Arsenal are actually an interesting one too - horrible start to the season and calls for Arteta to be sacked, but they seem to have turned it around somewhat recently. You still get the impression any half decent team will destroy them though. Technically Arteta had even less managerial experience than Solskjaer when appointed.

The manager has form for being a dick in public to players who aren't his favourites, especially when it looks like they're leaving the club. It's a wonder any of the players outside of the inner circle show the slightest loyalty to him as he has form for throwing players under the bus, whilst never taking so much as a shred of responsibility on his own shoulders. Not the kind of leader I'd want. How is Rothwell still a 'young lad' learning his trade? He's 27 in January ffs.

From what I remember he was initially brought in as a stop-gap, a caretaker manager who could get the fans onside for a little while due to the history he has at the club. However, Solskjaer did much better than anticipated and suddenly a lot of fans were clamouring for him to be given the role permanently. A strong board would have stuck to their guns and brought in the best possible replacement to take over from Ole, but United's board were weak and caved in to the demands of the crowd. Truth be told it's gone better than anyone at Man Utd could have realistically expected up until this point, but Ole's limitations are becoming painfully apparent now. He could still get them into the top four, but when 4th becomes your goal it isn't long before you end up like Arsenal.

I think Lampard knew as well as anybody that it wasn't going to be a long-term thing unless he had some serious success very quickly - which was unlikely as from what I remember they were under some kind of transfer ban at the time. Considering his inexperience, and Chelsea's situation when he arrived, Lampard did fairly well imo, but once they were able to sign players again it was a matter of time until a top manager was brought in as Lampard had a ceiling and Chelsea weren't prepared to wait years for him to gain the experience needed to raise that ceiling. Lampard knew better than anybody how ruthless Abramovic is, so I doubt he was particularly surprised when he was moved on. Solskjaer is basically at United for the same reason Lampard was at Chelsea - nostalgia. Managing Molde and relegating Cardiff isn't exactly a CV that screams 'top level manager'. I actually think up until this point Solskjaer has overperformed based on his experience and ability, but his ceiling has also become painfully obvious. With the amount of time he's been in the job and the money spent on players (United's much maligned backline cost close to £200m to assemble) there's no way they should be getting dicked 5-0 at home to Liverpool. It wasn't even a case of being unfortunate either, they were totally ripped apart and embarrassed. I don't think it's a case of players downing tools (except Pogba, possibly) as the midweek game against Atalanta suggests they are still playing for the manager. Solskjaer is just way out of his depth compared to top managers and unless United are willing to accept being also-rans for the foreseeable future they will need to make a change to get back into contention. Personally though I hope Ole continues on for a long time to come!

Neville isn't exactly lacking bias when it comes to Solksjaer. Pretty sure he'd have a very different opinion if it wasn't one of his mates in the dugout. Carragher in this instance is correct, United need a better manager than Solksjaer, just like Chelsea needed a better manager than Lampard before Tuchel was appointed and dramatically improved everything almost instantly.

He's been there since 2018, so he's had plenty of time to build a team that doesn't get destroyed 5-0 at home by the club's biggest rivals tbf. But I agree, hope Ole stays there for another 3 years at least. United are lucky Liverpool took it easy (or easier) once Pogba got sent off. Could have been 8 or 9 if they'd stepped it up a gear at any point in the second half. Salah looked visibly annoyed that his team mates weren't going for more, as I'm sure he knows he could have had another two or three at least. Can't really blame Liverpool for seeing the game out though, no point risking injury or expending any more energy than necessary considering the scoreline.

I guess Pogba wants Ole out as well 😂

You'd imagine this is it for Ole. Even if they get a couple back and it ends 4-2 that first half was a sackable offence in of itself.

There are teams in the PL who have shown you can be competitive in the division (for most clubs this just means avoiding relegation) without having huge resources - Burnley being an obvious one. Norwich can't use that as an excuse, especially when you consider how Brentford have taken to the top flight so far. Either the model at Norwich is incompatible with what is required at PL level, or Farke just isn't the manager needed for the situation they're in. Hearing them talk about accepting relegation a couple of seasons ago was embarrassing and as a fan I would have been furious with that kind of attitude. Even if you're fighting against the odds to survive, there's no excuse for accepting defeat as essentially inevitable. The problem at Norwich is that they aren't even doing the absolute basics required when you're an underdog in a division - closing down, keeping a compact shape, making it tough for the opposition to break you down. Farke can set up a team to do well when his team are one of the best in the division and don't have to focus too much on the defensive side of things (from memory they conceded the most goals of any Championship 1st placed team in the past decade plus), but seems to have no answer when his team are the underdogs and need to be more careful and detailed in their approach.

I think you're probably right. I have a lot of respect for Mick as a manager and how he generally goes about his business, but if I was recruiting it would be difficult to overlook him presiding over Cardiff's worst run in their entire history. I'd probably invite him in for an interview so that he could give his side of the story in regards to what happened, but I think the way it ended at Cardiff will have been a real hammerblow to his reputation. He's only 62 so in managerial terms he isn't ancient, and in fairness his record pre-2020 is still very good. It's just been a tough couple of years for him. He's someone I'd want to talk to if I was in charge of hiring a new manager, but I'd definitely need reassurances regarding what caused Cardiff's total and utter collapse under his watch.

