Virgil van Dijk, for that donkey, Chris Smalling ?

Not for me. The point at Anfield was a good one considering the form of both teams this season, yesterday was two points dropped though.

Wenger's substitutions worked and got him a point.

Mourinho's substitutions? Not so much.

Fair enough, I have no issues with people thinking like your good self, I just think it was a huge missed opportunity, and two points very much dropped there, but I can see why others might think differently.

Personally, I wouldn't class De Gea as average or a has been, who else would you prefer we had as our goalkeeper??

Makes me chuckle sometimes in here. Last season at this stage when we were picking up points nicely in the top 4, we were getting hammered for playing dour unimaginative football and almost inevitably we eventually dropped away. This season when we are playing what people were asking for - more imaginative stuff and IMO better than last season - we are getting hammered for not picking up enough points.

Well I know what I'd rather have of the two - this season - because we are mostly playing well, though annoyingly, have dropped points in three successive home games. But given that it's a new style of play, new manager and still first third of the season, I think the results will come and when they do it will be more enjoyable to watch than last season.

Luck in football evens out, so too do things like drawn games and most of the other top teams will at some point have spells like this. I see no reason to change my early season thoughts of a top 4 finish. But the title challenge will have to wait a year.

Who do you see us overtaking in the top 4? I think its still early and mathematically possible but I'd be suprised if Chelsea, Liverpool and City didn't occupy 3 of the 4 spots on offer then you have Arsenal, although they were poor yesterday would you fancy us finishing ahead of them when there notorious for clawing out top four finishes. Nevermind Tottenham too, unless we become more consistent regardless of our potential we won't get top 4.

But that's my point - because we are playing better than last year and the other things I mentioned, we will start to get more consistent results, hopefully before the turn of the year. Quality of play is already fairly consistently good IMO, but sadly, the results don't yet match the play.

Who will we overtake? I've no idea, just as none of us knows who will win the league - though it won't be us. But with (I think) improving consistency from us and 5 teams above us to potentially have poor spells, it's not unreasonable to think 2 or 3 of them can be overtaken. But of course, they won't all have poor spells, so the title challenge is out and I readily concede that.

Maybe the suits will look beyond the results and compare our overall performances with last year?

Arsenal didn't win a trophy for ten years but won CL qualification instead. Look at the bigger picture.

Liverpool got 8th last season but they showed signs of progress with some good football chucked in. Maybe the answer is to give the manager more time to get it right?

I can see the bigger picture, honestly the signs for us are otherwise positive if we can get it together I genuinely believe in the coming years that the title could be coming back to Old Trafford. This season though there is a question mark over us, hopefully we can get there.

The summer will once again be a big one, as if we miss out on a top four spot, then our income will go down hugely, as the bug money deal with our kit supplier goes down by about thirty percent I think.

We will need to add a goalscorer, as I think perhaps both Wayne and Ibra will be off, so that would leave Rashford as our only senior striker (if we are not classing Martial as a striker these days).
So we will need to spend big again, even with perhaps a depleted income.

Which is why this season it is vital that somehow we get Champions League football back at the club for next season, however despite our progressive football this season, very frustratingly, the results have not matched that part, and so that might well end up costing us, both on and off the pitch.

RVP is back to doing what he does best, scoring goals

Pleased for him especially considering his eye problem from a few weeks ago, could of been a lot worse for him than it has turned out to be. I wish we still had RVP to be honest, yes he was injury prone and not the player he once was but the one thing he guarantees you is goals and that is something we have been in short supply of at Old Trafford in recent times.

Selling off so many strikers without adequate replacements hasn't done us any favours whatsoever.

This should have been a penalty

http://s1244.photobucket.com/user/jr...lypmh.jpg.html

I agree, I think the selling of Hernandez and RvP, was the correct thing to do in both of their circumstances, but the problem was not adequately replacing them.

Rooney doesn't play as a striker anymore, Martial is not viewed it seems as a striker, and Ibra at best is a short term fix, so we really only have Rashford to build around.
More options would be nice to have in the future.

