Erik ten Hag | 2022/23 & 2023/24

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Iker Quesadillas said:
Ancelotti. Real Madrid only have a single striker in the squad, Joselu. He's a 34-year-old journeyman who failed in the Premier League. They are on track to win the league and in the semis of the Champions League.



Ancelotti and Zidane. Real Madrid spent over 100 million euros on Eden Hazard and he was perpetually injured. He contributed substantially less than either Martial or Jones and had an astronomically large salary. While he was at the club Real Madrid won two league titles and the Champions League. Then there's less-known players like Vallejo, Mariano.

You could throw Gareth Bale into the mix.



Probably Zidane, who had to rely on Vinicius Jr. and Rodrygo back when they had almost no experience due to serious injuries to Hazard and Asensio in 19/20. He won the league.



Zidane and Ancelotti had Luka Jovic in the squad, a 'replacement' for Benzema who scored 3 goals in 3 seasons at the club.



Zidane had to deal with Bale and James.

But generally Real Madrid just has players who the club can't get rid of. For example, in the comeback against City in 2022, Jesus Vallejo and Dani Ceballos came in as late subs. Vallejo is a permacrock who's barely had a top level career and Ceballos was coming off two unremarkable seasons on loan to Arsenal and spent most of 21/22 out injured.


It's simply not the case that top clubs have these perfectly assembled squads with no holes or problems.
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That’s a solid response, to be fair

1. Joselu has scored 14 goals, Madrid have 3 other players who have scored more, they clearly don’t rely on strikers and have plenty of quality in the team to compensate

2. Hazard was injured , my point was how much was the squad affected by his injury ? When he joined Madrid also spent another 200 million on transfers that summer ,hardly a shoestring squad (including Rodrigo). That would be like ETH getting Kane and Hoijland in one summer!

3. No experience in 2019/20? Varane, Ramos, Kroos, Benzema , courtois, Casemiro , valverde ? But even at that bale , Hazzard , junior could all be rotated when injuries were a problem. Hardly the same as Anthony , pellestri , Amad and an unproven Garnacho

4. Seems like strikers are not a an issue for Madrid considering the quality everywhere else on the park.

5 Real Madrid spends a lot on players but the quality of their squads has been far superior to Uniteds. Yes they get stick with players but the alternatives for managers is quality. They can drop bales or have injuries to hazards and the managers don’t have poor quality replacements.

Anchelloti had to deal with Bales golfing and Wales taunts. ETH had to deal with a sex and woman abuse scandal , his best forward going out drinking , a pierce Morgan interview from the highest profile player in the world , another player publicly calling him a liar on twitter and the club being for sale for the majority of his time. All that in less then 18 months at United!

United managers got madrids dregs, with Varane and Casemiro bought after their peak. That’s what United have offered our managers and it’s actually a decent reflection of how stupid our club has been.
 
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Leftback99 said:
We're likely to finish 8th and even that would be fortunate based on performances. By many metrics we're a bottom 3rd side, we were never this bad.
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But we're 6th right now, not 8th. We aren't a bottom 3 side by any means. Sure, in some metrics we might be, but in others we're at the other end of the table. The table doesn't lie. What's with the hyperbole? People love to wallow in their own self-misery on this site.

It is absolutely not the worst season we've had. The ole/ Ragnick season was horrendous and depressing from start to finish. We had literally nothing to play for beyond Feb, finished with our lowest points tally and the future looked as bleak as it gets.

Mourinhos performance in his last season was imo way worse as well given where we were in the league table when he left. A big criticism laid on him (and lvg) was that the football was so defensive and boring.

Well, when you have such glaring holes in your first 11 on top of the injuries this year, but you still play ultra offensive and 'go for it', what we've seen since the turn of the year is the result. Fans say the minimum requirement is entertainment. If our games aren't, then what is? As much heartburn as our games give our fans, we've seen incredible matches and swings within games that have gone both ways which is pure entertainment. That's to be expected when you don't have the necessary tools to be consistent.

I am genuinely intrigued to know if there's any manager out there that has navigated a season with this many injuries and brought about the level of success expected of ten hag this year. We've had no lb all season and 3/4 cbs injured at any given time, on top of all the injuries in midfield and up top.

I hoenstly don't think ten hag will be sacked this summer and find it a little bizzare how people are talking as if he's already gone.
 
Seeing some key members of the dressing room liking and commenting on Sancho's latest Instagram post is quite telling.

Ten Hag's captain, and one of (you would assume) his key allies in Martinez. Hojlund, Rashford.

It's a weird look for them to be publicly supporting the guy who openly criticised their manager, refused to apologise and has been subsequently ostracised.

In short it doesn't look like there's much unity in the dressing room and you'd have to question whether he has the backing of his players anymore.

