20 Sep 2017 16:39:10
Stand, i missed your reply earlier.

I wasn't implying United are doing things wrong due to their squad age. I am a big advocate of having a blend of youth an experience which you have got perfect right now. You do things differently is all.

In 3-5 years when the likes of Micky, Mata, Fellaini, Ibra, Carrick, Valencia, Young, Herrera and the like are gone, you won't bring through any of your own players under Mourinho, or even sign young players to develop. Mourinho's idea of a young player is an already established 22/ 23 year old who costs £30-90m.

Therefore when all those players are gone, he'll want mega bucks to replace them. By contrast, we need to have a crop of cheaper younger players already coming through to take over so we don't have to scratch about for bargain basement stop gaps like Matip, Milner, Lambert and Klavan.

Genuine question; do you think Rashford will hang around playing as a winger when he is a better striker? He'll never get to play there though because Mou would rather pay Ibra massive money and pay £80m for Lukaku. I see Rashford going to Spurs or Arsenal in a few years time purely because he will be replaced by a big money signing for instant success.

I'm not for one second saying it doesn't work by the way. You'll be an elite club for a good few years doing that, but it is unsustainable (hence why Mourinho always leaves after a short spell as manager at every club without exception) . He never plans for a smooth transition into a next generation because he never plans on staying anywhere for very long! So when the time comes that a lot of players are too old, he will jump ship and leave a mess for someone else to come and fix. United have a revenue stream which practically makes their resources unlimited so they can afford to go through that cycle every 3-5 years, and Chelsea and City have investment money from over seas that we also cannot match.

Klopp has to plan for the future because we can't afford to buy our way out of a transition in 5 years time. Your transition takes a year with a good manager because of the cash you have. Our transition takes 27 years and counting because we're skint 😂

We need to have a constant conveyer of younger players from our own or other academies so that we can supplement the squad with them and only have to go big on a few players a year. United pay more wages and transfer fees for squad players than we can afford on players for the starting 11! We need the likes of Ward, Karius, Arnold, Gomez, Robertson, Grujic, Can, Woodburn, Kent, Origi, Solanke etc because probably only 4 of them will come good and then only 2 of them will stay with the club! We live in a different world.

United can afford to gut the team every few years and just pay for a new one. We can't. It's no criticism of the way you are doing it mate. It works and gets much quicker results than the way we are doing it, but it is also far more expensive and unless you have the cash, you have to do what Liverpool and Spurs are trying to do. You are not our model for success. Dortmund and Athletico Madrid are.

Hope i didn't offend you mate. I was just trying to explain to some of our fans why we have to have patience and do things differently to yourselves. The last time we had a manager (Rafa) who tried to compete with United and Chelsea financially the club almost went bust due to a wage bill and debts it could not finance. People have short memories and forget that very quickly though.

{Ed025's Note - good post that MK..

1.) 20 Sep 2017
20 Sep 2017 17:33:41
Great post, MK.

2.) 20 Sep 2017
20 Sep 2017 17:36:31
Liverpool were in trouble because of H&G and the interest they leveraged against the club. You do realise that Rafa had Lfcin the CL every season bar 1 and generating very substantial income due to the reasonable success he had in it?

3.) 20 Sep 2017
20 Sep 2017 17:58:28
Excellent post and very true MK.

4.) 20 Sep 2017
20 Sep 2017 18:18:29
Rover, Rafa had over 50 players on the wage bill at one stage. For his time he also spent a lot of money trying to play Chelsea and United at their own game. His squads were always bloated and largely full of average players because he didn't have the money he was spending. Rafa was as much to blame fir our financial predicament as H&G. He just got off with the fans because he loved the club and brought us relative success compared to the 15 which preferred him. It didn't work though and it was completely unsustainable for a club with our revenue stream.

We are not there yet. We can get there, but it takes time. We are 20 years at least behind Man Utd on the commercial side of things, and about 10 years behind Chelsea and Arsenal.

City are not at there yet either but that doesn't matter when you are owned by an oil oligarch with rich fiends to help you bypass FFP rules.

5.) 20 Sep 2017
20 Sep 2017 18:37:20
*15 years preceding him* auto correct 😐.

6.) 20 Sep 2017
20 Sep 2017 18:42:09
Mk. Liverpool gained there biggest profit circa £8 million in 07 (i think) . It took Lfc another 7 years to make another profit (£900,000). To my memory they also made a net £30 million profit in the next season only to be wiped out by £36 million interest because of H&G leverage. Liverpools wage bill was the 4th highest behind United, Chelsea and Arsenal. So it was in line with their standing at the time. You have clearly disregarded the revenue Rafa brought into the club with his CL success (circa £20 million a season) .

7.) 20 Sep 2017
20 Sep 2017 18:26:26
Cracking post.

8.) 20 Sep 2017
20 Sep 2017 19:07:11
Also Rafa signed 54 players in his time which is a lot but he sold or released 70 in the same time. So im not too sure where you are getting this squad of 50 from. In only 1 season (04/ 05) did he sign more players than he released (1 more) .