Weather is turning cold, think we may have to prepare for Ayala being gone for a while unfortunately.

As I've said before, I believe our general first 11 are good enough to get into the playoffs. It's the manager and squad depth that are our major blockers to achieving that. Anyway, good that the death spiral is over for now and nice to get a clean sheet.

Surely McCarthy can't continue there much longer. Judging by the stats Cardiff are getting battered, again, at home to Boro. If they lose today it will be their 8th loss on the spin, which is ridiculous. Also only scored a single goal during that entire run (against us, naturally). Something has obviously gone badly wrong there, for whatever reason.

It's the same demeanour he had during our 2 wins in 17 run last season, when I think even Mowbray assumed he was going to be removed. It's crazy that he's still here, really, and he is probably as confused as the rest of us as to why he's being allowed to continue.

I don't know, I mean we didn't have these awful death spirals under GB, and he didn't tend to overcomplicate his tactics or team selection either. If anything he was too rigid, unable to think outside of the box when it was required. Mowbray on the other hand thinks so far out of the box that he ends up in another universe entirely. Even during the season we finished 9th under GB we had a decent cup run, which we've never had under Mowbray. When it did start going bad under GB (largely thanks to players being sold from underneath him and a proper transfer embargo) he was removed fairly swiftly by Venky standard. Mowbray meanwhile has continued to linger like a bad smell despite being at least 18 months overdue for replacement.

Why do you think he's been better for us than Bowyer, out of curiosity? I don't think promotion from League 1 can really count against Bowyer as he never took us to that level to begin with. In terms of full Championship campaigns Bowyer got us 7th and 9th, whereas Mowbray has been 15th, 11th, 15th. I don't think Mowbray's football has been any better to watch and by the end of his tenure he may have left us with very little in assets if BBD, Rothwell, Lenihan, Kaminski and Nyambe all leave this summer.

I don't think the average age of a squad is really correlated to league position. Teams with the oldest average age of players used so far in the division: Sheff Utd (27.6) - 17th Birmingham (27.4) - 19th Millwall (27.3) - 11th WBA (27) - 3rd Derby (26.8) - 24th Fulham (26.8) - 2nd Teams with the yougest average squad age in the division: Barnsley (23.1) - 23rd Rovers (23.7) - 13th Bournemouth (24.2) - 1st Hull (24.6) - 22nd Forest (25) - 14th Swansea (25) - 15th Even if you take out the recently relegated PL teams and Derby's points deduction I don't think there's going to be a particularly strong correlation between average age of the squad and league position. In fact I'd posit that it's very weak, even moreso when you take into account that the minimum is 23.1 and the maximum is 27.6. We aren't talking a very large variance there as far as the average is concerned. I can't be bothered to do a regression against the data but I am fairly sure it would not yield a statistically relevent correlation. I think it's just an easy excuse for him to make.

I think the "Mowbray, sort it out" chants bruised his ego. We've seen before that he reacts like a petulant child when the fans dare make their displeasure known.

Imagine BBD does go in January. The only remotely positive thing about the club and our top goalscorer (ridiculous as both of those statements are) gone and probably replaced with injury-prone Josh Maja on loan. Once the cold weather hits we may be without Ayala for a while as well. That would be bleak.

Kean, Berg, Appleton, Bowyer, Lambert, Coyle, Mowbray. Yep, depressing is right. 7 managerial appointments and the best they have to show for it is finishing 2nd in League 1.

Fair point, I think my brain tries to limit his involvement at the club as much as possible, so I try to forget he existed at all before December 2010.

Well yeah, but technically he was still hired as manager by them, so I'd say he has to count. If we're talking purely external appointments then there isn't much competition as other than Kean none of the others lasted more than 3/4 of a season. In my view Bowyer has been the best manager of the Venky era, and that just about says it all really! He probably had a bigger wage budget, but most of it was taken up by the dross and pay-offs from contract terminations inherited from his predecessors. I was annoyed by Bowyer towards the end, but that's nothing compared to how it feels with Mowbray now. It was nowhere near as hopeless. Bowyer was terminated for far less than the abysmal form and general performance Mowbray has displayed over the past couple of seasons. Makes you wonder if his sacking was based on performance at all, or something totally unrelated. It's either that or the owners have lost whatever small amount of interest and ambition they had between now and then.

Bowyer finished higher in this division than Mowbray ever has or will with Rovers, twice. He wasn't good enough either, but I don't think there's much (any?) evidence to say Mowbray has done better.

The thought of Mowbray getting a contract extension makes my blood run cold. Not sure I can handle much more of this hopelessness. I know Venky's are and will always be the root cause of our issues, but this utter apathy and inertia is soul destroying.

The worst part isn't even losing these hopeless, pathetic matches. It's that we all know there is no consequence that the manager or anybody else at the club has to face. Just a shrug of the shoulders and we move on into this seemingly endless oblivion. Still, dem £14.60 tickets. How could people not want to jump on that opportunity to watch this garbage?