Erik ten Hag | 2022/23 & 2023/24

[DavidDeSchmikes]

 

[Maluco]

The debate is a moot point. He isn’t turning this around no matter what your opinion is. The belief is gone and that his own fault for heading into the season so woefully unprepared.

There is only one way this goes now, and it’s better not to prolong it.

 

[city-puma]

Mount was good tonight, people simply don't want him to be good for some reason.

Individual good or alright performance doesn’t necessarily transform the team performance. We played so chaotically and there was no control at all. Too bad. But this setup is not working.

 

[steffyr2]

He's got other options than to play a very out of form Bruno on the wing though. He was honking tonight, still finished the game. Decisions like that do him no favours.

He's giving a really good impression of someone who doesn't know what he's doing. The players also act like they don't know what the plan is.

 

[Annihilate Now!]

I'm still behind him, but he really isn't helping himself with lots of his decisions at the moment.

 

[TsuWave]

Explain how it's nonsense. Every manager for the past 10 years has failed to succeed. What's different about the club's setup now?

Two things can be true at the same time - we have hierarchal issues and made poor managerial appointments, with Ten Hag being only upcoming manager we've appointed in said 10 years. The issues on the pitch can't all be explained away with "aha Glazers!' or "Arnold!" or "Murtough!"

It's OK to admit the manager is not infallible and has made/is making mistakes

But truthfully, I don't really want to exchange with anyone that needs this "explained", so be at peace and please proceed.

 

[Thom Merrilin]

Interesting that almost all of those moves came down our left side, the same side that Rashford and Sancho play on.

 

[Judas]

Individual good or alright performance doesn’t necessarily transform the team performance. We played so chaotically and there was no control at all. Too bad. But this setup is not working.

Bruno is king of chaos ball and Ten Hag's made him captain. I'll never understand how Bruno fits in with what I thought Ten Hag's football was meant to be. He's the exact opposite really.

 

[westmeath]

Hard to see any way he can turn this around. It’s just getting worse every game. His post match interviews are idiotic too which doesn’t help. If that’s how he speaks to the players then it’s no wonder they are playing such rubbish.

 

[bleedred]

The narrative has shifted here so much from last year.

It used to be that few summer signings, we will try to improve and catch up on city, even If we aren't challenging for the title.

Now all of a sudden, all the players we have are useless and NO MANAGER can win against palace and Galatasaray with this team because Eth cannot and they are all deadwood.

And the worst narrative of all is that he needs help with recruitment and the DOF should decide on a style, sign players accordingly and ask eth to coach them.I mean He cannot coach and get a response from HIS OWN signings, but will somehow improve players the DOF gets for him.

 

[Thom Merrilin]

Two things can be true at the same time - we have hierarchal issues and made poor managerial appointments, with Ten Hag being only upcoming manager we've appointed in said 10 years. The issues on the pitch can't all be explained away with "aha Glazers!' or "Arnold!" or "Murtough!"

It's OK to admit the manager is not infallible and has made/is making mistakes

But truthfully, I don't really want to exchange with anyone that needs this "explained", so be at peace and please proceed.

I agree, ETH should not be above criticism. He's definitely made some mistakes with in game management and team selection.

A lot of the problems were seeing are directly because of the Glazers, how can argue they're not? The reason players like Ronaldo and Sancho are at the club is the Glazers. The reason we've chopped and changed managerial styles so often is the Glazers. That's where the buck stops.

Perhaps "nobody will succeed" at United isn't correct. "It will take another SAF or Pep to succeed at united under current management" might be more appropriate for what I believe.

 

[kouroux]

Two things can be true at the same time - we have hierarchal issues and made poor managerial appointments, with Ten Hag being only upcoming manager we've appointed in said 10 years. The issues on the pitch can't all be explained away with "aha Glazers!' or "Arnold!" or "Murtough!"

It's OK to admit the manager is not infallible and has made/is making mistakes

But truthfully, I don't really want to exchange with anyone that needs this "explained", so be at peace and please proceed.

