The magical trio back together linking up in midfield - Fleck, Coutts & Duffy
This is the top and bottom of it. In my opinion, had the midfield 3 started 40 games apiece last season, we'd have got up. There was some stuff about 'teams working us out in the second half of the season' but, frankly, that is rubbish. To the extent that anyone worked us out, they merely worked out a pale imitation of United, post-November 17th. When we were in our stride before the injury, teams simply couldn't live with us.
I'm annoyed about the Brooks transfer, as many other Blades are, but principally from the standpoint of the fee being on the low side in today's market.
From a footballing point view, I actually felt that, frustratingly, Brooks doesn't have an obvious position in the team when Coutts, Fleck and Duffy are in place. And ultimately, they have to be in place, because that is what everything else that is good about us springs from. Brooks, though, doesn't really have the strength to play up front down the middle yet, and the system doesn't really accommodate him playing wide. That leaves him much of the time, merely as an impact sub.
It's almost typical of United to have a top class attacking midfielder on their hands at a time when we don't have an obvious position to play him in. I think back to when we were producing right-backs of the calibre of Lowton, Naughton and Walker, one after the other, when we only needed one (albeit Blackwell shoe-horned Walker and Naughton into the same team by playing the latter in an advanced role).
Anyway, looking forward to seeing Coutts running the games again, and when you look through the squad, there really are some proper players in it now. We just need to add a beast of a commanding centre-half and some pace up front.
