I’m still ETH in. But he’s not making it easy for himself. Spent a ton. Also we have manager’s at other clubs, most you can say they joined well run clubs. But Spurs? They have a tighter owner than us, they go from contrasting manager’s. There really isn’t an excuse to not have style of play and only be let down by the players who are not good enough for it. Then you know who to replace and who to sign.
Erik ten Hag | 2022/23 & 2023/24
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Yea, I’m done.
Case and McTom have been our main goal threats after Rashford, and we've have had many thrashings since Feb, I'd say -1 after last 37 sounds about right.
Many were concerned last season to be fair, we didn't get much from our other attacking players. Instead of adding we've now lost Rashford and are on course for a very low scoring season, lower than LVG's second.
As good as last season was, it was very flawed and waiting to be laid bare unless we had massive improvements on outputs of the rest, the fundamentals of scoring are just not there from the front line.
Many were concerned last season to be fair, we didn't get much from our other attacking players. Instead of adding we've now lost Rashford and are on course for a very low scoring season, lower than LVG's second.
As good as last season was, it was very flawed and waiting to be laid bare unless we had massive improvements on outputs of the rest, the fundamentals of scoring are just not there from the front line.
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He helped create red bull football group mate. Not beyond doubt he know a thing or two about transfer, surely More than ex bankers and ex Everton accountant
I'm pretty sure I remember ten hag confirming that last year he wanted to play with 2 number 8's but he had to quickly abandon that idea due to personal available/not acquired in the transfer window. This year it seems he's not willing to change this regardless of the personal he has available. He will need to adapt or he will be sacked. He's not got the team he envisioned, of that we can be pretty sure about but I feel the unwillingness to adapt will be his downfall this time around.
Where are you going to get width from though? We have spent most of the season without any left backs available and usually only one right back. All of our wingers prefer to play inverted except Pellistri. When Rashford plays on the right people flip out yet he provided that brilliant assist for Hojlund in the CL.
Right now I'd be inclined to play AWB now he's fit with no license to get forward tucking in to a back 3 in possesion and then have Reguilon holding the width on the left allowing Garnacho to play narrow. Then have Pellistri or Rashford wide right getting crosses in. I think Rashford with a simple remit to beat his full back and put a cross in could get back to form without worrying about scoring quite as much.
The constant there is the players stopping running for the manager. Playing slow, without aggression, pulling out of their 50-50s not pressing and leaving their man to someone else. This is the players on strike again, make no mistake about it. The club is in crisis yet again because the players are soft shites who collectively can’t rise to the challenge of being ultra professional and competitive for longer than a few months without throwing their toys out of the pram.
I feel for the manager as I felt for Ole. Ronaldo arriving (and the EL final) killed him and I’d say he would have wanted Haaland a 100 times at any point over ever getting Ronaldo back. We tried to cheap out on the fee but for really high wages yet again and end up spending so much bad after bad money to try and finally fix the position. Ronaldo plus Rasmus money and wages would have got us kane or haaland at any point in the last 3 years. Think of all the money and momentum we’ve lost signing stopgaps and using poor or short term players post Fergie? It’s just horrible and it’s left us with nothing. No wonder the players are sick of it all but the least they can do is be professional and try their hardest even if the manager is too strict or picks his favourites. If they do that they are good enough to get top 4 but not much else by the looks of it. Demoralised all round. I expect the sack any day now. They are playing to get him sacked clear as day
I think you’re probably right. I’ve lost much of my faith in ETH this season, after a really good start in the last. I don’t think he’s a bad manager, but I think it’s clearly beyond him here. I must say, though, I’m beginning to believe it’s beyond anyone to fix the gargantuan mess that is UTD on 2023/4.
Ralf would have got us 2 really good dynamic modern midfielders and pressing forwards for the Casemiro and Antony money. It would have been an improvement I think we can say in hindsight even if the way he managed the team was horrible. To be fair they all knew he didn’t rate them and it turns out he was right not to. I’m sick of believing in any of these players. They aren’t good or ambitious enough
Because our style of play is quite very different to Ajax blueprint and this goes back to SAF latter years, where we're happy to concede possession, soak up pressure and hit teams on counter, than trying to dominate possession, outside of 2 season with LVG. And ETH struggled to get the best of the class when it comes to the Ajax preferred profile players. Antony is not world class. Malacia is squad level. Eriksen is decent but he's not even among the best at his peak. Not so much right now at his age when transition to a deeper role. Lisandro is good but with weaknesses. Hojlund is young and may need time to become prolificent first before being considered top CF. Amrabat is no way top class or he would have been picked long time ago at the potential fee Fiorentina asked. Onana maybe one of the best with with his feet, but overall he's way down the list of top GK. Mount is unexplainable signing... And the squad ETH inherited is most United way squad Ole built.
No long term strategy and underwhelming short term transfer doesn't help this team moving onto the right path at all.