Regardless of how he's doing it honestly makes me question the attitude of our players. Side with Jadon if you want privately but it seems like a deliberate going against the manager. Footballers might not always be the smartest but they know enough to understand how that can be interpreted.
 
Nas-JR said:
But we're 6th right now, not 8th. We aren't a bottom 3 side by any means. Sure, in some metrics we might be, but in others we're at the other end of the table. The table doesn't lie. What's with the hyperbole? People love to wallow in their own self-misery on this site.

It is absolutely not the worst season we've had. The ole/ Ragnick season was horrendous and depressing from start to finish. We had literally nothing to play for beyond Feb, finished with our lowest points tally and the future looked as bleak as it gets.

Mourinhos performance in his last season was imo way worse as well given where we were in the league table when he left. A big criticism laid on him (and lvg) was that the football was so defensive and boring.

Well, when you have such glaring holes in your first 11 on top of the injuries this year, but you still play ultra offensive and 'go for it', what we've seen since the turn of the year is the result. Fans say the minimum requirement is entertainment. If our games aren't, then what is? As much heartburn as our games give our fans, we've seen incredible matches and swings within games that have gone both ways which is pure entertainment. That's to be expected when you don't have the necessary tools to be consistent.

I am genuinely intrigued to know if there's any manager out there that has navigated a season with this many injuries and brought about the level of success expected of ten hag this year. We've had no lb all season and 3/4 cbs injured at any given time, on top of all the injuries in midfield and up top.

I hoenstly don't think ten hag will be sacked this summer and find it a little bizzare how people are talking as if he's already gone.
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We should be doing better even with what we have available, that's the top and bottom of it. At different points we've had different injuries, like a lot of teams this season. You talk as though we've had them all at once and for the full season. We were struggling against lower placed teams and even championship teams in the just few weeks whilst only being 2 players away from full strength.

I don't see how it is even surprising, let alone bizarre, to have supporters expecting him to be sacked. For a team of our stature it is a given that the manger normally gets sacked after a session like this. We're just a basket case though, so you don't know what daft decision we'll make next.
 
What I'm most looking forward to when he hopefully gets the boot shortly after the season is over (although it already is for all intents and purposes) is the EtH defenders suddenly forgetting their Caf password, similar to all the people who were defending Murtough.

All of a sudden, all the correct reasoning and logic seems to have been forgotten when the hard reality of the sack arrives.
 
stevoc said:
For neutrals maybe, we're dull as feck to watch from a supporters point of view.
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Incredibly..... I'd even say it's at bad as LVG ball... Joint worst since Fergie at best
 
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Bayern really are a circus of a club :lol: . I'm pretty sure one of their senior hierarchy came out and said EtH was not good enough for the Bayern A team and he was firmly a B team coach when he was there.

But by all means, take our coach, just pay us enough to pay off Newcastle for Ashworth.
 
"Next season can’t possibly be as bad" is now the reason to keep him. Like, not only is the bar hilariously low but also these expectations are not based on anything but faith and luck :lol: Do we have a lot of gamblers in our fanbase?

I've said this before but it genuinely amazes me that of all fanbases, it's United fans bringing into question how important a manager really is and whether it's possible to judge if he's doing a good job or not.
 
Beachryan said:
For those obsessed with the 400m number, is it really impossible to think about how it was constructed, and whose fault that really was? Or is that too much to ask? I'm on the fence with ETH because I think whatever experiment he's trying has failed, and he's not changing it, which seems daft. But the amount of sh*t he gets on transfers is ridiculous.

Firstly, and most importantly, he is the manager. None of us are in the rooms, but he is explicitly not the one negotating terms and fees. He is clearly consulted and identifies targets, but it is not his job to get them at the right price. It is also not his job to set or even be able to impact the overall transfer budget. There are plenty of people at United who can, should and have taken the blame for that. And they're largely gone now thankfully.

Secondly, on to the actual situation. In his first summer, he identified that we had no midfield. Fans rejoiced. He identified the need for an energetic number 6 who could dictate play. He suggested FdJ, Barcelona said huzzah money, Frankie said no. Said negotiators tried all summer and failed. In the meantime, he did bring in Eriksen on a free to bolster numbers as short-term solution. He brought in our future player of the season for a similar fee to Arsenal buying Timber. He also brought in a young LB to provide cover. That was it. That's what we entered the season with. After a pretty thorough squad clean out. He also identified the need for a left-footed forward to augment the attack, especially given we'd lost Greenwood. Fast forward to two terrible defeats finally lighting a fire under the upper-management's backsides, and they panic buy. They make a 30 year old Casemiro one of the most expensive transfers in history, and throw all the money at Ajax to get Antony. Those two buys are basically half the money ETH is beaten up for. A player he didn't want, and one we hugely overpaid for - which I maintain was not his job or fault. For me, that was a terrible summer from a terrible management who didn't support ETH properly.

