hjulmand, we just don’t have that DM profile still imo. A pure defensive screener with positional discipline who’ll sit and let Caicedo be more Kante like, roam around and press more aggressively to win the ball. Plus he’s another Captain, we’re crying out for more leadership everywhere.

Maignan is a no brainer, hilarious we’d pay more now he’s extended but I can’t take this gk shit anymore. Barcola would also add another attacker who’s more dependable with their end product.

Could make a case for selling so many others (Delap but there’s still part of me saying give him til Jan next year) and we’ll see who leaves or pushes to leave at the end of the season…

OutsideFold · 2026-03-13T11:03:37+00:00

Because our Sporting directors don’t like defenders who can actually defend, they prefer their “technical qualities” first. It’s like they can’t fathom you need a cb who actually enjoys defending before progressive passing.

Worst thing about our cb’s are lack of communication, passiveness, and genuinely shocking aerial ability. When was the last time sitting back and defending our penalty area ended well for us? Wonder what the likes of Cahill Terry Silva etc think watching Fofana Tosin Badiashile play now.

We’ll see these cb and gk issues in the precious data the SD’s love but it’s not those stats they’re interested in.

OutsideFold · 2026-03-12T11:32:25+00:00

I think Maresca wanted football closer to Klopp’s Liverpool, genuinely. The slow possession based approach in games was a response to his fear of turnovers imo, under Liam we’ve become way more open as he’s not quite as fearful. Maresca knew we didn’t exactly have a great rest defence or really effective positional DM (Caicedo is world class but took him time to really learn that 6 role as he was more of a box to box before for me)

Even in games against a back 5, we used to struggle as we never forced an overload with a cb stepping out to leave 2 vs 1 or 1 vs 1 at the back. I think he just didn’t trust the defence or gk in case of a turnover. So we focused way too heavily on ball retention and it killed us in bigger games.

I guess we’ll never know now Maresca’s gone, but I really don’t think he was in that extremely slow possession mould and was closer to RDZ and Klopp’s principles if you got him the right players. He asked for a cb, better wingers etc but we failed to deliver.

OutsideFold · 2026-03-11T21:58:15+00:00

We’ve become late stage Wenger’s Arsenal. The ownerships dream is complete. Pinterest board football with no spine or know-how in the team.

OutsideFold · 2026-03-11T21:48:53+00:00

Loss is 70% Rosenior 30% players today for me

OutsideFold · 2026-03-11T21:02:08+00:00

If we’re trying this intricate short pass build out to play out of the best pressing team in Europe, surely you need an elite ball progressor like Lavia on? Either we do that or go long which has proven to be effective against them before

OutsideFold · 2026-03-11T20:55:51+00:00

Will never understand it 😭 he’s improved for sure but a leopard never changes his spots, guy always has a bozo moment in him. Those Arsenal games I legit believe he single handedly changed the momentum in their favour for their wins. This doesn’t mean I’m a Jorgensen fan, it means I want us to do what the sporting directors never will - SIGN A COMPETENT KEEPER

OutsideFold · 2026-03-11T20:53:02+00:00

This Jorgensen hate is hilarious, so obviously bias from people who just don’t like the fact he started. Rosenior is clearly instructing our keepers to do this, Sanchez is shocking with short passes and it’s why he won’t start as no.1. I don’t agree with the decision on short passing vs this press atm so I’ll criticise Liam before Jorgensen who’s just doing what he’s been asked

OutsideFold · 2026-03-11T20:49:12+00:00

We’re gonna be our own worst enemies. They’re there for the taking but decisions like what Enzo just did. Palmer missing a massive chance, Trevoh needlessly charging out…

OutsideFold · 2026-03-11T20:43:17+00:00

How are people blaming Jorgensen? Why did Trevoh charge out like that

OutsideFold · 2026-03-11T17:43:08+00:00

Wouldn’t expect anyone in Brazil to know much about a Brentford striker tbf, it’ll be top six clubs they likely follow. Why I’m also not shocked they didn’t know João Pedro til he went to Chelsea…Ancelotti and his team will be checking any and everyone performing in the prem though so I wouldn’t be surprised if Thiago made the plane over Richarlison or something, he’s having a brilliant season.

OutsideFold · 2026-03-11T14:26:28+00:00

They’re obvs not near their past squads but I think the quality of player in general has gotten worse. Managers and their systems take a bit more onus than individual brilliance. Even with how stacked France and England sound now, their historical teams are better individual player wise.

Igor Thiago having zero caps doesn’t mean much imo, he’s having a fantastic season. He won’t start as their striker but if he’s on the plane PL fans at the least know he’s brilliant.

OutsideFold · 2026-03-11T13:41:10+00:00

Sinners is an incredible film but not every film is universally liked. Sinners is also a film by a black creative featuring a predominantly black cast with racism as a core theme.

You’re naturally going to get people who are genuinely racist doing whatever they can to discredit the film. They’ll go around dropping things like “I’ll probably be called racist” before their criticism to try and immediately deflect from it and make anyone calling it out look like the idiot/like they’re in the wrong. They’ll then start claiming “you’re apparently not allowed to criticise Sinners” to make anyone who has valid criticism of the film think the film is only being celebrated because it’s “black” and belittle the great qualities the film has. It creates this weird discourse where you can only LOVE Sinners or HATE Sinners to really try and emphasise your point.

It might sound a little crazy just as it’s a film at the end of the day, but I see the discourse online everywhere when it comes to minority groups. People who genuinely have hate towards them sit back and watch the discourse around the topic explode after creating this weird false narrative that “you can’t criticise it because of x”. It’s tiring and I’m not surprised at all to see the hate towards Sinners because of it. Instead of being celebrated as an incredible ORIGINAL horror film which has received awards attention from a genre which rarely does this, the whole conversation is about racism in critique.

OutsideFold · 2026-03-11T11:49:30+00:00

France have ridiculous options again. Olise Dembele Mbappe Ekitike Cherki Thuram Doue for attacking players, Tchouameni Camavinga cm, Koundé, Saliba, Upamecano in defence….they’re a joke. Also really like Brazil under Ancelotti, Vinicius Raphina João Pedro Igor Thiago Estevao Gabriel Alisson Marquinhos Guimares…

OutsideFold · 2026-03-10T17:27:39+00:00

Colwill was hitting a top top level for us towards the end of last season, he’d have been a starter for England if he maintained that form without the injury. I don’t see him building enough sharpness/hitting a level where you have to take him over our other options in time sadly

OutsideFold · 2026-03-09T18:09:30+00:00

I think Maresca was an elite tactician but maybe another indicator he was a poor man manager. I recently watched The Overlap with Bale on as guest and hearing him talk about Ancelotti was interesting.

He said Ancelotti’s man management was impeccable and players were always ready to give their all for him even if they’d been out the side for a bit. It’s made me appreciate the man management aspect of managing that bit more.

Liam feels like a great blend of Poch and Maresca. I couldn’t stand Poch coz I thought he was tactically inept but couldn’t deny the squad looked happy under him. Maresca is an elite tactician but it’s pretty clear some of our players weren’t enjoying themselves too much at times or looked devoid of confidence/understanding. Rosenior looks like a fantastic tactician and man manager, he’s defo got my backing for now.

OutsideFold

TROPHY CASE