Stick to United with Wayne Rooney: Listen Now!

0:00Hello everybody, it's Mark here. Hopefully by now you've heard that we recently launched Stick to United with me and Wayne Rooney. I just wanted to let you know that if you want to listen to it, it has its own pod feed. So search Stick to United and subscribe now. Every week, me and Wayne will talk all things Manchester United. We'll have guests, debates, maybe the odd argument and hopefully lots of fun along the way. Here's a little clip from our latest episode. If you want to listen to the whole thing, go and search for the Stick to United feed. I'll see you over there.

0:35Welcome back to Stick to United then. Let's get straight into it, Wayne. Manchester United's loss to Hull City. I suppose the first thing I should ask is, where did you watch it? I watched it. I was doing a match today, so I was in the studio, I was watching the game, and it was a bad start to a long day. Yeah, it was a tough watch. It was tough. just to see them, you know, flatter to do anything, to create anything and never really felt like, once Hull went 1-0 up, never really felt like we were going to get anything out of the game. So, yeah, it was a tough first day of the season, as tough as, you know, I've watched for a long time.

1:20Yeah, I think the thing for me was just, I expected it. Maybe not that early, but I think when Carrick did really well last season, but I think he did really well in an interim environment or caretaker manager environment where he got the best out of what he had. And I think he did a great job, but I think he needed a hell of a lot of help from above to give him more. And I also think you could argue that with Casemiro gone, you lose that height in both boxes, you lose the efficiency and the tackling and the amount of work he puts in there. You chuck Tillemans and Santos in there. And I think that sort of game, and to be fair, you did call it a bit in the tactical preview we did that Hull could be more difficult.

2:02I went 4-1. You said it might be 1-0 United. But first and foremost, I want to ask you, how does a performance like that happen? You've had weeks of pre-season and it was a full 90 minutes of we didn't look like we were ever going to get back into it. Yeah, I think your whole pre-season really is designed for that first game of the season. that's you know the games you play obviously your players getting the fitness back in and players are at different places with the World Cup and some players went further and some players didn't go some were fitter than others at this moment in time but your whole pre-season is for that and I used to remember waking up the morning of the first game of the season and you just couldn't wait for it and you've got that excitement of a new season the buzz of getting back out there playing and it just didn't feel like that yesterday and I knew when you play a newly promoted team I can't say this enough you know how difficult it is away from home and if you give them any sort of encouragement any you know the fans anything to get up you know Hull playing Man United it's a massive game for them if you give them encouragement which we did before they scored we did you know McBernie was was proving really difficult for us to mark we were getting pressure on them we let them get it turn, get out wide get in the box get on the end of crosses so we got away with it early on that we didn't concede earlier than what we did and then when they get the first goal I just knew it was going to be tough and for the new players coming into Man United they have to realise very quickly that this is a different club it's different to you know Aston Villa or Brighton Chelsea wherever we're getting players from it's a completely different club and you are going to get scrutinised whether you like it or not from the first minute so you just hope obviously Myhill's been through that, you've got players who've been there for a long time, you hope that they can help them through, this week now is so important for them new players because now they've experienced what it's like losing at Man Utd, losing against a newly promoted team and it's not nice, you don't want that you never want that but you have to get through that very quickly and get over it because obviously we've got another team a nuclear team in the next game and although it'll be at Old Trafford Just from minute one the tempo's wrong the intensity's wrong and you're looking at every player that comes on and it doesn't change I mean I want to talk to you about half time and break the game down but watching the game I'm like it's Manchester United we're all buzzing it's the start of the season there's an opportunity to be better the week before we're closing this Belaber deal, which we'll talk about in a bit, and there's optimism.

5:00I mean, even Owen Hargreaves said before the game, you know, I'd have had a good transfer window, which I don't agree with, but you're thinking, come on, it's Hull City. And throughout the whole game, but certainly in that first 20 minutes, which we'd spoken about being so important, Hull are winning all the duels. And as a viewer of the game and as a fan of United, you sort of like, you'd run through brick walls for it. But it's so difficult because we've been in this position so many times. There's been so many of these results and it's not necessarily a manager thing. It's happened with many managers.

