Unpopular Opinion | Not sacking Ten Hag

I genuinely think that the only reason in support of not sacking EtH is that all our post-SAF managers have failed, so making changes won't fix stuff. But then, the same we might say for the right-wingers, and I guess people would still want some good player there (after the failures/relative failures of Mata, Di Maria, Greenwood and Sancho).

Maybe, just maybe, everything is gonna click next season and thus by sacking EtH, we will miss a period of glory. Maybe, just maybe, Martial will turn into a world-class striker next season, so by releasing him, we will miss his 50 potential goals. But, I think we have seen enough of EtH (and Martial) to suggest that these things are not very much grounded in reality, and there is an overwhelming chance, heck, there is almost certainty, that they will be very bad next season. EtH simply does not understand EPL, and nowadays, it seems he does not understand football full stop. He is already broken beyond repair when it comes to this club.

He might do well somewhere else, but I do not think he is a big club manager. He'll probably be back in Holland. It kind of sucks, cause he looked very promising, probably the manager I was most confident will make it here.

Think he is nailed on to stay no matter what happens. Neville seems to think so and he may have the ear if Ineos. There are really no world beating options available right now to replace, and they will owe him a lot of money if sacked. Jimmy came out earlier this year and said something about how any manager would of struggled under the current conditions at Utd. Next season though, he will be on thin ice.

If it was my team I would want him out and a lot of the players as well. It's a matter of cutting your losses early instead of hanging too long, yet again, on underperforming manager and players.

I actually don't think it's that unpopular an opinion

While there isn't a strong 'Ten Hag In' movement, there is a sizeable chunk who would accept him getting another season based on:

- showed he is a good manager last season
- horrific injury list
- worth a try with the new board
- dearth of decent alternatives
- bored of constantly changing manager

pocco said:

Well I'm sure you can appreciate that only either keeping Ten Hag or hiring a manager from the Championship isn't going to be agreed upon as a good approach by most people.

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Well it’s my two cents. And I care little for a consensus anyway, many people have no idea what their actual opinion on such things are until someone on the internet tells them what it should be. For me, I can’t see many available that we would appoint because we ‘want them to be our manager’. We would just be appointing from whatever is available, because we need a manager. That fills me with no excitement at all, and it will soon show I reckon. I can’t see options that we really believe in as a club and want to build with, and as a result, whoever we hire will probably be a dead man waiting to be sacked from the day he walks in. Literally a placeholder.

I get why people are unhappy, but perhaps they should start naming managers, and ask themselves if any of them are people that they genuinely and objectively simply want to be United’s manager.

ForeverRed1 said:

Let’s just try something different this time. Players out.

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Almost make too much sense!!

Oranges038 said:

I don't really care if he gets sacked at this stage. I think it's inevitable and he only really has himself to blame. Garnacho was already part of the first team squad and Mainoo was the only one not promoted out of necessity. The other 3 or 4 are there because of injury and absence.

There's no need to make stuff up to say the same shit in a different thread.

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Well that's a stretch lets be fair here, he made two 5 minue sub appearances while continuing to play for the youth team.

TheGodsInRed said:

Onana
Malacia
Lisandro
Mount (although he wanted De Jong)
Højlund (although he wanted Kane)

These were Ten Haag signings imo. The others were hoisted upon him last minute in desperation because he couldn't get who he wanted. Similar to Van Goal and the others.

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Which ones?

I kinda agree on the OP-s statement. Analayzing ETH-s performance last 2 years objectively you should end up deciding to give him a year more.

Lets lay down the facts without getting subjective. Note that my objectives might be subjective but those are estabilished ones based on the typical club demands.

