Quote Originally Posted by IBK View Post
You see, your position is precisely where I find confirmation bias rather than accurate analysis.

If you have to pick a player out for Manure's first goal, it is Gabriel M, not Zhaka. Gabriel needlessly jumped into a tackle with Fernandes (who had drawn Lokonga - not Xhaka - out of position) and failed to come away with the ball. And our left side was vacated by both Martinelli higher up the pitch - who failed to block the passing lane - and Zinchenko, leaving Anthony with acres of space.

For their second, again it was Lokonga who was caught out of position, allowing Fernandes to drop between the lines and deliver the pass to Rashford.

Their third goal was a team mess, caused by the triple sub, and we were all over the place. Our wing backs again failed to track their runners.

I felt that of our CM's Lokonga was dragged wide more regularly than Xhaka who often tried to move central when this happened. Xhaka moved wide in attack, but this was (I think) more to create an overload so I suspect that this was instructed.

As I said earlier, though, it was team frailties throughout that exposed us to Manure's more organised structure.

While I respect that you are entitled to your view - blaming Xhaka for Sunday's defeat represents scapegoating of a player that you have pre-decided is a problem, and so will look to blame rather than more favoured players.
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