Although it is hard for Manchester United fans to accept, Jose Mourinho brought them the very best results possible for this season's roster. A roster with no proper central defenders, even by the lowest standards of today's productised "football". Mourinho has been accused of things that can't be proved, just because of a "Manchester United has to beat all other teams 5-0 hands down" mentality he could not (and did not have to...) adhere to. They should have known, Mourinho likes to win 1-0. Since his dismissal, Manchester United had a winning streak against objectively weak teams that they neither kept at zero goals nor deserved to beat at all. Let's not forget the 2-2 draw with Burnley either, where "David" could have defeated "Goliath". All this in a low-level league, which makes UEFA's joke of a Champions' League look like a proper competition. In this "proper" competition, Jose Mourinho won a ticket for the round of 16 thanks to what was... the best-working defence in the entire group stage, with a total of 16 important chances conceded. But what did Mourinho's successor do?
-Bailly and Lindelof acted as back-halves, not central defenders.
-Young and Shaw acted as wing attackers, not side defenders.
-Herrera and Matic played at the base of the midfield, but Pogba acted as an old-school striker.
-Lingard, Rashford and Martial made a theoretically sensible triplette at the front, but in practice it didn't work, as PSG didn't give open pitch away to them.
PSG's tactical approach was simple:
-Silva and Kimpembe kept the centre of defence well under control, by the standards of productised "football" at least. Result: only one important chance for Manchester United (and this not nearly as important as the eight chances PSG had at De Gea's goalpost).
-Marquinhos was marking Pogba, this was evident throughout the match as it destroyed United's plan on the axis. The Brazilian was shown as a midfielder on the graphs, but ended up playing as a central defender. Pogba never had the chance to get the ball without pressing, so United's frontal triplette was cut out of the action for almost the entire match.
-Verratti got the one and only defensive midfielder's role for PSG.
-Alves often played... behind Kehrer on the right, while on the left we saw Bernat go all the way in to act as a "possession midfielder", leaving an enormous gap on PSG's left which nobody covered. The weaknesses of United's roster though left no room for taking advantage of that enormous gap, so it is almost like it didn't exist - except it DID exist. Di Maria and Draxler were nowhere to be seen for the defensive duties of PSG's left side.
-Mbappe just took advantage of Solskjaer's tactical inexistence.
Important chances 1-8, result 0-2. Fair enough, don't you think? Mourinho could have also lost this match, but neither in such a humiliating manner nor with such an enormous score - IF he lost it at all, that is. Plus, he wouldn't concede two against Burnley. If PSG manage to get thrown out by Solskjaer like they were thrown out by Luis Enrique and Zinedine Zidane (!), they 'll never get past the phase of 16. Zero out of three against tactically inexistent coaches sounds like quite a blow, so it isn't very likely to happen. But Thomas Tuchel isn't the best coach I know of either, so you never know...
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