1. 2023/24 Season objectives :

-Champions league last 16 - failed
-Champions league qualification - failed
-Cup win- still on

2022/23 Season objectives
Europa League deep run- Partially competed
Champions League qualification- Complete
Cup win- Exceeded

2. Estabilishing a distinct playing style with emphasis on attacking play

- 2022/23 Season - Partial success
-2023/24 Season - Failed

3. Taking a leadership role and maintaining a demanding and meritocratic club culture

-2022/23 - Success
-2023/24 - Partial success

4. Maintaining club tradition on youth development and giving first team football to the the youth members

-2022/23 - Success
-2023/24 - Success

The importance of these objectives is on the descending order. So 1 is the most important (10x multiplier) and 4 is least important ( 6x multiplier)

1. 3/6 met : Total Score 5 (max score 10)
2. 0.5/2 met : Total score 2.25 ( max score 9)
3. 1.75/2 met: Total score 7 ( max score 8)
4. 2/2 met : Total score 6 ( max score 6)

20.25 out of max 40 ( 50.5%) - Verdict assing score

p.s. I dont consider transfer business as part of ETH-s job description and he absolutely should not be blamed for the signings. The signing have no part on any logical score I can give to him as a Man Utd manager

Fortitude said:

Boggles the mind. What's even more bizarre is him being given more leeway and tolerance than anyone else post-Fergie.

It's like having Nick Leeson look after your bank by now, yet people still want to see how much further into ruin we can be driven.

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I honestly wonder what the breaking point for some of these posters is?

Game after game of opponents running through our midfield and taking countless shots on goal isn’t enough. Being 8th with a negative goal difference with three games left hasn’t done it either

It’s almost as if he’s been given a pass to be as bad as possible this season.

The craziest thing are those saying they don’t feel like the options out there are better than EtH so why not keep him. Imagine thinking there are only a handful of options better than Ten Hag after seeing what he’s done this season.

This team is on a journey. Unless we get a Pep type manager, the path back to the top will probably involve up to three managers. We don’t need a saviour but it’s hard for United fans to understand this. Every coach has to be the new Fergie and every young player the new Rooney or Ronaldo.

El Jefe said:

We don’t need a saviour but it’s hard for United fans to understand this. Every coach has to be the new Fergie and every young player the new Rooney or Ronaldo.

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I would argue this has precisely been the mindset of our owners and executives since 2013. It is why I didn't want Ten Hag sacked prior to INEOS's formal involvement.

Now we have the semblance of a modern football structure, we can finally move away from it.

Let the new recruitment staff bring in 3 new players over the summer, then another 3 next summer with a new manager next summer. Then I think you're giving the new guy a real chance to succeed.

You're going to ruin another young managers promising career with the current composition of the squad. I think it also sends a good message that United will honor the full length of the contract and let the manager see out his project.

Ban worthy thread of ever there was one.

This club deserve to be where we are based on this thread. It's crazy that someone would give ETH another season. Everywhere in real world, you need to meet your KPIs, no ifs and buts.

You can't blame everything to football structure when you were given full backing. You can't blame football structure when your tactics are shit. You can't blame everything to injuries because there are many teams in PL still perform well even with injuries.

The problem with ETH is not the football structure and need be given a chance with the new structure. The problem with ETH is he failed all the basic. End to end football facing 1000 shots a game. Playing with 2 number 10s in PL. Can't set up defence, midfield and attack. Negative GD. Seems the worst coached team in PL. Players can't pass and looks like strangers. Opposition score tonnes of cutback goals and set pieces, nothing being addressed. The list goes on and on.

We have better chance next season with a reset of manager. He is not up to the standard of PL and it's ok because there were many Dutch manager failed in PL and still do decently back to Eredivisie

Un

Carolina Red said:

A 50.5 / 100 is an F.

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Actually is an E, so its passing. It can be a D- if we somehow end up winning FA cup.

ForeverRed1 said:

Let’s just try something different this time. Players out.

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How is that different? We've gone through bucketloads of players.

