Dodged a bullet with Ronaldo

bomdia Ole lost less league games than Pep Man City in 19/20 and 20/21 season combined so we are not far off. Just seemed to draw too many games we should have won. Been a problem since SAF left, we draw games we should win too many times. SAF found a way to win those games consistently.

I think we got too many bottle job players. They seem to freeze when it matters, last 2 seasons cup competitions prove it.

De Gea is a below average goalkeeper. I actually joked he most likely will not save a shot in the Europa League final and not only did he go 120 minutes without saving a shot, he also didn’t save one after tons of penalties and ignored instruction for one of the penalties which if he hadn’t would have been an easy save. Then he takes his penalty and it was so poor, you could see the other goalkeeper already knew he was gonna save it before he even took it.

Man Utd would most likely have won the last 2 seasons Europa Leagues if they played Romero and Henderson. What annoys me is we had the highest save percentage goalkeepers in our last 3 Europa League campaigns but played De Gea near end of the competition to have near the lowest save percentage in the competition.

Its a bit like Klopp playing Allison and him saving nearly every shot and then playing the reserve keeper who can’t really make a save. 2018 CL final is De Gea level Karius and 2019 is Alisson Romero and Henderson level.

Interestingly our lack of trophies is mainly due to De Gea being so bad. He barely made any saves in crucial cup games and made howlers that knocked us out. Even if we had someone like Roy Caroll ability instead of De Gea we most likely would have won 2-3 trophies.

Even Ole said he knew Henderson has an amazing record at saving penalties and De Gea a terrible one yet kept De Gea as he played 120 minutes yet he never made a save in the whole game and the only shot he had to save was a weak shot near him.

It is telling Henderson and Romero both in last 6 and a half years had significantly higher save percentage and XG prevention and clean sheets than De Gea.

Man Utd record of home clean sheets in 2021 was embarrassing. What is worse was we had near the most expected clean sheets of all the teams in the premierleague in 2021 and like the fewest in 2021 as De Gea conceded more goals than expected in nearly every home league game in 2021.

I honestly think Man Utd just give him player of the month no matter what. He has won so many player of the months awards despite that month conceding more goals than expected and having below average save percentage. It is funny since SAF left he has been consistently near the bottom of saves per game but somehow he makes a camera save for a shot straight at him, they think he is amazing.

De Gea rarely dives for any shots, if it ain’t straight at him he won’t even try to get near it. Also on one on ones he is the worst keeper I have seen, he stays on his line and makes it like an open goal for the opponent. He also is shocking at corner and set-piece defending.

https://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/sport/football/david-de-gea-man-united-22660111.amp

Just look at the Liverpool game they beat us by 5. When Man Utd have one on ones a couple of times Allison confronts our player and De Gea in much better positions to confront the player just stays where he is and lets them score.

Look at the goal we conceded at home to Newcastle and last goal away to Watford, he just makes it so easy, I think Fred would have done a better job.

Our expected goals against in last 6 games has been 5.66 goals and we conceded 5 goals. In that time we had the 4th best expected goals record in that period yet they make it sound like De Gea has been heroic lol. Averaging less than 1 expected goal a game over a 6 game period is usually a title winning defence form.

The main criticisms of expected goals (xG) often appear in scenarios where the metric isn’t actually being applied correctly. The most common of which is at the game level. The team that has the higher xG in a match doesn’t necessarily imply that they should’ve won the game. xG is only measuring chance quality and not the expected outcome of the game. Exactly as the old saying suggests, goals do change games and the score line influences how teams play. If a team takes an early lead, they don’t necessarily ‘need’ to generate more chances and we often expect to see the opposition generate more goal scoring opportunities for the remainder of the game in pursuit of a comeback.

https://utddistrict.co.uk/2021/07/21/tactical-analysis-henderson-vs-de-gea-a-battle-of-numbers-and-mentality/

I feel sorry for Henderson, he has been the best ranked keeper in the league on XG prevention in 19/20 and 20/21 season yet we play a keeper with near the worst ahead of him consistently. What is worse he gets player of the month for conceding a similar amount of goals to what he should have done but as many of the games the expected goal stat against us is near 1 or less than 1 you would expect him to keep clean sheets for fun but he rarely does.

Its funny the Man Utd media time and pundits will have you believe De Gea has been incredible in the last month or so but most of the shots he saved were shots every keeper would expect to save hence low XG.

Its hilarious De Gea got player of the month back to back in a team ranked near the best in expected goals against in that time. I suppose it is encouraging we are ranked near the best teams in XG against in last 2 months yet De Gea somehow won player of the months award for having fewer clean sheets than expected.

We conceded pretty much as expected in November and December and the main reason De Gea even got that stat was due to Chelsea missing the target against us near the end of the game so otherwise he would have conceded more than expected in last 2 months.

Boris that is why Pep is successful as he doesn’t allow that to happen. The top teams don’t allow going 1 goal up to affect the way they play in changes against.

Chances* not changes. Anyway I am grateful to Ronaldo. I knew when he came he is my only hope to make up for a below average keeper in goal and so far he is our top scorer so has done the job.