One simple example is ETH letting Bruno taking set pieces, I don't see how that idiotic idea has anything to do with the Glazers.
Like you said, there is more than enough to criticize both elements

 

[Irwin99]

Our centre backs and goalkeeper haven't exactly been great but our full backs and the defensive screen have been appalling. Even AWB who was/is the best of the bunch before his injury was guilty of going AWOL or being beaten too easily and the midfield cover just isn't there. I know we have an injury crisis but it really needs sorting out.

You look at the first goal we conceded against Bayern which isn't on the video and it feel like any runner can cut through the team. The manager has to sort out the system balance.

 

[groovyalbert]

I loved Erik when he first came in because he had the balls to drop the underperforming players, no matter what their status at the club was, and it turned our form around straight away.

So why he's showing loyalty now to underperforming players now is very frustrating, and will probably end up getting him the sack.

Presumably because you have to start a match with XI players if they're available.

 

[spiriticon]

He doesn't have a DOF or advisor because he didn't want one in Rangnick apparently.

So in that case, he better make his signings and coaching work. Very soon. It's simple as.

 

[AneRu]

I don't agree with your assessment of his signings, for starters declaring a keeper who hasn't had chance to play for us as shite is completely irrational.

Still, be it ETH or someone else, we need to continue down the path we've started on for any of this to be worth it.

We will have to agree to disagree on the signings but I am with you on the direction and succession. It would be so easy to bring in a Mourinho clone and revert to low block fast paced breaks and we would probably get a CL qualification or two but we will be back to square one the moment teams find us out or we try to challenge for the bigger honors.

If ETH is to go we need a better coach of the same school but the problem with the club right now is that it is stuck in paralysis and I can't see anyone having a clear head to cooly identify the next guy in the midst of this crisis. Murtough, for one, will be lucky to survive this disaster or have the same leeway he had in choosing ETH.

Feels like we have to forget about any achievables this term, get Erik to do an Artetasque clean up job for 18 months and hopefully emerge with a younger, leaner squad. Just changing the manager feels like a 'been there, done that' scenario because say we get Di Zerbi in, he will need 5 to 8 players at 50m each, which the Glazers can't afford and by the 2nd summer he has fallen into the trap of relying on the Bruno hero ball and a Rashford purple patch. The moment those two feel comfortable, the team will be exposed and another manager will be done again.

There are painful things that will need to be done to undo the recent and long standing errors underpinning this malaise. We should let Erik do the clean up, he fecked anyway so we might as well use him to clear the decks. We shouldnt lie to ourselves that there is a manager who is like a silver bullet to our issues because this team is broken to the core, its been traumatised far too many times and some attitudes just stink which will undermine any new manager in due course.

 

[groovyalbert]

Joking aside, ETH needs to go right back to basics. Forget possession football/particular style, just focus on getting the most simple aspects of the game right. We look like a group who've never played together every match right now.

 

[Judas]

Ten Hag is making questionable and odd tactical and selections every week. Thats on him and his staff. I'm feeling pretty deflated by how things are looking right now.

I still want to believe in him long term, but we need an uptick in performances and results desperately quick.

 

[Get In Scholesy]

This has been an issue for 5 years.

 

[redshaw]

Looking very difficult for him to last beyond Jan.

One of the alarming things is before joining he apparently roasted the board in our recruitment yet he has found himself going down a very expensive and poor return recruitment path and also has devalued a player in Sancho, if you handle it better and play the long game you can either get some use and sell for higher this Jan or summer.

The manager and the club have to stop with so many 50-85 million signings and get some value and replace more. We're looking at another expensive flush and loading more debt if we can't find and be confident in getting some lesser known players that fit a profile, young techincal athletic.

Not only is ETH adding to his problems, with them being so expensive you can't even put the existing problems out. It's very hard to see where to turn looking through the squad. It's rinse and repeat of LVG Jose Ole.

We badly need a strong hand at the top of the club. Some say it's in place and Hojlund is a product of that, he looks a great buy yet it's two summers and we're not really testing any structure if it is in place and falling down the same trap. The start to this season is such a calamity it would make Ole and Ralf blush.