Sacking ten Hag now or end of the season will only repeat the cycle that we did in the past. I believe giving ten Hag 1 more season is an ideal move for these five reasons:

1. Financial reason - He only has 1 year left in his contract.
   • Why throwing the money to sack him now if he can leave without costing us a penny by waiting until summer 2025? You might think if we keep him, we might be suffered next season for not getting top 4, which will affect us financially. But what if the other way around that he could make us top 4 next season because he has proven himself he could lead us to top 4 last season? It’s not like the new candidate manager can guarantee us top 4 either. Hence, the ideal move will be at least keeping ten hag until his contract expired.
2. The new structure might be similar to the Ajax structure in term of the manager’s role and the recruitment.
   • INEOS wants to deploy structure where the manager acts like a head coach focusing more on coaching and developing players. INEOS wants to have more control in recruitment. At Ajax, ten Hag wasn’t the main guy who decided the recruitment. He was more the head coach and focusing more on coaching and developing players, which something ten Hag was highly rated at Ajax. They had Marc Overmars to overlook the recruitment, planning, contract, and etc, which reducing the work load and the responsibility of the manager. This new structure could benefit ten Hag, hence why I would like to see what ten hag can do under INEOS’s new structure.
3. ten Hag is still a high talented coach.
   • Last season: He finished 3rd, reached FA & EFL Cup final, won EFL Cup, and only lost once at home last season (vs Brighton) in PL. I dare to say, it might be our best season post SAF based on combined league and all competition. Mourinho won two trophies in his first season but he faced nobody in Europa league and finished outside the top 4 which a reflection of how poor we were in the league. While We beat Barcelona the La Liga winner in Europa league last season.
   • At Ajax 22/23, ten Hag made Ajax became one of the most productive team in UCL by scoring lot of goals and playing good football. He beats sporting 4-2 and 5-1 against Ruben Amorim, the same manager who won Portuguese league twice and wanted by Liverpool to replace Klopp. He beats Dortmund 3-1 and 4-0
   • At Ajax 18/19, ten hag reached semi final UCL beating the likes of Bayern, juventus, and Real Madrid playing great football. Only to lose in semi final despite of having 2-0 lead in first half of the second leg and the only reason his team was knocked out because of the away goal.
   • Ajax won every eredivise under ten hag, even when they sold their main players in 2019, ten hag still won trophy with a new rebuild team. The moment ten hag left, Ajax couldn’t win a single trophy and couldn’t even qualify in UCL spot.
4. Don’t let the players power overcome the manager or coach once again.
   • Is the manager really the problem when we still have the same players majority who let the previous manager and coaches? The players convinced some Or many fans that Kieran McKenna was a poor coach. Look at him now promoted Ipswich Town back to back from league one to championship to PL and playing good football. Rangnick - he’s done well with Austria now with more than 60% winning percentage. People thought he was poor manager but yet Bayern wanted him.
   • May be we shouldn’t be rushing sacking the manager or coach but giving ten hag another season to show what he can do if he has stability in his back four plus DM and under new structure where hopefully we will see improvement in recruitment.
5. Unlucky with the massive amount of Injuries
   • Any managers will suffer with more than 30 different combination back four in a season. There is no stability and not enough time to play/train together to develop as a team. We might see massive improvement if we can sign less injury prone back four and DM who has the leg.
   • There was also lot of question marks about our fitness coaches and medical department. There was even a report that Casemiro had to go to Spain because our medical department couldn’t identify Casemiro’s injury. Ten hag also had a dig to our medical department who told him that Malacia and Shaw will be back so he didn’t need to extend Reguilon’s loan deal or could let Fernandez going on loan to benfica. The fitness coaches and medical department require overhauled before the manager.

Dr. Dwayne said:

He's atrocious and people want to waste another season on him?

Unbelievable.

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It's not that surprising. For a lot of United fans, managers are always the least of our problems. The fact that he's an horrendous tactician is the Glazers fault.

