In the 21st round of the Premier League, Manchester United lost 0-1 at home to Wolves, B Fei came off the bench, first grabbing the point to shoot at the crossbar to pop up, and then assisting C Ronaldo's header with a free kick, but the offside was blown. And this, almost the only connection between the Portuguese double stars, their coexistence, is indeed a problem.
Last year's three firsts, the B fee has recently been sluggish
Looking at all the competitions of Manchester United in 2021, B Fee has made a total of 58 appearances, the most in the team, and the second place is Greenwood, who has played 4 games less than him. Third place was Wan-Bissaka, then Fred and Maguire.
In these 58 games, B Fee scored a total of 18 goals, becoming last year's team's top scorer! Second place was Cavani, with 15 goals. Greenwood and Cristiano Ronaldo are tied for third with 14 goals. Then there was Marcus Rashford with 10 goals.
In addition, B fee also delivered 18 assists, still the most in the team! Second place was Pogba, 12 times. Marcus Rashford, Luke Shaw and Wan Bissaka were all less than double digits.
However, looking at the season alone, B Fei Has played 18 times in the premier league, with only 5 goals and 3 assists, and before scoring the Arsenal goal on December 3 last year, the last goal dates back to September 11, which was Ronaldo's return debut. That is to say, in the last 14 Premier League games, he has only recorded 1 goal, and the downturn is synchronized with the return time of Ronaldo, which is probably not a coincidence.
Cristiano Ronaldo was third in the year with 14 goals, with only 3 goals being assisted by B Fee
After Ronaldo returned to Manchester United, in the four months, he has scored 14 goals in all competitions, not only the team's top scorer in the first half of the season, but even if it is placed in the whole of 2021, even if he is not in the Red Devils in the first 8 months, he is also the third top scorer in the team, and the number of goals scored by Aoki in a year is as many, 1 goal less than Cavani and 4 goals less than B Fee.
However, of Ronaldo's 14 goals, only 3 came from B Fee's assists, and 2 goals were in the Champions League group stage, and in the Premier League, the two only had 1 successful connection.
Of the three assists, two were the same: 1-2 Bern in the Champions League and 3-0 In the Premier League. As shown in the figure above, it is all a long pass of B fee, and the right side of the C Ronaldo penalty area grabs the goal from a small angle, but this pair of feet in the cross, the fineness of the running position, and the tacit understanding of the two have high requirements, the difficulty is not small, the success rate will not be high, more often either the pass is not accurate, or it cannot run, or it is released by the defender's header.
The 2-2 atauda match is actually the routine that Manchester United fans most want to see: B Feiqian inserted himself into the box, attracted the defense, and passed the heel to Ronaldo, who easily pushed the goal. In short, the closer the two people are, the more they can produce a good chemical reaction and form a good cooperation, and vice versa.
Why is it so difficult for dual cores to coexist?
The direct reason is that the B fee is farther away from the goal. Under Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, especially last season, he played in the front of the 4231 formation, either Cavani, a good pivot center, who can pull the edge and retreat to do the ball; or Rashford or Martial, who prefers to pull the edge, so he has a lot of opportunities to insert into the box and shoot and score, like a shadow striker, as shown in the following goals:
After the return of Ronaldo, the center in front of B Fei became a shooter who took the goal of scoring goals and waited for opportunities in the penalty area, so he entered the box and gained less space and opportunities in the penalty area.
After Lonnick took office, he changed to the 4222 formation, and B Fee had two strikers directly in front of him! He has no chance to plug in, but because of the position of the full-back and the back, he often retreats to the midfield to help the center-back out, and is naturally farther away from the opponent's goal.
As evidenced by the stats, B Fee has shot 2.21 times per 90 minutes in the Premier League this season, 3.19 times last season; 40.68 passes this season, 49.43 times last season; 29.78 offensive three touches this season, 38.89 times last season; 3.12 touches in the penalty area this season, 3.83 times last season – all of which have dropped significantly.
In addition, the B fee that regards C Ronaldo as an idol is getting farther and farther away from the president on the field, but he still wants to directly pass to C Luo in the penalty area, so he is too persistent, even some blind practices, the error rate is very high, and his teammates will feel ignored, and the result is that both of them are not happy.
I have to say that now B Fei is anxious and has lost himself a bit. In the case that Ronaldo's status is irreplaceable and his playing style cannot be changed, he wants to return to the top and must take the initiative to adapt and change. Ronnick also needs to make corresponding adjustments in time, change the formation or change the position of the B fee.
In fact, in the battle with Wolves, the change has been initially presented: B Fei returned from suspension, but did not start until the 60th minute, and at this time Manchester United has changed to a three-back, B Fei's position is even more advanced, and finally showed the ability to grab the point to shoot again: in the 67th minute, Matic's left side inverted triangle pass, C Ronaldo took away two defenders, he did not watch and pushed the crossbar to pop up!
In the 68th minute, B Fei's free kick from the right was crossed and C Ronaldo's header was broken, but the offside was first, and the goal was invalid! Unfortunately, such coordination, whether it is positional warfare or set-pieces, is too rare. In particular, the effective connection between the Portuguese twins was still seriously lacking, and as a result, Manchester United ultimately failed to equalize and lost to Wolves.
Of course, B Fei's previous performance was too good, which infinitely raised the expectations and demands of fans, especially in terms of goals. In fact, if you only regard him as a midfield organizer, and then put aside the factor of Ronaldo, then his performance this season is already good: 8 times to create scoring opportunities, third in the Premier League, second only to Salah and Arnold; averaging 2.7 key passes per game, second in the Premier League, more than De Bruyne!