Then he was forced - again because of a good, needed clear-out, to try to find decent players available on loan, because we literally didn't have a CF and backup MF. At the 'biggest club in hte world'. And you know what? You don't get great players on loan.

Second summer I do think is more on ETH. We needed a new keeper, got one in line with fees paid by other clubs for keepers. And after an awful first few months, he's been largely fine. We needed 2 new CFs, ETH got one, again at huge expense because that's what United negotiators do. Look around, great sages of the caf, and give us your CFs purchased last summer that have been incredible successes, that we could have/should have gone for. And we got Mount. I'll be the first to admit I don't get it, but also the first to admit I can't get it because he hasn't been fit to show what his role is.

What I see is that ETH has not come close to being able to replace the pure first-team squad numbers he has removed, and has brought in a very low number of players. Of which, 3 have been injured this entire season. Put another way, all of ETH's defensive signings have not been able to play this season.

All I see from the 400m is about 150m worth of players that our amazing negotiators paid 250m over the odds for. Now maybe you want to beat up ETH for that, but I really don't think that's his fault.

Beat him up for playing a donut formation, for playing Rashford through this 'form' for failing to instill game-management into senior players. But you can't say it's his players that have us in 6th. Outside of the keeper, the most minutes are all played by players here before he arrived.
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It's about the 400m, but it is more about the players that he brought into the club who we already need replacement for. He rightly thought that our upper management team is shit, he wrongly thought the solution to that is getting players he knows or through his agency.

Yes, we paid over the odds and that's not entirely ETH's fault. However, if the manager insists that the left footed attacker he wants is Antony, then the club has to get it if they decided to give him a say in the transfers. Yes, the structure is at fault for indulging this fool by buying the player, however the judgement to think that Antony is anywhere suited for Man Utd is ETH's fault. Amrabat is another classic example. He wanted to shift McT and get Amrabat on a permanent. Fortunately for him, the club's incompetence meant that McT stayed and we could only get Amrabat on a laon, albeit on a hefty loan fee. And now McT has saved his ass multiple times whille Amrabat can't buy a start. And I can do that for every player.

However, there are more factors than simply what he has spent. My main gripes with him and why I think he is not the man for the job:

- He doesn't know how to rotate. He runs players into the ground and then only brings replacement in instead of properly rotating the squad. He did it last season when everyone had a crazy schedule with the mid-season WC. He keeps flogging the same horse until it breaks down. He did it with Eriksen last season, he did it with Rashford, he did it with Martinez and the rest. It's not a surprise that our performances tailed off badly after the League cup final.

Even this season its the same. Eriksen went missing the entire season but starts the last couple of games (two games in 3 days) after everyone is injured and his 10m loan signing is warming the bench. And please don't come back with 'Eriksen's legs are gone', if they are, why did he start the last two games? Is Amrabat worse than a dead Eriksen? Good managers know to make use of the resources at their disposal. Heck, we used to win league titles by rotatiing and making use of ageing Giggs and Scholes in the midfield. TenHag doesn't have that ability. He pulled the same nonsense with Varane at the start of the season by telling everyone that he cannot play on the left and playing Harry on the right, when Harry has played most of his football on the left. And then all of the sudden he started using Varane on the left.

- His in game management is seriously terrible. He doesn't know when to make subs and who to sub in. Time and again I am shocked to see a player who has stunk up the entire game and another player come off. Time and again, I am shocked to see no changes made at half time or early in the second half, as if he has prewritten script on when to make subsititutions and who is going to be subbed in.

- He has used baffling tactics the entire season. The unscripted high pressing with a deep line leaving the midfield open for the opposition to atttack is seriously mental. We have sufferred due to it the entire season and have seen no adjustments being made to it. Neither before the game, neither in-game.

- Last season's third place was also a bit misleading. Liverpool were really off-color for most the season and Spurs were going through an upheavel with Conte doing his usual act of failing out after 2-3 seasons at a club. We had a new manager bounce and pounced on that opportunity. And now that normal service has resumed, we find ourselves back in the hunt for a Europa league squad.

EDIT: Just to add:

Onana
XX Casemiro XXX
Amrabat Eriksen Mainoo
Antony Mount Garnacho
Hojlund
​
Those are all ETH's players he could have started last game.
​
 
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Gavinb33 said:
Zidane and Ancellotti had Ronaldo, Modric and Kroos in their prime we have Scott Mctominay and Antony
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Ronaldo wasn't at Real Madrid in any of the seasons mentioned. But that's not my point.