Lash said:

From what he talks about, he wants to be a quick transition side that squeezes the opposition high up the pitch. Inevitably leaving a shit tonne of space to cover if you give the ball away as cheaply as we do and we have absolute carthorses all over the pitch. So I don't necessarily discount his headline vision, I don't think he can identify the players needed to suit his system or at least get his message across coherently.

I think the style can have it's moments, but as I mention above, there are obvious flaws with the personnel and the manager accounting for that. I think he didn't fancy reverting to how we played under Ole and doubling down on the philosophy would at least see some attacking gains, but boy was he wrong.

Well, when he had Overmars and VDS, he performed infinitely better than what we're seeing here. The question would be is the appointment of Wilcox and Berrada enough to move the needle enough at this point? I'd have to say probably not, but then again we maybe seeing a ridiculous amount of outgoings this summer with all the expiring contracts and everyone up for sale, so there's a bit of a reset within the squad. I'd prefer Tuchel, but I'm not against Ten Hag given a chance if the option is fecking Potter or god forbid, Southgate.

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A lot of people can talk the good talk. Heck, you can find posters on Redcafe who can write some detailed and lengthy essays displaying their vast knowledge obtained from reading 442 type tactical websites. That doesn't mean that they can go and become successful managers.

He played a pretty compact system and could have reverted back to it if he understood the gravity of the situation. But instead he has continued and failed with it through out the season. I don't even know which missing players will come back and allow him to play this stupid system completely unsuited to this league. We had Martinez, Mount and Shaw all available at the beginning of the season and faced similar problems as we did without them. The midfield and the attack has been available almost throughout, but has that changed our pressing, passing, control of the midfield or chance creation? I think the answer to all of those is a no.

He performed infinitely better in a league where Ajax is a dominant team and had a golden generation of players coming through. His record in the Champions league and Europa was mediocre at the best. Yeah, that unprecedented and historic semi-final run aside, it was nothing to write home about.

Again, my question: Do we see himself as a manager who can get us back to challenging again? The answer is staring at our face.

RedBanker said:

Ban worthy thread of ever there was one.

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Just wanted to highlight this as an example of why this forum can be such an absolute shitshow at times.

"Your opinion is different to mine, therefore you should be banned."

What a lovely way to act. Christ.

Rood said:

I actually don't think it's that unpopular an opinion

While there isn't a strong 'Ten Hag In' movement, there is a sizeable chunk who would accept him getting another season based on:

- showed he is a good manager last season
- horrific injury list
- worth a try with the new board
- dearth of decent alternatives
- bored of constantly changing manager

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Which is the most unserious reason any club could possibly have to not sack a manager. Are they also not "bored" of constantly changing players? It's the same embarrassing "we're not a sacking club" stuff that keeps living on from Moyes era to this day. Same unhealthy attachment to one guy in the whole organization that we apparently can't get rid of.

Meanwhile, in real life, in many big organisations, if the organisation were not performing well the leadership team/managers need to go. It just doesn't make sense to change the entire workforce instead. It's just impossible unless you want to bankrupt the organisation. It's easy for us fans to just say change the players and keep the manager to make a statement.

But if it's your company or you're running a business, things will be very different. No other club in history stick to the failed manager and changed most of the player for the manager. It's a recipe to disaster and put us into bankruptcy or at the very least even more trouble with FFP

I’d accept one more season only if rashford is sold against his wishes.

SuperiorXI said:

For me we've been at this crossroads before and it has not worked each time.

I am convinced that Ten Hag should stay and we should instead remove certain players. It's a more difficult road but will yield the best results.

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I agree.

As an aside,

Insanity said:

A lot of people can talk the good talk. Heck, you can find posters on Redcafe who can write some detailed and lengthy essays displaying their vast knowledge obtained from reading 442 type tactical websites. That doesn't mean that they can go and become successful managers.

