Erik ten Hag | 2022/23 & 2023/24

[yumtum]

Don't know if you were one of the worst but some people blamed the players and said they were hopeless, they don't listen, are spoiled etc. All it took was a few weeks of work and they are a team again.

Yeah I still think nost of the first team players should be moved on at some point, there's just no faith there.

They've proven to be spineless under different managers, bottling Cup finals and semi finals, choking top4 etc, failing to even run (shouldn't have ro e coached to run).

I said it earlier in the summer, but if Martial has a 20 goal season for example and a club offers us £30-40m for him next summer, we should snap that clubs hand off.

Anyway, Ten Hag was my preferred choice, and I've consistently said that playing good football is the most important thing for me, winning will come with time, just want to see good football again and this guy seems to be on to something.

 

[arthurka]

I understand being optimistic but some of you are fecking mental, holy shit.

Give them a slack it's been a while, but you are absolutely right.

 

[Adnan]

 

[amolbhatia50k]

Reminds me of Van Gaals first preseason. We looked great I was super excited for the season, then the real football started, and we all know how that panned out. So I don’t think I’ll get excited just now

There's no doubt implementing his style will take time and we will face many issues this season. What's important is that he has the quality and authority to see it through.

 

[The Red Thinker]

"JADON!!!! heh pass".

This is like a week old.

 

[WR10]

You know we’re playing
Frankie Erikson
Bruno

For fun at a cup game.

It’s insane under this system

This system has made Savage look like scholes ffs

 

[r0663664]

I hope we sign 1 more striker and left winger so that players don't get complacent. The thing with Ole, he has favourite and refuse to drop when they are shit. With ETH, I have feel that you don't show willing to play for the team, you can sit on the bench and rot. This is last chance for Martial, if he works hard then he will get games. That's how it should be. Ole downfall for cuddling these players.

 

[sullydnl]

We don't have to press full 90 mins, we press until we have 3 or 4-0 lead then we can afford to take our feet off the pedal. That's how Liverpool and City does it.

Yep.

If you look at the stats City were actually the team with the least "pressures" in the league last season. The key thing though is that they were also the team with the highest percentage of successful pressures. And a disproportionate amount of their pressures came in their own attacking third.

In other words if you dominate the ball as much as they do (and we want to do) you massively reduce the amount of pressing you actually have to do. But when you do press, you need to press very well.

 

[ROFLUTION]

God I love Irwin!

He’s a cute little raisin. What a player he was

 

[sillwuka]

There seems to be a noticeable change in our playing style, trust the process.

 

[Buster15]

Yep.

If you look at the stats City were actually the team with the least "pressures" in the league last season. The key thing though is that they were also the team with the highest percentage of successful pressures. And a disproportionate amount of their pressures came in their own attacking third.

In other words if you dominate the ball as much as they do (and we want to do) you massively reduce the amount of pressing you actually have to do. But when you do press, you need to press very well.

Very good point.
Pressing is something of a black art and it has taken years of coaching to achieve the level of City.

And a lot of it is actually down to the intelligence of the players to both comprehend what is being said to them and bring able to carry it out effectively in different situations.

 

[led_scholes]

Reminds me of Van Gaals first preseason. We looked great I was super excited for the season, then the real football started, and we all know how that panned out. So I don’t think I’ll get excited just now

LVG was a great coach. There were two issues with him: too rigid and too stubborn. Let's hope ETH is more flexible and doesn't make the same mistakes.

 

[hellhunter]

Reminds me of Van Gaals first preseason. We looked great I was super excited for the season, then the real football started, and we all know how that panned out. So I don’t think I’ll get excited just now

We also looked great with LvG until Leicester happened, and in the big games generally

 

[Delano]

We also looked great with LvG until Leicester happened, and in the big games generally

That was the thing with LvG, we often looked great when teams came at us, but clueless when they sat.

Hopefully with the players we are linked to and his more modern system, we can break teams down like yesterday.

 

[Zlatans Knee]

I don’t get this thing with fitness. With the number of sports scientists around, the amount of data that is available, how could our players possibly have been far less fit last year. Wasn’t it one of the first things that Ole said when he took over? That he needed the players to become a lot fitter. What was going on last year?

 

[the hea]

That was the thing with LvG, we often looked great when teams came at us, but clueless when they sat.

Hopefully with the players we are linked to and his more modern system, we can break teams down like yesterday.

This has been a problem every season since Fergie left. The problem has always been a lack of creativity from deep, hopefully with a midfield of De Jong and Eriksen that will be solved.

 

[FrantikChicken]

I don’t get this thing with fitness. With the number of sports scientists around, the amount of data that is available, how could our players possibly have been far less fit last year. Wasn’t it one of the first things that Ole said when he took over? That he needed the players to become a lot fitter. What was going on last year?

Yeah I don’t get it either. Surely at this point and at this level all fitness coaches should know how to maximise the human body’s potential for this specific sport?