 

[Thom Merrilin]

He doesn't have a DOF or advisor because he didn't want one in Rangnick apparently.

So in that case, he better make his signings and coaching work. Very soon. It's simple as.

Murtough is our DoF or "Football Director" which is his official title. He hired Ralf and was never going to fire himself so Ralf could have the job.

 

[RedRonaldo]

The narrative has shifted here so much from last year.

It used to be that few summer signings, we will try to improve and catch up on city, even If we aren't challenging for the title.

Now all of a sudden, all the players we have are useless and NO MANAGER can win against palace and Galatasaray with this team because Eth cannot and they are all deadwood.

And the worst narrative of all is that he needs help with recruitment and the DOF should decide on a style, sign players accordingly and ask eth to coach them.I mean He cannot coach and get a response from HIS OWN signings, but will somehow improve players the DOF gets for him.

Its just like Mourinho final season, or Ole final season when they get the sacked. High expectation at the start, yet something went wrong and we keep getting worst and worst, and everyone can see we are heading to car crash, yet no one could point out exactly where's the problem coming from.

 

[MrMarcello]

At this point, I'm confused about what "his" football is...its not possession, its not transition, its not long ball...its like a weird, horribly chaotic mix of all three

In fairness to the man, perhaps it's having a collection of low football IQ players, individualists, and bad decision making abilities on the pitch. But, the flip to that is he sticks with too many non-performers and out of form players, some of that due to injury and some of that likely his stubbornness.

Are there no U21 players that could step in at LB or RB? If not, perhaps try something different, maybe three defenders vice four, and play Amrabat in his natural position, in say a 3-5-2 or 3-4-3 (I'm no tactician so leave that up to others to debate).

Part of me thinks he sticks to a certain crop because with certain players unavailable the rest are garbage, so he continues with Dalot and sticks Ambrabat at LB. What if they hadn't been able to get the loan move through before the deadline... he would be at LB now?

 

[Thom Merrilin]

Joking aside, ETH needs to go right back to basics. Forget possession football/particular style, just focus on getting the most simple aspects of the game right. We look like a group who've never played together every match right now.

I agree, bring it back to basics when things aren't going to plan. Some of these players have actually barely played with each other. This was game three (?) of Cas, Bruno and Mount playing together, Amrabat and Hojlund are still new, we seem to have a different cb pairing ever week. It's been a crazy start to the season.

 

[InfiniteBoredom]

Joking aside, ETH needs to go right back to basics. Forget possession football/particular style, just focus on getting the most simple aspects of the game right. We look like a group who've never played together every match right now.

If anything, possession football is what we need to climb out of this mess, matches like Palace stinks but if we get 70/80 percent possession every match, we will win more often than not. Our idea of creating a chance atm is hoofing it up from deep for someone to run on to, or to force turnover when opponents win the ball from said hoofs, it's purely playing percentages and theres no patience or finesse involved, no attempt to break the lines by working the ball quickly and intelligently. Let's actually try and test the opposition by camping in their own half, instead of faffing about at the back and try to exploit the space when they are tempted forward (and make no mistake, we are only playing this way because our 'best' players like space to run or attempt a through ball into).

 

[Oscar Bonavena]

He ran out of players. Who knew that there were only so many players in a squad and you had to work with the players you had?

What, there's no better option than an underperforming Bruno on the right wing?! Really?!

 

[Oscar Bonavena]

Presumably because you have to start a match with XI players if they're available.

What's that got to do with dropping underperforming players?

 

[Thom Merrilin]

What, there's no better option than an underperforming Bruno on the right wing?! Really?!

Is a non match fit Antony any better? Pellestri?

 

[AneRu]

I actually agree.

There are obvious issues with some of his man management, signings, tactics, decisions and in 18 months he has still not developed a coherent and consistent style of play. We are all over the place at times last season and it is even worse this year. We still rely on individual moments of brilliance for goals, like the Bruno goal V Burnley.

