Sir Alex Ferguson has given his strongest statement yet that he see’s Michael Owen as nothing more than backup for Dimitar Berbatov and Wayne Rooney. Owen was signed from Newcastle United in the summer on a free transfer and has only started one game for United so far this season. The United number 7 has found the back of the net once already in the 5-0 mauling of Wigan Athletic – although he may have to wait a little longer until that ‘blend’ has been found. Have your say in our forum on whether you think Owen is United class.
Sir Alex Ferguson has been involved in some shock signings over the years. Eric Cantona was probably the most famous, but in the free signing of Owen – particularly with Ronaldo saying ‘adios’ – runs the Frenchman close. Fergie was quoted as saying:
“Owen has not been involved and I explained that to him,”
“Owen doesn’t come into the equation because we are trying to get a blend of Berbatov and Rooney, but he will play plenty of games.”
Michael Owen was once one of Europe’s top marksmen scoring goals for fun for both Liverpool and England. Since his move to Real Madrid in 2004 – things have never been the same for Owen and I can’t see them ever touching the heights he reached pre-Madrid. You have to ask yourself, why didn’t a major European club break the bank for Owen when he was available in the summer of 2005?
I’ll tell you why – all top European teams need something more from their main striker than a goal scoring ability. Didier Drogba couldn’t touch Owen in terms of one on one and the runs that Owen makes – but Drogba has so much more to his game. He may be an annoying clown at times but he was, for me, one of the most lethal strikers in the second half of last season – both domestically and in Europe. Michael Owen will never be the main focus point of our attack. He will be mainly used as a substitute and even if we’re losing I wouldn’t object to seeing Macheda being thrown on ahead of him. I think Owen can exploit a team who are chasing a goal and push up – as Birmingham did on the opening day of the season in the last ten minutes, although Owen did manage to fluff his lines.
I agree with Fergie – Berbatov and Rooney are the priority whereas Owen will have to wait his chance to compete with our first choice strikers. Hopefully Owen gets a chance and takes it for United but I do get concerned at the thought that his mind is on getting into the England squad for the World Cup next June. United first Michael, England second.
How unfair can you get? Mickey Owen is being treated very unfairly by SAF. Owen did more in the last 10 minutes against Birmingham, than our other strikers did most of the game. He didn’t fluff his lines either, because the goal he scored was ruled WRONGLY offside. To say he just wants to use us to play for England is a bloody cheek to be honest. He wants to play top class soccer for us and for England. To be honest he should have ambition, its what drives a player. He is a potent goalscorer, and if played regularly for us would easily get 20+ goals. Some United fans haven’t got a clue what they are talking about, and this is one of those times you have got it wrong!
@Craig Mc, I agree. He should get more minutes on the pitch. He will score! The more he gets used to our system and our players, the more he will score. People had been slagging Anderson the last few months, but now every one is talking up his goal scoring potential. Trust Fergie for who he buys, at least off late! Owen will play a larger part than most of our fans think.
I ABSOLUTELY AGREE with both of you . Owens story is very sad. An injury took him from the top of the world to nothing. He was truly magnificent in his time and he’s being treated very unfairly now
A striker of his class should be universall recognized and embraced but the whole world is out to get him…. Why?
i dont understand all this fuss about Owen getting more minutes. He will definitely get much more minutes but is HAVING A LITTLE PATIENCE too much to ask of an experienced player? Berbatov arrived b4 him on a record transfer so you dont expect SAF to keep him idle. Moreso, Owen actually fluffed some sitters in matches leading to the Wigan game. He should make sure he is mentally ready whenever he is called upon which would be very very soon.
Craig Mc – its good to have you back. I don’t think anything I said was out of order OR incorrect to be honest. The laughable dossier put together by Owen’s PR team prior to his move to United should be considered a desperate attempt to move to a club – any club – that will take on a once good striker.
So Craig, would you play him ahead of Berbatov? Or Rooney for that matter? Would you be happy to see him line up as our main striker in the European Cup final? Great deal from Sir Alex – as he can’t lose – but I still believe Owen will be nothing more than backup for the first team.