Pau Torres aerial ability is questionable too. There is a reason no other top clubs went in for him especially after the World Cup. Emery knows him well since he coached him at Villareal, so he kinda covers for his weaknesses. He's not the kind of savior/transformative signing
If we expect good scouting, we could have gotten Kim Min Jae before he moved from Turkish league to Napoli. Or Hojlund before he moved to Atalanta, Enzo before he moved to Benfica and soon joined Chelsea (Rangnick recommended him?!)... Not another known quality with weakness that also eats a good chunk of our budget.
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Some thought we should win pretty much all of these; others correctly identified that ETH would be in real trouble if he lost three (or four tonight with Newcastle added on).
Please explain why all the managers have failed at similar stages, lost some of the players, everyone is underperforming? Whatever is going on behind closed doors; the down spiral and failure of all the managers and the destruction of this club has not been all the fault of the managers.You guys are just believing anything now, come on
As much as I want Ten Hag gone, I'm at a point where I don't want the players to think they can outlast the manager. As bad a job as Ten Hag is doing, they should be better than this. I don't trust these players.
Yes, exactly. Surely, Ten Hag (not advocating that stays or goes) is not incomptent to the point that he can't get a goal out of these players in two consecutive home games? Regardless of the result.
The job he has right now is coach, he is not a DOF. It is surprising that some posts suggest that he is an amazing DOF, but he himself doesn't know it, and he keeps asking for coaching jobs and not for DOF jobs!
Really sad how it is no different to the matter days of Ole, Mou, LVG. The tactical setup isn’t working and that is on him but there are so many players just way off the basic level - like passing to a team mate off - which is not.
People always say its the players on strike but hardly any of them remain from Mourinho's time. Shaw, Lindelof, Dalot, McTominay, Rashford. I don't think there are anymore. Is that enough of a core group to have striked for Mourinho, Ole and now Ten Hag. The players have been changed and the kind of issues we see have remained form one manager to the next.
Obviously, there is more of a crossover with Ole's signings but often times when people say the players have gone on strike they actually mean they've lost belief in the manager. If players have even a little bit of doubt in the boss then it bleeds into matches. It's the half-hearted run. It's the opposite of 'running through brick walls for the boss'. All of a sudden any niggle means a player is unavailable rather than chomping at the bit to play.
How anyone can defend that is beyond me. If he were managing the scousers and had that record we'd be pissing ourselves laughing and calling him the dutch Hodgson or something
Actually, none of our managers "failed". They all got positions from 2nd to 7th, which is good for most managers.To do better than that, we don't need a good manager, we need an exceptional manager. None of our managers was exceptional. ETH isn't, either.
One of the things people miss is that failing is also part of the journey. You don't usually finish 5th then 4th then 3rd until you win. Progress can be a meandering path. It's hard to imagine now but if ETH somehow survives then it's this time when we may look back on and think 'thank god we didn't give up on him'.
Sure, but I don't think it's wild to suggest that the attitudes of the former players, gets passed to the newer players. However, having said that it's impossible to get rid of everyone. I want players like Rashford gone. If we want consistency with a new manager, we need to continue the path Ten Hag was going for at least with regards to possession. Players like Onana, Martinez, Shaw, etc... are oriented towards possession based football. The next manager needs to demand we work towards dominating possession at the bare minimum. And if that's the case we need players like Rashford gone, Mctominay gone, and Bruno gone.
Going back to the players' effort, I don't think it's right that the players can lose belief that fast. They should carry out their instructions regardless. If United are a side that plays 6th-8th place level football consistently, then fine the manager is a clear problem and we can identify our squad needing huge upgrades.
However, there have been too many times where the players go from 2nd-4th place football and revert to football that is more deserving of those around 12-15th level. As bad as the coaching and the player quality is, it should never revert to that level. That to me shows that these players are downing tools or are incredibly weak minded.
That shows to me that even if we get a manager next season that starts doing well in year 1, eventually in year 2 or 3 these players will once again have another period of football where the football gets laughably bad like under Mourinho, Ole, Rangnick, and now Ten Hag forcing us to reconsider the manager. LVG is the only one that didn't have his players turn to absolutely near relegation level. He was sacked at the end of the season. We're on a worryingly bad trend of appalling losing streaks that get managers sacked.
You should rewatch arteta first season mate. He made Fat Frank looked like genius in comparison.
Not a single soul believed he would last more than 3 years with that football they played.
ETH is in a more worrying state though since he never commited to what hes good at from day 1. Spending big on 2-3 players comes with pressure to success fast, he has to be pragmatic and play such football that might not be his strong point.
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Yeah, I agree. The worse it gets the worse they play and the more the pressure grows until everyone is just being crap. It is particularly concerning that even big moments like winning late against Brentford or Onana saving the pen against Copenhagen didn't lead to any kind of uptick in the mood of the squad.
Even within games it seems like we can start well like against Spurs and even City for 15 mins then it all falls apart. Is it because we didn't get the goal to reward the play and then the players start cheating the system or start acting individually?