He talks about control, but we very rarely control a game. Outside of convincingly beating Crystal Palaces B team, we have not dominated a game this season. We look like the worst drilled team in the Premier League. Even the teams at the bottom of the table can pull together and defend as a unit. Shit, even Burnley were stroking it around and dominated possession.

It doesn't feel from what we are hearing in interviews that he knows how to fix it. Beating the players with the proverbial stick isn't working.

But he did have a good first season, even though we got humiliated against some of the big teams. He has had to deal with a lot of off field issues, some that he may have arguably made worse, but still. Injury's this year have been tough, but i question him playing injured played like Licha and AWB.

And as discussed with your good self, we are so invested in this manager in terms of his signings, from his old clubs, there seems little value in throwing in the towel now.

If it turns out to be a 6th or 7th place league finish, out of the CL at the group stage, no cups and no green shoots of hope, then I think he has to go in the summer.

He is on a slippery slope and maybe to far gone to turn this around but to me the bolded is the biggest problem we have had in a decade. We shouldnt base our managerial tenures on what happens with a the CL qualification, the Glazers do for obvious reasons, but for us fans what joy is there for us to qualify for a tournament we have no hope in winning so that we can attract the next batch of mercenaries?

Don't get me wrong, I love CL football and this club was built on our exploits in that tournament but we are placing too much emphasis on it to our own detriment. It could be the reason why we are failing, managers know that if they make it they are safe and it leads them to relying on off-the-cuff mavericks who have no regard for team structure, control and tactics for the overall good of the team.

Managers won't have the motivation to work on long term, team building solutions when they know 4th is enough. Then other teams raise the bar and we are shocked when we can't compete. They are building Championship winning teams, we are just building for top 4.

I would say allow Erik to weed out the rats or at least be in charge of the big players. If he the one telling Bruno and Casemiro to waste possession by spamming long balls then he deserves what's coming. If we hold our nerve and resist firing him we can finish the clear out and rebuild. More than anyone he will know the mistakes he made in Onana, Mount etc but if the club works with him we have the youth to help us cover some of the most glaring ones.

He has got to this level by mistake, we saw the football he played in the CL with Ajax. He has made a few costly mistakes but we all know that we will be here in two years with the new guy. At least let's be in that position with him, he would have solved a few of the issues we have. Ordinarily I would say sack but as we have seen before that's got us nowhere.

 

[RedDevil@84]

If he wants to survive, he will need to drop Bruno and drop Rashy as well. He has to take a drastic step

 

[DSG]

If anything, possession football is what we need to climb out of this mess, matches like Palace stinks but if we get 70/80 percent possession every match, we will win more often than not. Our idea of creating a chance atm is hoofing it up from deep for someone to run on to, or to force turnover when opponents win the ball from said hoofs, it's purely playing percentages and theres no patience or finesse involved, no attempt to break the lines by working the ball quickly and intelligently. Let's actually try and test the opposition by camping in their own half, instead of faffing about at the back and try to exploit the space when they are tempted forward (and make no mistake, we are only playing this way because our 'best' players like space to run or attempt a through ball into).

I disagree with this for the most part. feck possession. Right now, it’s LVG style possession without creating chances.

The fancy way of saying it is patterns of play, but it’s really fundamental stuff. We’re so focused on being the cool team who has lots of possession, with pinched fullbacks, building possession in midfield, line breaking passes, blah blah blah. Get the ball to your wingers, encourage them to go 1v1, get to the end line, cut the ball back, utilize overlapping fullbacks, use classic wing play instead of inverted wing play.

Look, Pep has focused on possession, but he’s all about movement and search for 3v2s and 2v1s, but he also encourages his wingers to go at people. The obsession with possession football is ridiculous. Most teams can’t execute it consistently save Barca and Bayern.

 

[Thom Merrilin]

If he wants to survive, he will need to drop Bruno and drop Rashy as well. He has to take a drastic step

I'm still on the fence about this. On one hand you can point to the Palace cup game and say look how great we are without them. On the other hand, Bruno is the reason we beat Burnley.