ShaQ/Venu – thanks for the comments lads. I’m not criticising the decision to sign him, I just don’t think he is United class. Lets hope he does hit 20 goals this season – I’d love it if he did, and then decides to retire from International Football to concentrate on his club career. He’d prove me wrong and we wouldn’t get the media circus come May about ‘will he or won’t he’ be going to South Africa.
Your just being selfish Stretford-end – sorry but that’s the truth! Why should he give up his South Africa dream? He loves playing for his country.
As for would I play him instead of Rooney or Berba – I wouldn’t have a problem alternating him with Berba! Berba is a 30million plus striker, who DOES NOT SCORE GOALS, even when they are laid on a plate for him. Would Owen have taken the chances Berba had at Spurs Saturday and in other games where he had chances that were so easy my grandad could have scored them – YES I BELIEVE OWEN WOULD. You think he is not good enough for United, I think your wrong. But hey – how the hell can he prove either one of us right or wrong, when he doesn’t get the opportunity on the pitch. A lot of things come out of SAF’s mouth, like how this was going to be the season of blooding the kids – yeah right, and the exact opposite happens with the golden oldies still trying to do what their legs have long since gone! Owen would not be the red card waiting to happen that Scholesy has become, and believe me we are not always going to get away with the games where Scholesy red cards reduce us to 10 men! I love our legends, but they should be the subs these days!
Oh and Stretford-end, thanks for your kind words of welcome back mate – appreciate that!
Craig – the notion that Owen would have scored those chances is very simplistic. His all round play is leagues apart from Berbatov and although Fergie has used the Berbatov and Rooney partnership as his reason I would also argue that Fergie is trying to nail a 4-4-2 system whereby Berba sits back and uses the wingers too.
So far it seems to be working. We’ve been at our most fluent using this system this season so why change it? We hammered Wigan and were exceptional the other night and the common demoninator was Berbatov and Rooney.
Besides, Owen had a start against Burnley and missed two sitters. He came on at home to Brum and missed a sitter. He’ll score goals, I’m sure, but there’s no guarantee he would score the chances Berbatov missed on Saturday. At the end of the day though we won 3-1 and Berbatov’s performance was a big part of that. Would Owen have been as influential in the performance? It’s impossible to say, what we can say is Berbatov had one of his best games for us. Despite not scoring. And I’ll be honest, I’ll take that over a “what if”.
Yolkie – I’m a fan of football, so I am not a Berba hater. However, apart from the free kick which led to Gigg’s goal, how exactly was Berba the influencing factor you are making out? He had no part in Andi’s goal, and no part in Rooney’s goal, and he missed at least 2 sitters. Yes, I would agree that his all round game has more to it than Owen’s, but Owen is a striker, and his huge art is to put the ball in the net. That is what I personally want from a STRIKER! Owen plays off the shoulder of the last man better than any of our other strikers, and that includes Rooney. He seems to have the exquisite timing to hold his position with the last man, and go at just the right time. Timing in such a way is an art as well. If he did miss some golden opportunites he should have scored in early games for us – then I am not surprised, the OT crowd and expectation would put the fear of God up anybody. If he played regularly, I would place my bet on him to score more than Berba, and I am not trying to put Berba down. Berba has permanent stage fright at OT, and many away grounds come to think of it!
I’m not saying he had a direct influence in the goals, that would be foolish and easily proven wrong as you have. But he clearly did on the overall performance and that is the over-riding factor for me.
I judge a player on what I see with my eyes and then use statistics to swell out that opinion if need be (I’m sure we all do it in the same manner, but bear with me). Anderson didn’t really favour too well with assists or goals (I think it was just the 1 assist in 2007/8) yet was widely considered to have a great first season, something I agreed with.
Conversely, although he had no goals last season I think he ended up with around 7 or 8 assists. Statsically a large step forward but we could all see he had stagnated and wasn’t as impressive as his debut season. Hopefully this season he can prove us all wrong, but as long as he PLAYS like he did on Saturday I couldn’t give a flying fraggle if he scores again. It would be nice as statistics are a handy weapon in debate but, really, I’d be happy with the performances.
