This is a funny and endearing comment, but it shouldn’t detract from the fact that he picked the team and set out the tactics tonight. He is at least partially culpable.
I’m gonna get pelters for this, but there’s been far too much Jose love over the last week for my liking. Yes, he says all the right things, but this has been a season of mixed performances so far.
We’ve played well in patches (Utd, Newcastle, Soton 2nd half, against some sub-par EL competition), and poor in others (Everton, West Ham 2nd half, Burnley, tonight).
We have a squad capable of competing in every competition IMO, and I truly do trust Jose to get tactics and team selection right against the big teams.
But we are not great against poor sides. Going back to last season with performances against Bournemouth and Sheff U, if we don’t get an early lead we really struggle to impose our will onto opponents. For me, my frustration with Jose has never been about possession or lack of attacking intent, I just wish he played higher up the pitch. I truly believe that would help us “impose” ourselves on the weaker teams more.
Burnley was a perfect example of this; they had no pacey threat in behind and 2 CM’s without attacking intent, and yet we still sat too deep for me. It meant we never won the ball high up the pitch and allowed Burnley to “shape up” defensively against us, that suits them perfectly.
We’ve had a big influx of new players so there were always likely to be some teething issues, but performances like tonight and Burnley (yes I know we won) are as much because of Jose as the great Utd performance was.