 

[DSG]

He is on a slippery slope and maybe to far gone to turn this around but to me the bolded is the biggest problem we have had in a decade. We shouldnt base our managerial tenures on what happens with a the CL qualification, the Glazers do for obvious reasons, but for us fans what joy is there for us to qualify for a tournament we have no hope in winning so that we can attract the next batch of mercenaries?

Don't get me wrong, I love CL football and this club was built on our exploits in that tournament but we are placing too much emphasis on it to our own detriment. It could be the reason why we are failing, managers know that if they make it they are safe and it leads them to relying on off-the-cuff mavericks who have no regard for team structure, control and tactics for the overall good of the team.

Managers won't have the motivation to work on long term, team building solutions when they know 4th is enough. Then other teams raise the bar and we are shocked when we can't compete. They are building Championship winning teams, we are just building for top 4.

I would say allow Erik to weed out the rats or at least be in charge of the big players. If he the one telling Bruno and Casemiro to waste possession by spamming long balls then he deserves what's coming. If we hold our nerve and resist firing him we can finish the clear out and rebuild. More than anyone he will know the mistakes he made in Onana, Mount etc but if the club works with him we have the youth to help us cover some of the most glaring ones.

He has got to this level by mistake, we saw the football he played in the CL with Ajax. He has made a few costly mistakes but we all know that we will be here in two years with the new guy. At least let's be in that position with him, he would have solved a few of the issues we have. Ordinarily I would say sack but as we have seen before that's got us nowhere.

I don’t know mate. Real Madrid hires and fires based on results and they seem to be doing well.

 

[Thom Merrilin]

I disagree with this for the most part. feck possession. Right now, it’s LVG style possession without creating chances.

The fancy way of saying it is patterns of play, but it’s really fundamental stuff. We’re so focused on being the cool team who has lots of possession, with pinched fullbacks, building possession in midfield, line breaking passes, blah blah blah. Get the ball to your wingers, encourage them to go 1v1, get to the end line, cut the ball back, utilize overlapping fullbacks, use classic wing play instead of inverted wing play.

Look, Pep has focused on possession, but he’s all about movement and search for 3v2s and 2v1s, but he also encourages his wingers to go at people. The obsession with possession football is ridiculous. Most teams can’t execute it consistently save Barca and Bayern.

Brighton beg to differ. Im pretty sure it's the norm for the best teams to have more possession not the other way around.

 

[DownRiver]

How can Onana play the way he did vs Man City in terms of passing in the CL final vs now, where every match he seems to pass/lob more and more hailmarys up top?

 

[AneRu]

If he wants to survive, he will need to drop Bruno and drop Rashy as well. He has to take a drastic step

I think soon as Antony is fit Bruno needs to feck off to the bench, get some LB from the youth (what happened with young Alvaro), play Maguire CB, use Amrabat as a second 6 cause we need to shut shop for a few games and use Hannibal as the most advanced mid. I would keep Rashford in the side, he has his uses when the rest of the team is playing compact.

Play a Mourinhosque 4-2-3-1, get a few 1-0s and stabilise the side.

 

[Mike Smalling]

Only slight hope is that we will look better with a real left back and Amrabat in midfield. I’m not overly optimistic though. Seems like the problems run deeper.

 

[AneRu]

I don’t know mate. Real Madrid hires and fires based on results and they seem to be doing well.

Real Madrid always have a great team and the last time they had a rot akin to ours was almost 15 years ago. If it was us that wasted 100m on Hazard we wouldn't have won in CL in the fallout after that signing, we would still be playing him hoping to unlock him.

 

[Big Ben Foster]

I don’t know mate. Real Madrid hires and fires based on results and they seem to be doing well.

Every club does. We're the only one that relies on the manager to lead a multi-year "rebuild" from the moment we hire them.

 

[city-puma]

Only slight hope is that we will look better with a real left back and Amrabat in midfield. I’m not overly optimistic though. Seems like the problems run deeper.

Obviously deeper. Today’s team missed only one natural LB.