The other point I would make on this is that if you remember back to the Cantona days, aside from one stellar season in 1994 his goal tally was usually around 15, and that included penalties. Compare this to Rooney who always hits 15 without penalties (until this season) and people always say he should score more. This isn’t something I agree with as I am always more than satisfied with the level of effort of Rooney’s play and the results we tend to get with him on the pitch. I also was never disappointed with Cantona, even in his last season.
The long winded point I’m making is that Berbatov and Rooney have both been major factors in the overall performance of our best two displays this season. It might not have fleshed out in stats in Berbatov’s favour on Saturday but surely the best evidence is what you see with your own eyes.
Side issue to this is something always missed in statistics – you always get the assist and the scorer but there are so many instances where the driving force behind the goal that came before the assist. I’m not saying Berbatov would be far more favourably represented in this sense, I’m just illustrating the clinical and sometimes unfair nature of statistics.
On the Owen point – I’ll admit I did not take favourably to the signing. However like all things concerned with United if I have a doubt, I always love to be proved wrong. I had a doubt with O’Shea last season and he was sensational. I had reservations about a long run for Fletcher and I was wrong there too.
Owen may well hypothetically score more goals given a run in the team – they are two different types of players.
At the moment Berbatov is functioning well as a creative player that is bringing the best out of Rooney and also helping the likes of Valencia, Nani and Giggs who have all looked impressive. Some of the football played at Wigan and at Spurs was better than anything I saw us play last season (save for the Arsenal away game).
While I can accept Owen may score more goals given a run in the side, surely it’s undisputable that Berbatov is far more influential on the team’s play than what Owen would be? Berbatov is a far more capable footballer – and at the minute it’s a joy to watch as well as bringing the right results.
Putting Owen in to the side would probably be detrimental to the overall style of play, could possibly have a bad effect on Rooney’s form, and would basically give us a goal hanger who offers nothing else to the performance.
I don’t neccessarily agree with you about Owen’s attributes but for the sake of argument I will say you’re right – what it boils down to is what does the team need to win? At the moment we are playing brilliantly and winning, scoring plenty of goals. I’m happy with it the way it is. If Owen is a goalscoring plan B, then what a plan B to have, however for the moment at least a plan B it should stay.
Just for the record, I’m not Berbatov’s biggest fan. I thought he was well over priced at £30m and I championed the cause of bringing someone else in in the summer. As I said though I love to be proved wrong and although it’s far too early to tell either way, the early signs are promising and I don’t see the sense in rocking the boat.
Yolkie, I see where you are coming from, but we will have to agree to differ over Berba and Owen! Thing is, if anything happened to Rooney, I wouldn’t be in any way confident that Berba could get us the goals we need.
With regards to Nani, that lad did nothing wrong in his 1st season, that SAF should have treated him so abysmally last season. Everyone says that his decision making was poor – but please, typical shortsided United fans I’d say. He didn’t play hardly any games in PL, and when he did it was cameos only, or he was made the scapegoat for the failures of the rest of the team to come up with the goods. Now everyone is saying his decision making has greatly improved, which is rubbish, because their short memories fail to give them the understanding that he is giving the very same decision making now, as he did in his 1st season, where he was second highest in assists, just one less than Rooney. He is also the best crosser of the ball into the box that we have. So SAF was justing being unreasonable leaving Nani to gather splinters in his arse last season. He was giving us the goals or making them in the cup games he played in last season. I truly believe the lad should have left us and taken up the Inter Milan or Barca offers he had in the summer. Can’t be much wrong with the lad, when big clubs were chasing him in the summer. I will NEVER know why his love for Man United kept him here, when Spain and Italy were calling!
Yeah definitely agree to disagree! But again that’s the beauty of debate. I share your sentiments regarding an injury to Rooney but dare I remind you that we do have two very exciting prospects in Macheda and Welbeck we haven’t even discussed! Add into this the exciting potential of Ljajic in January then we do have quite a strong squad.
I must say I do agree somewhat with your views on Nani. Many people were on his back last season, his inconsistency did frustrate me too, but I have always been of the opinion that he should have at least one more season and I hope he really finds his feet this year. He was arguably more developed in his first season with us than Ronaldo was, and while I would never compare the two, perhaps Nani could become the out and out winger that Ronaldo never did. If that makes sense.