Erik ten Hag | 2022/23 & 2023/24

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For anyone trying to absolve ETH and put this all on the players.. Villa up 2-0 with 76% possession and only given up 2 off target shots early into the second half vs Brentford. No way you can tell me that squad is better than any version of United, injuries or not.

Don't see any relevance in that.
 
For anyone trying to absolve ETH and put this all on the players.. Villa up 2-0 with 76% possession and only given up 2 off target shots early into the second half vs Brentford. No way you can tell me that squad is better than any version of United, injuries or not.
Aged well :lol:
 
For anyone trying to absolve ETH and put this all on the players.. Villa up 2-0 with 76% possession and only given up 2 off target shots early into the second half vs Brentford. No way you can tell me that squad is better than any version of United, injuries or not.
I'd actually say it might be, because of how badly Ten Hag has spent £400m.
 
For anyone trying to absolve ETH and put this all on the players.. Villa up 2-0 with 76% possession and only given up 2 off target shots early into the second half vs Brentford. No way you can tell me that squad is better than any version of United, injuries or not.
Look at them now. EtH worked out the tactics that limited Brentford to a single, late goal. Emery has just made Villa concede 3.
 
The structure is everything.
Really? If that’s the case, then we can get anyone, and I mean anyone in as manager. We don’t need to pay 10m/year for Ten Hag, let’s just get some bum off the street.

The problem with absolutism is that it looks at a complex problem and thinks there is a single silver bullet solution.

‘The reality is that does a proper structure contribute to a winning culture? Yes. Does a good manager contribute to a winning culture? Yes. Do better players? Yes.
 
Really? If that’s the case, then we can get anyone, and I mean anyone in as manager. We don’t need to pay 10m/year for Ten Hag, let’s just get some bum off the street.

The problem with absolutism is that it looks at a complex problem and thinks there is a single silver bullet solution.

‘The reality is that does a proper structure contribute to a winning culture? Yes. Does a good manager contribute to a winning culture? Yes. Do better players? Yes.
Not quite anyone but it should become less important over time as we are looking to change it more into a 'head coach' role.
 
I don't get this argument, a good chunk of this squad is his, Antony, Hojlund, Mount, Martinez, Casemiro, Eriksen, Onana, Amrabat, Evans and Malacia.

Are they all bottlers? Or has his transfer business been a bit hit and miss, like most other managers?

He clearly has a talent with younger players, Mainoo, Garnacho and Hojlund for example have all progressed very well under his guidance and I think most of the caf would agree they need to stay.

But the problems through the squad I think reflect only really on EtH and his seeming inablity to motivate them.

Personally I would sell/let leave on a free Martial, Greenwood, DvB and Sancho obviously to help with FFP. I'd also sell on Cas, Varane and Eriksen.

Controversially I'd keep Rashford as there's a great player in there and McT as he is a versatile squad player and possibly look to replace Bruno with someone who is ab it more careful with the ball.

Please no sensible measured posts thank you. That's not what this forum is for.
 