He played a pretty compact system and could have reverted back to it if he understood the gravity of the situation. But instead he has continued and failed with it through out the season. I don't even know which missing players will come back and allow him to play this stupid system completely unsuited to this league. We had Martinez, Mount and Shaw all available at the beginning of the season and faced similar problems as we did without them. The midfield and the attack has been available almost throughout, but has that changed our pressing, passing, control of the midfield or chance creation? I think the answer to all of those is a no.

He performed infinitely better in a league where Ajax is a dominant team and had a golden generation of players coming through. His record in the Champions league and Europa was mediocre at the best. Yeah, that unprecedented and historic semi-final run aside, it was nothing to write home about.

Again, my question: Do we see himself as a manager who can get us back to challenging again? The answer is staring at our face.

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Well yeah, but he obviously is a bit more than that.

I always point to the Arsenal game, although we lost, I thought that was the style of played we'd go for this season but it's not materlised. I don't think I've seen those passing patterns since and if we can get back to that with some better additions, I'll be all for that next season.

He had two and both haven't lived up to being a golden generation. He also had players like Tadic, Blind, Haller, Ziyech and not to mention DVB who have all been deemed not good enough in our league, but worked pretty well in Europe. That is recruitment doing it's job properly and aligning to how a manager sets up, we should expect a better structure to do something closer to that.

As I said, probably not, but I'd prefer Tuchel. If the alternative is Potter or Southgate as linked, I think they'd be just as bad and would rather stick until a better option appears - iraola as an example.

Yakuza_devils said:

Meanwhile, in real life, in many big organisations, if the organisation were not performing well the leadership team/managers need to go. It just doesn't make sense to change the entire workforce instead. It's just impossible unless you want to bankrupt the organisation. It's easy for us fans to just say change the players and keep the manager to make a statement.

But if it's your company or you're running a business, things will be very different. No other club in history stick to the failed manager and changed most of the player for the manager. It's a recipe to disaster and put us into bankruptcy or at the very least even more trouble with FFP

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This is why this "players getting clean slate under new manager" idea is ridiculous as well. Of course most players will stay. Most players from most clubs stay, it's unrealistic and unfeasible to change the squad. "Let's try backing the manager and getting rid of players" is not a serious solution.

Rood said:

I actually don't think it's that unpopular an opinion

While there isn't a strong 'Ten Hag In' movement, there is a sizeable chunk who would accept him getting another season based on:

- showed he is a good manager last season
- horrific injury list
- worth a try with the new board
- dearth of decent alternatives
- bored of constantly changing manager

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I get all this and I'd normally be alright saying "go on, let's give it another try" due to the horrific injury list. However, his inability to adapt and change tactics when faced with an injury crisis is horrendous management and inexcusable, he's sleepwalked all the way through the season, just hoping the continuation of the same tactics will eventually "click".
So what happens if we have a good Summer, but then Martinez, a new centre back and a CM gets injured in November, because we clearly don't have a manager who can adapt, it's like we need to be the luckiest side in the league and have no issues, then we might be alright.

Is a big part of the problem that we shouldn’t ever really be thinking about is it a manager X’s squad rather is this a Man United squad?

We go too quickly from different styles of play to leave us with Frankenstein’s monster squads. If Wilcox thinks Ten Hag is building the “United” style of play then we stick with him.

Carolina Red said:

18 years of school & 12 years of teaching and this is the first I’m ever hearing of an E. You make a 50.5 in my class, that’s an F and a D- starts at 60.

And I don’t really think that making a point that an E or D- is a standard that should retain your job at Manchester United is a good look to begin with.

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E is the 5th letter in the alphabet. It comes between D and F.

For context in a British schooling system depending on the subject a 50.5 could be worth a C.

Rista said:

This is why this "players getting clean slate under new manager" idea is ridiculous as well. Of course most players will stay. Most players from most clubs stay, it's unrealistic and unfeasible to change the squad. "Let's try backing the manager and getting rid of players" is not a serious solution.