5:29It's happened with many players. I know it's only game one and I know there's been a massive rush to say it's only game one, but we've all been here before and it's almost like a lack of trust. How does it keep happening? What is it? What needs to change? I think players need to take responsibility on the pitch as well. I think because when you play against Hull City or, as I said, the next game is Ipswich, you can set up tactically however you want to set up. And a lot of the time, it's decisions. The game doesn't go as, you know, you can stop and start training sessions and you can tell you if the ball goes here, we have to come across and then you make sure your wing is in with you or whatever that is.

6:15But it's decisions from players on the pitch which make the difference. so that first 20 minutes I was sat with Alan Shearer watching the game and I said to him the two forwards for Man United they were coming back and they were covering the midfield players for Hull now what that allows, and this goes back to what Bruno said after the game, what that allows is that allows the Hull goalkeeper the centre backs to have time on the ball which then that allows the full backs or the wing backs to get higher up the pitch so then if the ball just go long it might fall for them then there's no other thought then, get the ball out of your feet and cross the ball.

6:53But then if an individual makes a... So in this occasion it was Bruno and Cunha. If one of them makes a decision, we're not letting them dictate what's going on here. So one of them gets to the ball and then they forget about the midfield players because what that does, if he goes to the ball, then your midfield player in behind you automatically has to come in and take care of these midfield players. Then your centre-backs come in and then you squeeze higher up the pitch. but then you're putting a better press on. And we were too passive. We were allowing them to just dictate and do what they wanted.

7:25So why is that not happening then? Who's responsible for that? Is that the players? Well, a lot of it comes from... I can only say when I used to play, that comes from your centre-backs. And I used to have arguments at Rio all the time over it. So they'd tell you to go or wait. So they'd say wait, go, wait, go, whatever. And I'd always remember it was me and Tevez who'd done it mostly but that was just off the cuff just like do you know what we've got there's no not being disrespectful we've got championship centre-backs on the ball why are we giving them time? So when the centre-backs would say wait we were like on a leash and then in the end there was like no chance and then we'd go and we'd just put pressure on the ball and what'd they do?

8:09They'd rush it they'd kick it long and normally it goes through to your keeper and then you'd get the ball back and then you'd start playing from there and we showed them too much respect and I think you can now there's that much you know technology there's everything where you can analyse the game and data and stats and all that but actually the game hasn't changed the game remains the same in terms of if you put pressure on players who are not as good as you nine times out of ten they give you a ball back then you end up then taking the ball off them their fans get on the back because they're just kicking the ball back to you so I think that's why I'm saying about players taking responsibility yeah you can be set up in a block, a high block, low block, mid block, whatever that is.

8:51But it's decisions you make on the pitch as an individual or as a, like it was me and you, the forwards at times. Right, I'm just going. And now what? Sometimes you might have a bit of quality and pass it into midfield, play it and you bounce around you. So what? You've put one play out of the game. But if you don't and you're too cautious with it, you end up, what happens is you're dropping deeper and deeper. then now they're getting balls in the round your penalty box where they are a threat. Yeah, because I think like, obviously, we've spoken last week, we'll speak again about like the Labour coming in and what can be done in the last week and a half to help out Michael.

9:27But ultimately, it's a bit like when Amrim lost to Grimsby last season. You don't need a manager to beat Grimsby. And I think with Hull, you can't really blame the Glazers or Ineos for not beating Hull. So in that first 20 minutes, when the tempo's not there and all the way up to half time, it's on the 11 players on the pitch. Is that what we're saying? Carrick can't really do a hell of a lot other than say, do it. Why aren't they doing it? Is it technical? No, I think the difference I've found now and obviously I've been fortunate or unfortunate looking at both ways that I've managed. So I've seen it from both sides as well.