For me the gravest crime ETH committed were his transfers. Apart from Martinez, the rest of his 450m+ spending was misguided at best. The matchday meltdowns we see match after match is mostly a function, I believe, of a squad that was poorly built.
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Honestly, I think using transfers as the stick to beat him with actually absolves him. His big mistake is his football. Look at what we have going on the pitch. These players are not that bad to concede 20 shots per game. Its clearly a system problem, and this issue has been going on all season. Players, more than in any other regime we've had, are not being put in the best positions to succeed. The fact that its taking so long to get to the conclusion that his tactics are poor, actually speaks to the real issue we have at the club. It has never simply been the players. We've gone through far more players than we have managers. Those players also played better in other teams, also had good reputations coming in. IN fact, you could argue that outside of a few managers, for the most part, our players were always let down by the managers we've had. Yet somehow, people think going through Moyes, LVG, Mourinho, Ole and ETH is actually a sign that its more than the manager. However, outside of Mourinho ( who showed his decline prior to and after leaving us), its quite apparent that none of the managers were great enough to expect a guarantee of success. The players we've gone through have been more impressive, Pogba, Lukaku, Di Maria, Sanchez, Mhikitaryan, Evra, Rafael, Rooney, Van Persie, Bruno, Rashford, Martial, Varane, Casemiro, Ronaldo, Cavani, Ibrahimovic, Mata and more. Our fans can stick with a terrible manager and make excuses for years. Blaming the characters of different sets of players, without recognizing that we've consistently been behind in regard to the shape and structure of our teams. These managers squandered lots of money and were poor in setting up the team on the pitch. In that time span, we've had players carry these managers through individual brilliance to greater heights than they should have achieved at the club. In the last decade, most of our runs of form have involved consistent flows of individual brilliance, passion in the form of fighting back and our defences holding firm against waves of attacks from top teams. Yet at the end of it, its the players that get blamed. Yet the systems these managers have manufactured have consistently not created chances nor controlled games in possession.

The figures say that we've actually ran through a lot of players. They say that even if we had star players, they would be performing under par due to the systems we've been playing. We've had some of these star players come out and say as much. These cries have been treated as petulance from people who were considered superstars before they came. Yet we're wondering why we've spent ten years not challenging for anything. In comparison to this, we've had Chelsea from 2007 to 2021 listen to players. This allowed them to see managers who weren't working and replace them with ones that could get more out of the team, leading to different spells of success. Real Madrid did the same thing during that span of time. They didn't tolerate Benitez. They listened to player complaints about Mourinho despite his profile. They ended up being the most successful team of the last decade. Yet United have been in complete opposition to all of that. We've always stuck with poor managers despite reports and player complaints. We always back managers with no proof of success at the club. Hence we always reach the conclusion that we wasted years under that manager. When we get with the times, and actually listen to employees ( the players), that's when we'll be back to where we need to be.
 
Please no sensible measured posts thank you. That's not what this forum is for.
To me his setup leaves the players under terrible pressure defensively every game. That must be both physically and mentally tiring. Don't think we are bottlers, but some player are not good enough and the manager is stubborn.
 
It’s more expensive to keep him (which will keep costing us CL football)
Probably. There's also the problem thats he's already costs us tens of millions with the early exit and non qualification this year. Utter failure might actually help keep him in a job.
 
Just had a look at the table... If we don't sort our shit out soon we could be looking at a finish as low as 11/12/13th!
 
How do you quantify that?
Simple math, he has one year left on his contract. Sacking him will cost us one year salary (£ 9Millions)… keeping him and having this year’s abysmal results repeat themselves next year would cost us at least another 50 M…
 
Probably. There's also the problem thats he's already costs us tens of millions with the early exit and non qualification this year. Utter failure might actually help keep him in a job.

If he stays next season then I will lose all belief in Ineos.
 
Are we in course for our worst points/gd tally under him post fergie?
 
Newcastle only a point behind us now, Chelsea should go 2 with a game in hand tomorrow.

How low will he take us?
 
And if it’s a choice between him and Southgate?

That would even further reinforce me losing faith in them. ETH needs to go and be replaced with a manager that hasn’t bored England fans to death over the last 4-5 years.
 
Simple math, he has one year left on his contract. Sacking him will cost us one year salary (£ 9Millions)… keeping him and having this year’s abysmal results repeat themselves next year would cost us at least another 50 M…
You said it's more expensive to keep him I was asking you to explain that. I'm aware of how much it is to sack him.
 
We would have absolutely walked top 4 if we had sacked him in January. Pathetic and not a great start to life under INEOS. Just in the door obviously but we need decisive action.
 
Don't see any relevance in that.