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While that is likely to be the case, Arteta has been able to sign 24 players on permanent deals since starting at Arsenal. In fact, I think in the majority of cases, PL sides don't make the jump from top four hopefuls to title challengers without significant squad overhaul. That usually goes hand in hand with a managerial change too, by the way.

didz said:

While that is likely to be the case, Arteta has been able to sign 24 players on permanent deals since starting at Arsenal. In fact, I think in the majority of cases, PL sides don't make the jump from top four hopefuls to title challengers without significant squad overhaul. That usually goes hand in hand with a managerial change too, by the way.

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We've sold and bought plenty of players. You just don't sell half your squad at once which is what people seem to be expecting to happen. For some reason only under Ten Hag too.

Red00012 said:

Ten hag out closed followed by Lindelof , AWB , Varane , Casemiro , Antony, Rashford , Eriksen and Martial, Donny , Williams and Sancho
Avoid European football and it will enable us to have a smaller squad and start the rebuild .

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Forgot he was still here, unbelievable how we have managed to get in this position squad wise.

didz said:

Just wanted to highlight this as an example of why this forum can be such an absolute shitshow at times.

"Your opinion is different to mine, therefore you should be banned."

What a lovely way to act. Christ.

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Ah another *******. How lovely.

Justvpoopedy head in here to see what people are saying.

Can't believe I'm seeing posts like "players this timr" or "players not the manager".

Forgive me if I am wrong but wasn't there a brief from all the tier 1/2s saying this summer we are having a proper clear out?

Have we all forgotten that it is planned for this summer?

There seems to be an either or attitude toward it , I think it's obvious to the powers that be that most of this playing squad need to go. It's been briefed and reported in the media.

I'm not sure why people are conveniently ignoring two facts.

- Most of the playing squad are up for sale already.

- Most of our starting 11 is comprised of useless ten hag signings.

Rista said:

We've sold and bought plenty of players. You just don't sell half your squad at once which is what people seem to be expecting to happen. For some reason only under Ten Hag too.

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Have we though, really? Under every manager it's 3, tops 4 permanent additions. Everyone always wants a whole new squad every year, so I don't know what you're on about with the "only under Ten Hag" thing, but he's on 9, so about the same rate.

As I said, teams who go from top 4 hopefuls to title challengers tend to overhaul their squads a lot more than we have done under any post-SAF manager. And that does usually come at the same time as a new manager, so you would hope that INEOS know that bringing in a new head coach may need to go hand in hand with a decent squad turnover if they want a big step forward. History tells us that.

RedBanker said:

Ah another *******. How lovely.

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I believe it is usually cults who want to ban out different opinions.... you know, like you suggested?

El Jefe said:

I honestly wonder what the breaking point for some of these posters is?

Game after game of opponents running through our midfield and taking countless shots on goal isn’t enough. Being 8th with a negative goal difference with three games left hasn’t done it either

It’s almost as if he’s been given a pass to be as bad as possible this season.

The craziest thing are those saying they don’t feel like the options out there are better than EtH so why not keep him. Imagine thinking there are only a handful of options better than Ten Hag after seeing what he’s done this season.

This team is on a journey. Unless we get a Pep type manager, the path back to the top will probably involve up to three managers. We don’t need a saviour but it’s hard for United fans to understand this. Every coach has to be the new Fergie and every young player the new Rooney or Ronaldo.

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Fergie got 6 years to win the league so obviously our next messiah also needs 6 years.

When even the people wanting to give him another season are reduced to arguing that his overall time here should be considered as a grade of E and not an F you know there's not really much of a justification for keeping him.

ForeverRed1 said:

Let’s just try something different this time. Players out.

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Love this idea. Clear the squad from the dross and allow ETH to pick his own players. Only then we will know how good he can be. Give him another £500m to build his team and then give him 2-3 years to put it together, gel and only then judge him. We owe him that.