9.) 20 Sep 2017
20 Sep 2017 20:05:35
No idea of the facts and figures so i won't dispute them. Whatever the books said, Rafa wasted a lot of money. Itandje, Cavalieri, Degen, Johnson, Pauletta, Skrtel, Plessis, Dossena, Aurelio, El Zhar, Babel, Leto, Keane, Riera, Pennant, N'Gog, Voronin, Cisse, Morientes, Bellamy, Aquilani etc.

Don't let a few financial statistics paper over that buddy. Can't argue with the official figures and Rafa did earn a lot of revenue through CL qualification and progression. But he also wasted a lot of it trying to sign too many players. Although he sold as many as he signed, most of his sales were at a massive loss, and you have to consider the wages and agent fees we must've blown on such a constant squad rebuilding every summer.

If the club actually broke even most years, fair play but those figures sound wrong to me, considering the club was running at a £1m a week deficit when FSG took over. And it is impossible to deny he wasted money, even if he was making as much back. Regarding the 50 man squad, i remember reading it on here once but no idea if it was from an Ed or another poster. But we apparently had over 50 players on first team squad salaries. So some of them were probably over paid youth prospects to be fair.

10.) 20 Sep 2017
20 Sep 2017 20:41:04
Keep up the good work mk I am starting to really enjoy your work. Not quite Harry level but I take my hat off to you.

11.) 20 Sep 2017
20 Sep 2017 20:48:48
Can't comment on those nos., Rover BUT we do know this much: Rafa spent money and recruited over 70 players all together, most of which were average or simply poor. Simply having 50 players on the wage bill is damning in itself and is unacceptable. Rafa tried to play a game he was never going to win cos he had not enough cash to back it up. It tooke years for us to get out of that mess and we are just regaining our footing financially at this point BUT we lag behind the other rivals considerably. That is his fault and his only. No one else.

12.) 20 Sep 2017
20 Sep 2017 20:58:04
Cheers Walter!

13.) 20 Sep 2017
20 Sep 2017 21:51:08
Im no huge Rafa fan, but you can't ignore that he bought us some good players aswell. Alonso, Garcia, Reina, Agger, Bellamy, Aurelio, Kuyt, Arbeloa, Mascherano, Lucas, Maxi, Sterling.

14.) 21 Sep 2017
21 Sep 2017 00:12:36
MK, no offence at all mate. I always enjoy your posts, I think your one of the better posters to be honest. I obviously mistook what you were getting at. And I agree, we clearly are on anther level to Liverpool. I hate when other people label us the same as City and Chelsea though, not that you did, just in general. Obviously city and Chelsea have cash from sugar daddy owners. We're different and we earn our cash.

I genuinly think both Rashford and Martial are special talents mate. And I think both will be at the club long term. I personally don't want Zlatan back, but in reality it's only 6 months, and it's an option if Lukaku is injured or needs resting, although I'd rather play one of Rashford or Martial through the middle if Lukaku is out.

The big difference with Jose is he is much better in the market that the last two fools. When you looks at the signings Moyes and LVG made, only Mata and Hererra were good signings really. Under Jose, we've had Bailly, Miki, Pogba, Lukaku, Matic, and then Zlatan on free and Lindelof. The squad is so much stronger this season. We have spent a lot but it's spent well imo.

I suppose the question is will Klopp be given that time to build a squad? People comment on Jose leaving clubs after 2/ 3 years, but at clubs like Madrid and Chelsea your out the door with no silverware. I think he'll stay longer at united. If Klopp is trophyless again this season how long will be be before the fans turn, or fsg decide enough is enough? Interesting times ahead anyway mate.

15.) 21 Sep 2017
21 Sep 2017 03:33:00
No doubt Stoupid. Was just making the point that he did waste a lot. Not sure Bellamy and Aurelio can go on the good signing list though. One lasted a season and got moved on for fighting with team mates, and the other played about 5 games a season.

Cheers for the reply Stand. Yeah your money comes from your revenue stream so to my mind it's fair game until they make rules which stop it.

{Ed001's Note - second time round Bellers had a good spell.}

16.) 21 Sep 2017
21 Sep 2017 12:03:03
Yeah good post mk. There is a strange pride I feel (even though I of course have had nothing to do with it except buy shirts etc) when I see a youth player making it in ghe first team. Especially when they are a success. It's all relative and scouting is key. We are getting keita for half the money utd paid for pogba and keita looks the better player to me (definitely a better dancer)

Regarding rashford (who I rate and would rather have at lfc than lukaku) I was told he is a manc and loves utd, he will probably out last Jose at utd. He should be playing up front though. It won't happen coz he doesn't weigh 20 stone, I don't think would go to spurs to play up front coz of a guy called harry kane, if they changed their formation, rashford kane and alli would be a hell of a front line.