 

[Giggsyking]

 

[Red Dreams]

Only a few weeks and Rashford and Martial actually look like strikers even if they had not scored.
Their movement and touch was excellent.

 

[RuudTom83]

Loving the positivity!

Way to soon but feck it! let’s get onboard the ETH train.

 

[Giggsyking]

 

[DSG]

Funny how Ole spent 50m on AWB to loan out Dalot and then both Ralf and Ten Hag instantly bench/want to sell AWB and actually seem to like Dalot

Dalot is our worst defender by a fair margin, and that’s saying something because Telles is abysmal. I understand he is better on the ball going forward than AWB, but he is absolutely dreadful as a defender. If Ten Hag can turn Dalot into a decent defender, he deserves the PL Manager of the Year. Shocked he didn’t look at our RB situation and buy a new RB straight away.

 

[peridigm]

I don’t get this thing with fitness. With the number of sports scientists around, the amount of data that is available, how could our players possibly have been far less fit last year. Wasn’t it one of the first things that Ole said when he took over? That he needed the players to become a lot fitter. What was going on last year?

It was an easy excuse when he said that. The players had already downed tools under Jose.

 

[Amarsdd]

Its like we're going from saying there's no pattern of play at all under Ole to everything we're seeing is a pattern of play already under ETH. I'm optimistic we'll get there with ETH with patterns across the pitch which are reproducable with good consistency but lets calm down for now.

 

[dubplate warrior]

Dalot is our worst defender by a fair margin, and that’s saying something because Telles is abysmal. I understand he is better on the ball going forward than AWB, but he is absolutely dreadful as a defender. If Ten Hag can turn Dalot into a decent defender, he deserves the PL Manager of the Year. Shocked he didn’t look at our RB situation and buy a new RB straight away.

Would still rather him than AWB. Bang average but Manchester United should expect a prerequisite level of technical ability from their players.

 

[Escobar]

If Phil is stating the obvious…. Well, lots of United fans are not the brightest and love to moan, so….

 

[Escobar]

I don’t get this thing with fitness. With the number of sports scientists around, the amount of data that is available, how could our players possibly have been far less fit last year. Wasn’t it one of the first things that Ole said when he took over? That he needed the players to become a lot fitter. What was going on last year?

I think the problem was that the managers were not demanding enough and could not push the players. They cruised at 60 percent and it was ok, but not under EtH who is the all in kinda guy

 

[Leftback99]

I don’t get this thing with fitness. With the number of sports scientists around, the amount of data that is available, how could our players possibly have been far less fit last year. Wasn’t it one of the first things that Ole said when he took over? That he needed the players to become a lot fitter. What was going on last year?

They say the same every year. Proof will be when the actual season kicks off. Brighton on the first day is a completely different level to these pre season knockabouts.

 

[Mr Pigeon]

Reminds me of Van Gaals first preseason. We looked great I was super excited for the season, then the real football started, and we all know how that panned out. So I don’t think I’ll get excited just now

True but you need to consider that Ten Hag has said he would cater the team's style to the players available to him, whereas with Van Gaal he flat out refused to change when things weren't working.

 

[Escobar]

True but you need to consider that Ten Hag has said he would cater the team's style to the players available to him, whereas with Van Gaal he flat out refused to change when things weren't working.

I don't get why he compares all that to LVG, especially after we played 2 friendlies so far.... some drama queens in here

 

[Stinkypete]

Yeah I don’t get it either. Surely at this point and at this level all fitness coaches should know how to maximise the human body’s potential for this specific sport?

Ten Hag reportedly prefers to do his fitness work on the grass with the ball.

How I see it, is whilst shuttle runs and endurance runs improve fitness, the stop start nature of pressing inside rondos and smaller pitches probably has a better success rate in terms of developing match ready fitness whilst also having the advantage of developing chemistry and technical ability for the same time spent training.

Maybe I am wrong, but there was talk that things were a bit behind the times in terms of modern methods and data science.

 

[Flexdegea]

Can we get Rangnick back please?

Ten Hag clearly isn't on his level.

Hard to tell what is sarcasm anymore on the Caf

 

[Grande]

I don’t get this thing with fitness. With the number of sports scientists around, the amount of data that is available, how could our players possibly have been far less fit last year. Wasn’t it one of the first things that Ole said when he took over? That he needed the players to become a lot fitter. What was going on last year?

Yeah I don’t get it either. Surely at this point and at this level all fitness coaches should know how to maximise the human body’s potential for this specific sport?

It’s important to remember that it’s not just about fitness, it’s about relative fitness - relative to opponents, and relative to the needs of the playing style. All teams have experts who are always looking at the state-of-the-art methods, the question is who uses them best in relation to style of play and the demands of the season?

