Man U reaction and player ratings

[IBK]

Again I think you’re missing the point, the point is not that other players didn’t make errors weren’t out of position. It’s that the space that United players had in central midfield was down to Xhaka vacating it completely. The whole team was pushed up too high and it was too easy to be caught out, my point is that defenders are more prone to mistake when the midfield in front of them is inadequate.
Zinchenko for example worries me as a left back because he doesn’t even understand how to perform the role. But the problem always begins in midfield.
Lokonga was caught out of position multiple times but again he’s trying to do the job of two people.
But overall I think the issue was less individual errors and more the system that made those errors more likely

Agreed with you last point. But I think it was Xhaka, not Lokonga, trying to do the job of 2 people in defensive MF, and I am not trying to focus on other players making mistakes (we agree it was a team thing) just giving you examples of how the player in your sights was not responsible for their goals...

[Mac76]

Agreed with you last point. But I think it was Xhaka, not Lokonga, trying to do the job of 2 people in defensive MF, and I am not trying to focus on other players making mistakes (we agree it was a team thing) just giving you examples of how the player in your sights was not responsible for their goals...

Xhaka can't do the job of one person yet alone two

[IBK]

Xhaka can't do the job of one person yet alone two

...and yet he has been an integral part of the engine room of a team sitting on top of the league; playing without his first choice MF pairing for half our matches to date, with Arsenal having the best goal difference bar Citeh and Liverpool (Pool skewed by their freak 9-0 vs Bournemouth), and having conceded only 1 more goal than Citeh and 2 more than Spurs (and fewer than all our other top 6 competitors). 3 of our conceded goals being down to clear individual defender/GK mistakes. You haters will never alter your stance, but the stats simply don't support you.

[Mac76]

...and yet he has been an integral part of the engine room of a team sitting on top of the league; playing without his first choice MF pairing for half our matches to date, with Arsenal having the best goal difference bar Citeh and Liverpool (Pool skewed by their freak 9-0 vs Bournemouth), and having conceded only 1 more goal than Citeh and 2 more than Spurs (and fewer than all our other top 6 competitors). 3 of our conceded goals being down to clear individual defender/GK mistakes. You haters will never alter your stance, but the stats simply don't support you.

our last performance does support it - i think a lot of people are underestimating now the minute we come up against the kind of team we need to beat if we're genuine top four, we allow them three goals, partly due to the fact that he's too slow to do defensive work against quality players and can 't keep the ball well enough

i'm not a Xhaka 'hater' - what i hate is that Arteta and some deluded fans think he should be in our first choice 11 when he's not good enough for a top four team

our top of the table position is only temporarily - we will only be even fourth if Arteta starts learing quickly and also some of the other teams slip up, plus we but one or two better CMs in january and ship Xhaka out

[IBK]

our last performance does support it - i think a lot of people are underestimating now the minute we come up against the kind of team we need to beat if we're genuine top four, we allow them three goals, partly due to the fact that he's too slow to do defensive work against quality players and can 't keep the ball well enough

i'm not a Xhaka 'hater' - what i hate is that Arteta and some deluded fans think he should be in our first choice 11 when he's not good enough for a top four team

our top of the table position is only temporarily - we will only be even fourth if Arteta starts learing quickly and also some of the other teams slip up, plus we but one or two better CMs in january and ship Xhaka out

OK - so provide the counter-analysis to my observations regarding how Manure scored their goals to support this. I've done a trawl of several player ratings for the game - by journalists who understand the game better than I do. These have Xhaka as a 6/7 - and only Martinelli Saka and Jesus consistently rate (1 point) higher. This simply does not support the suggestion that he was the problem - or even that he was any worse than the other Arsenal players on the pitch. Most commentators are of the view that Xhaka has performed well for us this season - in a more advanced role where he is not the principal DM.

I've said it before. I'm not particularly a Xhaka fan boy. And I agree that we could (and inevitably will) upgrade on him - albeit that clearly the manager does not consider this to be a pressing priority. But I don't like the fact that the player remains a scapegoat, and (for me) is criticised unfairly for measuring (in some people's minds) unfavourably against a perfect ideal of what we might have.

As for your final sentence - we have generally performed as well as we could ever expected to have done at this stage (the performance rather than the result against Manure - the one game we have lost - still justifies optimism). I perfer to comment on what happens - not speculate pessimistically. And top 4 is our aim this season - anyone who expects us to finish higher is a bit delusional, IMO.