To think that there were rumours of Mata being sold.His goals and assist stats are one of the best in the Premier league apparently.

I'm pretty sure I argued those exact same points in the summer, which you disagreed with. That Rooney won't play as a striker (much), Martial would be considered a wide player, and that you'd be relying on an aging Zlatan and Rashford to come good. According to you, though, those two, and Fletcher and Wilson were good enough. When I argued you'd need to sign another striker in between Zlatan and Rashford, you said it's fine, and you considered Fletcher and Wilson as part of that strike force, and argued that your strike force is "up there with any of them".

It's funny how times change, eh?

Also funny how man united fans argued last season that they didn't need to sign another striker even though they had less options than now.

Surprisingly situations do change, in the summer Wilson was not injured for the rest if this season, plus Fletcher was still with us, so we did have somewhat adequate cover, that is not really the case now.

With Wilson being injured and Fletcher sold, that means the situation that you are talking about has drastically changed.
Now we could do with one, maybe two senior strikers, to compliment Rashford, and to take some of the burden away from him, seeing as presumably Ibra will not be around for next season (I kind if think he might join Becks in Miami or go somewhere else in America who has a free DP slot).

Not me Gov!

I was pissed LVG sold three strikers and decided to rely solely on Rooney. We got Martial last minute and Rashford was thrown in because everyone was injured.

Fletcher and Wilson becoming unavailable hasn't changed a thing. I even argued as much in the Summer. You only had Zlatan and Rashford as strikers. I said that. To include Wilson and Fletcher as part of that strikeforce was entirely wishful thinking on your part. The most they'd feature is in the odd cup game. Wilson and Fletcher were completely irrelevant, before and after injuries and transfers.

I said you will need more than Rashford and Zlatan, to handle the league and Europa league, and to have someone inbetween Zlatan and Rashford. I didn't need situations to change to know that. You only had Rashford and Zlatan, that's all you were going to have if you didn't buy a striker in the summer. That's what I said.

It seems I was right all along, and now you're making the same points I was making, that you were disagreeing with just a few months ago.

I think we are perhaps on somewhat on the same page due to the injury to Wilson and, the selling of Fletcher, both could have taken the burden off of Rashford to a degree at times this season, sadly now though obviously that is not the case.

The reason that we need one or at a push two extra strikers is due to the above happening, and them not being replaced within the squad (it is unfortunately too early for Gomes, Chong, and Buffonage from the Under 18's).

If we had signed Ibra plus one other striker once Fletcher was sold, then perhaps in hindsight, that would have been better.

No, we are not on the same page, because you included them two as part of your strike force back in June, and I didn't, because I knew they wouldn't feature, or at a push they'd make the odd cup appearance.

Fletcher was sold, so obviously not good enough. If Wilson wasn't injured he still wouldn't have featured. They are totally irrelevant, and totally irrelevant to what I'm saying now. Injured or not, sold or not, they wouldn't have made a difference.

The reason you needed another striker was argued in the summer, because Zlatan was an aging striker who wasn't proven in this league, and Rashford had to prove he was good enough. Wilson and Fletcher being unavailable means NOTHING in any context. The reason you needed to invest in a striker are the same now as they were in the summer, but since Wilson and Fletcher were fit and available you didn't seem to think it was needed.

I didn't need hindsight to make my point. I didn't have the benefit of hindsight back in the summer when you thought a strike force of Zlatan, Rashford, Wilson and Fletcher was good enough to challenge for the league and compete in the Europa League. When I said Martial would be classed as a wide player, and Rooney wouldn't play up front, and so you only had two recognised first team strikers in Zlatan and Rashford. I don't know why you keep mentioning Wilson and Fletcher when they were irrelevant then and they are even more irrelevant now.

I believe Fletcher was offered a contract but decided to go elsewhere.

Wilson may have been decent at youth level but I've seen nothing to suggest he can step up. Yeah I agree we needed better alternatives.

The lack of goal from the midfield is also worrying.