21 Jul 2025 17:36:44
Looks like vietek and Harrison are both leaving on loan again. Really important for young keepers to get experience.
There was some suggestions on here that they play a part of our 1st team squad this season. I for one am glad that's not happening i hope they both get good game time and start learning their trade. Its the one position that we rarely young kids get experience in the epl.
21 Jul 2025 17:50:05
It was clear they both need loan time, no way we can stick a rookie in goal, Chido needs to go loan too, he not ready to be our number 9 1st or 2nd choice.
I know some think pick the kids, but really probably only 1 maybe 2 might be good enough.
They need the experience I would say the same with Leon too, he is not Roberto Carlos like he thinks, quit yet.
21 Jul 2025 19:49:11
Agree on obi but not Leon he had been playing mens diurnal for a year so a bit ahead. Only saw him for 45 min but he looks very aggressive and maturity in his play beyond his age.
Wide areas are also easier for younger players in a lot of cases.
22 Jul 2025 00:40:50
Are you already suggesting Leon has an attitude issue? Why does he think he’s roberto Carlos?
22 Jul 2025 09:44:14
I don't think anyone was seriously suggesting that the academy keepers be first choice, just given a run out in pre-season to see if they could be a squad option if needed.
Although I fully agree that they are much better placed having a loan for a season and playing mens football regularly.
Chido in an ideal world would also be better off with a loan, but with a dearth of options at the club then he will probably get more chances here this season then he probably should at this stage.
Diego Leon has been playing senior football for a while and is far more ready than the others mentioned. Like Ken said playing wide is also easier for young players with less pressure. It might have only been 45 minutes but he does look more ready to play at this level than Amass does. So I can understand why the club are looking to loan Amass and keep Leon.
Ultimately all youngsters will have rough edges to their game that needs rounding out, and they will make mistakes. How they learn from them ultimately determines the player they become.
We have a lot of talented young players in our first team squad, players like Yoro, Heaven, Fredricson, Dorgu, Leon, Mainoo, Collyer, Kone, Amad, Chido and Højlund.
Not all will make it at the highest level, even the ones that ultimately do, will make mistakes along the way.
We need to get behind them and support them rather than tear them down, I can assure you they will do that enough by themselves. We forget what it was like to be a young man trying to find his place in the world, second guessing ourselves, and repeatedly going over our mistakes. Even the ones who portray confidence bordering on arrogance are internally questioning themselves.
I also think that this modern world of social media only amplifies the negatives around people and their actions. Which given the way the younger generations are glued to their phones probably makes it that much harder for young footballers who will likely see a lot of the negative options on them that float around social media.
I do know of a couple of young EPL footballers whose management team around them ban the player from all social media for 3 days after they play any senior game to protect them both from the negatives and the hype that tends to follow. To give them space to reflect on their performance themselves and with they're coaches to form their opinions before they get influenced by the views on social media.
As fans as supposed "supporters" we probably should think before we type in frustration. Will our anger and negativity have a positive effect if the young player reads it? Probably not, in reality it'll probably have a negative impact. Especially if it is one of thousands saying the same thing.
Players in their mid-twenties with over 200 professional games under their belt should have the emotional maturity and experience to handle criticism and to be able to put it in context. Teenagers or lads just entering their twenties will likely not yet have that emotional maturity or experience.
Maybe imagine that if the player was your son, how would you want thousands of people to react, and what would you want them to say about a poor performance from him? Then maybe respond like that.
The best advice I ever received was "a wise man stays silent when angry" as words said in anger cannot be taken back, and often cause irreparable damage.
22 Jul 2025 21:34:23
German how do you know what Leon thinks?
23 Jul 2025 06:32:00
Ken the same way you seem to know how we all think!
23 Jul 2025 21:40:53
Great to see you can read and write Shappy :-)
I was one of those who suggested lifting some youth to the first team, and also supplementing with a Lammens or Garcia - with the view that both Onana and Bayendir were being shipped out - that isn't the case now it seems.
For those who can't read - try to read between the lines and you may be less obtrusive in your responses.
24 Jul 2025 10:37:40
Jimbo, I think at the end of the season there was a lot of unknowns around our keepers.
Heaton was out of contract, Bayindir showed himself to not being up to challenging Onana. While Onana continued to struggle (although I do feel that it is being overstated/ hyped about how much he has struggled) .
Under such circumstances where we could have lost all three first team keepers it made perfect sense to bring in two new keepers and promote an academy keeper to be third choice. However, that isn't what has happened.
While I don't think Onana is anywhere near as bad as he is being made out, he will need replacing. The trouble is that we won't be able to move him on this year. Partially because of his high wages and the fee we paid for him means we need a significant fee for him. But also because the hype in the press and on social media about how poor he's been will have put off any potential buyers.
That's something we don't consider enough as fans, but what we say about our players online does reverberate across the football landscape more so than a lot of other fan bases. We are partially responsible for creating the narrative around our players and that narrative will impact potential buyers for our players.
This was definitely the case when it came to selling Mason Greenwood. The noise out fans made around him and the whole situation only added fuel to the fire which definitely impacted other clubs who were looking at him. We helped create the negativity around him that made fans of other clubs not want him to sign for their club which definitely put some teams off as they didn't want the public backlash from their fans.
Look at Nicolas Jackson for example, he's a very good player, but one who struggles with one aspect as a striker. Yet the majority of the negativity around him online doesn't actually come from Chelsea fans. As such they will still be able to get a good fee for him (more than they paid for him) . Now if he'd been at United for the past couple of seasons he'd probably be spoken about in a similar way to how Højlund has been. Which would make it almost impossible for us to sell him for even what we paid for him let alone a profit.
We want to sell Højlund, but can anyone hand on heart say that if they were in charge of another club and having heard what United fans say about him that they would be interested in signing him?
Ultimately some signings work out and others don't. United fans have a habit of writing off every one that doesn't as the biggest flop in history and speak about them like they aren't even Sunday league level.
Yet in reality a lot of our "flops" in recent years have gone on to be successful elsewhere.
I suspect many of Onana, Antony, Rashford, and Højlund etc will have very successful careers when they leave us.
Yet all have been spoken about by United fans as if it's a miracle that they ever managed to become professional footballers.
With Onana now unlikely to leave and with Heaton signing a new one year deal it looks like Bayindir will be the only one to leave. With us looking to sign a higher quality keeper to come in and challenge Onana for the No.1 spot. Which gives us no room in the first team squad for a young academy keeper, so it's best they leave on loan.
With a bit of luck the new keeper we sign this summer steps up and takes Onana's place and then he moves on next summer. Probably along with Heaton retiring. At which point with two keepers leaving we sign one and promote one of the lads who have hopefully had a good season on loan this year.
26 Jul 2025 05:51:04
It’s not the fans so much, but the Manager and RA in this respect as devalued his own players considerably, TBF no one pays much attention to fans ramblings when they are buying or valuing a player, but they certainly do to a fellow professional (manager) when he says they have crap attitude, not good at this or that, that certainly devalues a player, did he think he was adding millions to there value with such naive remarks!
RA not helped himself here.