The game again tonight wasn't going too badly until one poor bit of play near the opposition box leads to a counterattack and a goal. The players then never threatened to come back. It's like it sucked all the confidence away again and that's somewhat understandable given how fragile we are currently.
Not sure why you guys don’t see this but it’s obvious. ETH plan is to get us out of all competitions, relegate us and by doing that finally rid us of the Glazers.
You should be thanking him. Nitwits.
You should be thanking him. Nitwits.
Stop cheering or applauding for these sets of lazy giving up sets of players
Back your managers. Let them know that their petulant acts arent welcomed
Back your managers. Let them know that their petulant acts arent welcomed
He is definitely ahead of the schedule for Plan Phoenix.
You start to wonder how many players took Sancho's side over this,initially I thought it wasn't many because he was being encouraged to apologise. However when you look at performances it now looks like the majority want him back and have decided to stop playing for Erik until he's sacked most likely by these leeches
What happened mate you changed your tune on Ten Hag , players may be the problem but that doesn't mean managers weren't in past or now in present it's fecking collective shit fest .
I say purge them all manager , players , management everybody .
We have a MINUS FIVE goal difference!
Only 5 teams have a worse goal difference than us this season.
Bloody Everton and Wolves have better goal difference than us this season.
How pathetic is that?
I’ve reached the point of despair.
How have we come full circle in 18 months.
Its like sick version of groundhog day.
I’m fearing the worst against Fulham. How has it come to this after £400m spent.
Only 5 teams have a worse goal difference than us this season.
Bloody Everton and Wolves have better goal difference than us this season.
How pathetic is that?
I’ve reached the point of despair.
How have we come full circle in 18 months.
Its like sick version of groundhog day.
I’m fearing the worst against Fulham. How has it come to this after £400m spent.
If I could, I would
Gladly spent a year or two in the championship.
But if we sack ETH, the rot will seep and spread to the new bunch.
I think how the club handled DDG situation is more damaging than anything. DDG may need to go due to performance issue, but he's a long time servant to the club with good attitude. When you treated DDG like that, it would definitely affect the morale. Players may now feel insecure about club dumping them like hot garbage despite they try to give their all. The club didn't own up and be honest with DDG about no longer want his service, and instead making it into ugly bye bye.
Calmed down a bit after the weekend and today. I think we should stick by ETH because I don't want these dogshit players to get another clean slate. I would throw these fecks out first and then decide what to do with the manager.
Yeah DDG was treated absolutely shabbily by the club there is no doubt about that,maybe he has more support from players than Erik realised and his decision has backfired on him badly
This. How are players going to feel motivated when the manager treats a long-time servant of the club like some disposable piece of tissue? Especially for the senior players.
He/they should have addressed it publically or at least brought him back to celebrate his career. No goodbyes etc.
The biggest problem that we have in our team right now is our "pressing" or our lack there of. If you press, the entire team has to press. You either press with everyone, or you press with nobody. The moment you have your front 3 pressing, but your midfield is backing off, then your front 3 press is useless because now their back 4 has outlets. ETH has to either tell his entire team to press, or tell his entire team to back off. The way it is now, we are so easy to play through because we aren't pressing as a team. Some are and some aren't, and that's the worst thing you can do. Pressing is supposed to take away space. Our press opens up more space. It's really quite pathetic. And this is only a small part of our problem. Don't even get me started on our "attack". Antony will beat his Fb wide and have space to run into because the oppositions entire back line, but then he will stop, cut back to his left foot, and let the entire back 4 get goal side. WTF??? When was the last time one of our forwards took the ball wide and crossed it back post for the other winger to tap it in? All our wingers want to do is assist. If I was manager the first thing I would is make Antony play on the left wing and make Rashford play on the right wing to help teach them that assisting is just as important as scoring.
You know what you are asking is nearly impossible. On manager is always cheaper to rid of than a bunch fo players. Besides, we have already got rid of a fair number of players in the past 2 summers.
So I think you are setting yourself up for another prezel rationalisation phase.
Well a lot of it is down to him for his refusal to drop players who were downing tools. He stubbornly played Rashford, Bruno, Case when they were all in shit form. The injuries of course is not his fault,
Obviously we cant do that in 1 window but 3-4 out in the summer would be a good start. Hopefully the takeover is done by then and we have new setup planning for the summer.
I really have no solution for DDG if I am the decision maker at the club. I meant everyone know whatever we do now is covering our own ass, whereas the bridge is truly burnt; damage has been done especially onto DDG. It would require DDG be quite "nice" (submissive even) to agree to play a puppet in the club face saving show.
That incident sent a wrong message really. So good attitude, professionalism is not appreciated, who care about the management dealing with unprofessional teammate. Siding with either sides doesn't matter because in the end you can still be kicked out for doing the right thing if one day management doesn't see value in you anymore.
I don't know if it's because he's too meek in his public persona at a club where it matters a lot. Or just incompetent in the role. If the refs were shite, call it out. Same goes for the transfer window, summer prep or tactical plan(s). Now he can't do it from a position of strength as he'd be seen as a crybaby.
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