I think regardless of Villa there is a point there. He has definitely been unlucky with injuries this season but for most match days he has had better squads available than a lot of sides who manage to look like far more functional football teams that are not utterly exposed constantly. He could and should have gotten a lot more out of what he has had available to him even if it isn't his ideal squad.
 
Better players, pursuing his targets with more urgency and efficiency, hire better coaches to help him with fitness and tactics. Basically we need to ensure ETH can succeed, this clubs first and foremost priority should be to cater to its manager needs. I want to believe that Berrada, Ashworth and Wilcox will be here to serve ETH.
This. What this guy said is bang on. ETH need more money to spend maybe another 500m and some of those Eredivisie players to realize his grand vision. The club and structure have failed him so far and if not for him we would be languishing on relegation spot. Berrada should be listening to him. He's having this masterplan that our useless players cant execute thats why we are currently still losing
 
For anyone trying to absolve ETH and put this all on the players.. Villa up 2-0 with 76% possession and only given up 2 off target shots early into the second half vs Brentford. No way you can tell me that squad is better than any version of United, injuries or not.
And the end result?
 
Better players, pursuing his targets with more urgency and efficiency, hire better coaches to help him with fitness and tactics. Basically we need to ensure ETH can succeed, this clubs first and foremost priority should be to cater to its manager needs. I want to believe that Berrada, Ashworth and Wilcox will be here to serve ETH.

The structure of a club should absolutely have the goal of giving the head coach the best possible platform to succeed. Ten Hag has also vastly under performed in his role based on what has been available to him until now based on performance level this season. It is fair to believe that there are better coaches we could get for the improved structure to work with going forward.
 
What about those managers who are in that tier under Klopp and Guardiola such as

Nagelsmann
Inzaghi
Amorim
Tuchel
Enrique
Flick
Motta

You're missing my point - i wasn't intending to start a discussion about managers.

It was in reply the poster who asked why it's so difficult for us to lure world class managers here but not other staff. I was making the point that you can say there a lot of world class Staff in different positions and that they can come and do their job pretty effectively so they are easier to pilfer. Where as they are so few world class managers in comparison, it makes it that much harder to get them - and then the scrutiny is much higher on our manager in the press than on say a director of football, which compounds the issue.
 
If he is kept and does better will you be undone with him?

You didn't ask me but yes I will. My opinion is based on facts available to me, if he improves and makes things work then logically I will change my current view to an up-to-date one.
 
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Probably yes… football fans are turncoats

It has nothing to do with being a turncoat, adapting your view to new circumstances is the right thing to do. What is wrong is to refuse to have views that match reality because you believe that you have to stay in a "side".
 
You didn't ask me but yes I will. My opinion is based on facts available to me, if he improves and makes things work than logically I will change my current view to an up-to-date one.

I don't think there are many of us who wouldn't love it if everything clicked and we started playing good football and got back on track.

There were coaches like Jose and Van Gaal who people took glee in seeing them fail for different reasons. I don't think anyone really finds Erik that divisive, it's all about the football.
 
We would have absolutely walked top 4 if we had sacked him in January. Pathetic and not a great start to life under INEOS. Just in the door obviously but we need decisive action.
Agreed - I really hope we move away from the tendency of dithering on big decisions until entire seasons are in the toilet.
 
Is this process worth continuing though?

After 2 years and £450m spent this process has lead to us now being worse off than we were 2 years ago when he arrived. We have a new CEO, DOF and Head of recruitment coming in anyway so whatever Ten Hag was building is now a moot point anyway as they'll be taking over and shaping the squad/style of play from this point forward.

If we look at Erik simply as the head coach of the new direction the clubs taking. Has he shown enough this season with his tactics and the teams structure/performances to suggest he's the man to take us to the next level?

What do we lose from sacking him?

Given the lack of a standout replacement I don't really think we've got anything to lose from keeping Ten Hag either.

Worst case scenario we get to sack him without the big pay off we always seem to have to find, at which there might be more options available.
 
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