Remember also that Solskjær announced stamna fitness and number-of-sprints-fitness as needing improvement after his interim season, and that he achieved that with intensive training periods in his first preseason - several players testified to this. But after that, the core of our team has not had a real collective preseason until now. No one in the world had the expertise on how to maximise training for fitness with how the last couple of seasons has panned out due to covid and the greed of all the football institutions.

 

[Stinkypete]

It’s important to remember that it’s not just about fitness, it’s about relative fitness - relative to opponents, and relative to the needs of the playing style. All teams have experts who are always looking at the state-of-the-art methods, the question is who uses them best in relation to style of play and the demands of the season?

Remember also that Solskjær announced stamna fitness and number-of-sprints-fitness as needing improvement after his interim season, and that he achieved that with intensive training periods in his first preseason - several players testified to this. But after that, the core of our team has not had a real collective preseason until now. No one in the world had the expertise on how to maximise training for fitness with how the last couple of seasons has panned out due to covid and the greed of all the football institutions.

So under the same conditions, how do you explain for example, Liverpools tireless pressing throughout the season plus all the cup runs?

 

[NLunited]

Ten Hag reportedly prefers to do his fitness work on the grass with the ball.

How I see it, is whilst shuttle runs and endurance runs improve fitness, the stop start nature of pressing inside rondos and smaller pitches probably has a better success rate in terms of developing match ready fitness whilst also having the advantage of developing chemistry and technical ability for the same time spent training.

Maybe I am wrong, but there was talk that things were a bit behind the times in terms of modern methods and data science.

Sounds good. Conte has an assistant, who was a marine, doing condition drills and players were dying. Kane was throwing up behind the goal. Sounds very outdated to me.

 

[The Red Thinker]

Sounds good. Conte has an assistant, who was a marine, doing condition drills and players were dying. Kane was throwing up behind the goal. Sounds very outdated to me.

Yeah I trust ETH. His teams never tired whenever I watched them in the Champions League. Ball work fitness as long as you can sustain in game is good enough. As for John Rambo running Tottenham’s fitness… I wonder how long the players will put up with that. In theory it’s great. But there is such as thing as being durable beyond what’s needed.

 

[The Red Thinker]

Yep.

If you look at the stats City were actually the team with the least "pressures" in the league last season. The key thing though is that they were also the team with the highest percentage of successful pressures. And a disproportionate amount of their pressures came in their own attacking third.

In other words if you dominate the ball as much as they do (and we want to do) you massively reduce the amount of pressing you actually have to do. But when you do press, you need to press very well.

Great post this. Goes to show that if you master pressing and possession, you can sustain dominance as evidenced by City

 

[roonster09]

Yep.

If you look at the stats City were actually the team with the least "pressures" in the league last season. The key thing though is that they were also the team with the highest percentage of successful pressures. And a disproportionate amount of their pressures came in their own attacking third.

In other words if you dominate the ball as much as they do (and we want to do) you massively reduce the amount of pressing you actually have to do. But when you do press, you need to press very well.

Pressures per 90 mins won't give better results as it ignores possession stats.

Like you said, team that dominates ball won't press all the time as they are on possession all the time.

Imo PPDA is a much better indicator, liverpool and City tops the chart for that.

 

[tenpoless]

If there's one thing in common among top top managers that succeed in PL is that they're all eccentric. Fergie always chewed on gums, Klopp is a maniac, Pep is a weirdo, Ranieri did the impossible but he also did dilly dong dilly dong. While the normal ones that looked nice, well educated and well spoken ended up being average managers (Ole, Lampard being the latest example). I'm glad ETH is eccentric himself which means chances are he'll be a success, especially after reading about him being meticulous and a perfectionist.

 

[Grande]

So under the same conditions, how do you explain for example, Liverpools tireless pressing throughout the season plus all the cup runs?

I’m not really in a position to explain either Liverpool or United’s fitness regimes, as I have only snippets of information. I can only guess and wonder. I think there may be something in that Klopp spent a few seasons at Liverpool before he got them to the level we’re talking about, and match stamina and being defensively sound (finding sustainable levels of high pressing) seemed a big part of it. I imagine it takes at least a two to three good preseasons to lift the physical level to the requirements to sustainably being able to play Klopp’s brand of football at a WC level.

It was also easy to see Liverpool struggling like United after the covid break season, even with a longer break than us, they lost 7-2 to Villa when we lost 6-1 to Spurs.
Solskjær’s United where actually better than Klopp’s Liverpool across the board for one and a half season in that period, and if you look at the games played, it is evident that Liverpool’s relative slump in form
did not begin or end with Van Dijk’s much bespoke injury. So I’m guessing the covid years effected their ability to play their style of football to full effect, even if they had a better platform (more preseasons of optimal training) than we had.

All this to say that I’m slightly optimistical that we might see a raise in production from a few of these players who disappointed the most during last season, and even more so next season. Depending on how the Quatar Bloodwashing Championship affects clubs.