Is the reason that we keep on bottling semi-finals a mental thing, or is it just us finally encountering good teams in the tournament?
A factual thread looking at each competition we've gotten to the semi-finals of and lost under Ole Gunnar Solskjaer.
EFL Cup, 19/20 season:
Rochdale, 5-3 win on penalties
Chelsea, 2-1 win
Colchester, 3-0 win
Chelsea are the only decent team here
Semi-final:
1st leg = 3-1 defeat to Man City
2nd leg = 1-0 win to Man Utd
City win the semi-finals on aggregate 3-2, go on to win the tournament.
FA Cup, 19/20 season:
Wolves 0-0 draw, game is replayed and Manchester United win 1-0.
Tranmere, 6-0 win.
Derby, 3-0 win.
Norwich 2-1 win.
Semi-final:
Chelsea, 3-1 loss. Chelsea, the only decent team (alongside Wolves) proceed to the final where Arsenal win.
UEL, 19/20:
Partizan, 3-0 win.
FC Astana, 2-1 win.
AZ, 4-0 win
Club Brugge, 6-1 aggregate win.
LASK, 7-1 aggregate win.
København, 1-0 win.
Semi-final:
Sevilla, 2-1 loss. We end up losing to the only decent team in this campaign. Sevilla go on to win the UEL
Bearing in mind, the Europa League campaign was played with 3 less games than usual and Ole didn't have to worry about squad rotation/fixture congestion as football had just come back from lockdown.
More or less, our easiest run at a Europa League and we still managed to lose.
Semi-final:
Man City, 2-0 loss. Again. Manchester City will now join Tottenham in the final of the EFL Cup in April.
Ole Gunnar Solskjaer and United skipper Jacob Harry Maguire have a combined 1 win in their last 14 semi-finals. A 7% win rate.
That one win came from a penalty shootout back in Norway under Ole.
The worst manager x captain duo in Europe. Also have a combined 5 relegations.
In 3 of these 4 semi-final defeats the winner went on to win the final.
Pretty much, we get knocked out every single time we play the half decent team. If we lose to Liverpool in the FA Cup 4th round there's more argument that decent opposition is what knocks us out.
Overall, it isn't a mentality thing. It's an "Ole Gunnar Solskjaer isn't good enough gor Manchester United" thing.
Top reds knows it too because of the reaction when we got Liverpool. Whether we win or not, complaining we have to play a decent team says it all 💀
Disproving the notion that "ole hasn't had any money to improve his team, not his fault he can't win silverware!!!!"
A thread comparing the first 2 transfer windows of each manager post SAF.
Note how Ole is the only one of these managers incapable of spending money wisely.
This thread has nothing but factual information in it that can be found with a quick Google search. If for whatever reason you are rattled by factual information then continue scrolling 👋
Let's start with David Moyes' first 2 transfer windows. Got the least money to spend out of all manager's post SAF.
Juan Mata = £37m
Marouane Fellaini = £28m
Total = £65m
Bruno Fernandes vs Man City might be one of the worst individual performances from a Manchester United player in a semi-final and I'm not even joking.
I've just gone and rewatched the game and I have no clue how people are saying that Bruno has no blame for that loss.
The constant attempts at glory passes. Taking stupid popshots that I'd take on Fifa if I was losing 4-0 and was looking to piss around.
As much criticism as our other players get I don't even think they've ever played as bad this season as Bruno against City.
Juan Mata or Marouane Fellaini playing instead of Bruno gives us a better chance at winning that game. Normal, simple passes keeping the ball along the ground and moving.
Not playing hero ball trying to look like fucking Superman taking stupid shots at goal