10:08It's the difference with players now is in the academies they're getting taught so much and then a lot of it is on the computer a lot of it is in the classrooms so the players now they're used to seeing stuff on their laptop and then when the ball goes here you should be here but then you press play on that laptop within half a second the pitch is completely changed so what you have to do as a player and after training after games do you want to watch the clips back and every clip I've had players come in asking to watch the clips back after the game and you're like you rarely want to see them.

10:43They're horrendous. Some of them, but what players have to do is understand and manage the game and understand, you know, we've got Hullier doing to us, like bullying us, doing what they want, having time on the ball, the crowd are all having a good time. You've got to be horrible. You've got to be horrible on a football pitch and you've got to, you know, sense the right moment where this is not good enough I'm doing something different I used to do it to full backs I used to like if the game went in and sometimes the fans as well at Old Trafford sometimes where the back in the day we used to play Wofford at Old Trafford and you're expected to beat Wofford so sometimes if you're not playing well or it's not going it can go a bit quiet so I used to do it on purpose I used to go and smash a full back that's absolutely spot on and the crowd get up and then it brings energy a new energy so that's where the clouds then help you lift your energy at times when you're not bringing it at all it's like I think it was last week against AC Milan the pre-season game Rashford didn't do particularly well but he clattered into someone on the right hand side and everyone goes mad about it and I think it's like you look at that game against Hull and you're sort of like it's almost like a trust thing it's a trust thing I go into games like Hull or Everton and I don't know what I'm going to get whereas in your day with your team Obviously you did lose games.

12:11We mentioned that Burnley game in 2009 when you lost 1-0. But I don't trust this team. I think they're good players, but I don't trust them. Trust is a big word. And it's so important to have trust in terms of a manager trusting his players and the players trusting the manager. The reason I say that is because you hear Bruno after the game when he was talking about it's just like last season, the first 20 minutes, we're not pressing, their goalkeeper's getting the most ball that's the captain coming out after the game saying people aren't running people aren't doing their job but then that comes down to you have to make a decision as well you have to make a decision on the pitch in terms of I've been in that exact position with Bruno's in as captain of Manchester United and if I feel the goalkeeper's getting on the ball or not I'm thinking I'm not sitting here and letting him do this again and watching him play the ball long and then I'm having to run back and then all of a sudden I'm defending on the edge of my box.

13:16I'm not doing that. So I'm going to press him and whether we've worked on sitting in and and trying to stop them at field plays from getting the ball I'm going and whatever managers on the touchdown it could be Alex Ferguson it could be Van Gaal whoever it is they know that's going to happen and that's a trust what they have but then I've got to trust any of my teammates behind me sometimes you make a wrong decision and you go at the wrong time. But if I'm going to commit to it, you better commit to the army. So that's leading by example. That's where, when you hear, you know, people talk about what type of captain is he, what type of leader are you, you can lead by how you speak, you can lead by what you do on the pitch, but you have to lead by how your body, we spoke about body language last week with Marcus, what your body language is on the pitch, how you're going, right?

14:03If Bruno sprints to that centre-back, Like, what do you think Santos and Telemann's going to do behind him? What do you think? Well, they're going to run, aren't they? They're going to sprint in behind him. So straight away, there's three players sprinting, getting to the ball. Then if Harry Maguire and Heaven see the field players doing that, they're naturally going to think, as defenders, if we don't get up behind him, that gap in between is going to be massive for their players to get in and get on the ball in turn. So we have to get up behind him. and that's when I was saying last week if they do that when I brought the Tangerine in the keeper then sweeps up so it's a domino effect so it has to be yet you can get messages from your sense backs but you have to have people at the front of the pitch who are going to lead by example and say I feel the game it might be a time where you might have planned to do that to go and press the ball and that might be a time where you say do you know what they're getting a lot of joy from playing rounders so let's just sit there and let the centre-backs have the ball because they're not going to hurt us as much as these are.

15:07So you have to think and know what's going on in the game to then make decisions and react to them.

15:18So that was Stick to United with me and Wayne Rooney. If you want to listen to the whole episode, search Stick to United wherever you get your podcasts. Cheers.