My point is that it's not true that United have a uniquely poorly assembled squad, whereas every other top club diligently signs two perpetually fit players per position and moves them on as soon as they are bad. Most cubs have failed transfers, players who are past (or never) it and refuse to move, long-term injuries, holes in their squad, and their managers are expected to manage around this.

Just three days ago Real Madrid lined up against Bayern with a substitute GK, a 4th choice CB, and a reconverted winger as right-back.
 
Watched the interview. You can tell there's some stuff he can't say for fear of upsetting the dressing room/board.
 
Hopefully this is as bad as it gets either way. His quotes are driving me nuts these days. Like the meme with the room on fire, everything is fine. I understand if he’s trying to set us up in a more ‘modern’ way but it’s failing. Our best ever manager was a pragmatist to the last. Even when he had our best squads ever we would still grind out ugly wins. All the best teams have to. This is just like ping pong and at this point I don’t even think a fit Mount Shaw and Martinez and an arsed Rashford stop the ridiculously open games. Surely we need forwards who at least play well as a unit and a settled defence before you take the handbrake off? It’s naive at best. Totally stupid at worst
 
Nas-JR said:
But we're 6th right now, not 8th. We aren't a bottom 3 side by any means. Sure, in some metrics we might be, but in others we're at the other end of the table. The table doesn't lie. What's with the hyperbole? People love to wallow in their own self-misery on this site.

It is absolutely not the worst season we've had. The ole/ Ragnick season was horrendous and depressing from start to finish. We had literally nothing to play for beyond Feb, finished with our lowest points tally and the future looked as bleak as it gets.

Mourinhos performance in his last season was imo way worse as well given where we were in the league table when he left. A big criticism laid on him (and lvg) was that the football was so defensive and boring.

Well, when you have such glaring holes in your first 11 on top of the injuries this year, but you still play ultra offensive and 'go for it', what we've seen since the turn of the year is the result. Fans say the minimum requirement is entertainment. If our games aren't, then what is? As much heartburn as our games give our fans, we've seen incredible matches and swings within games that have gone both ways which is pure entertainment. That's to be expected when you don't have the necessary tools to be consistent.

I am genuinely intrigued to know if there's any manager out there that has navigated a season with this many injuries and brought about the level of success expected of ten hag this year. We've had no lb all season and 3/4 cbs injured at any given time, on top of all the injuries in midfield and up top.

I hoenstly don't think ten hag will be sacked this summer and find it a little bizzare how people are talking as if he's already gone.
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Conceding 20 shots per game to teams like Luton and Brentford isn't entertainment, it's a disgrace.

We generally look to be on the backfoot and get battered for long periods in every game - it's not entertaining
 
pocco said:
Would be too good to be true, think he'd pack his bags himself as that's apparently where he's always wanted to coach. They're surely not that daft though...
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Ralf Rangnick was favourite for the job until he decided to stay with Austria. The manager market is not great and Bayern have backed themselves into a corner by deciding to move on from Tuchel with no replacement lined up.
 
Nas-JR said:
But we're 6th right now, not 8th. We aren't a bottom 3 side by any means. Sure, in some metrics we might be, but in others we're at the other end of the table. The table doesn't lie. What's with the hyperbole? People love to wallow in their own self-misery on this site.

It is absolutely not the worst season we've had. The ole/ Ragnick season was horrendous and depressing from start to finish. We had literally nothing to play for beyond Feb, finished with our lowest points tally and the future looked as bleak as it gets.

Mourinhos performance in his last season was imo way worse as well given where we were in the league table when he left. A big criticism laid on him (and lvg) was that the football was so defensive and boring.

Well, when you have such glaring holes in your first 11 on top of the injuries this year, but you still play ultra offensive and 'go for it', what we've seen since the turn of the year is the result. Fans say the minimum requirement is entertainment. If our games aren't, then what is? As much heartburn as our games give our fans, we've seen incredible matches and swings within games that have gone both ways which is pure entertainment. That's to be expected when you don't have the necessary tools to be consistent.

I am genuinely intrigued to know if there's any manager out there that has navigated a season with this many injuries and brought about the level of success expected of ten hag this year. We've had no lb all season and 3/4 cbs injured at any given time, on top of all the injuries in midfield and up top.

I hoenstly don't think ten hag will be sacked this summer and find it a little bizzare how people are talking as if he's already gone.
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First, learn to read. I said bottom 3rd not bottom 3 and that's no exaggeration.



Lets see where we end up. The table can definitely lie in a short time frame. It's now catching up with the underlying figures. Chelsea have been consistently played better than us for example but haven't got the results.

It's funny that every Friday the Ten Hag hype reaches its peak from his apologists. Only to be blown apart when football is actually played. Must be a real roller coaster for them.

I still think he's likely to stay. He's cost us that much money in lost revenue that we can't afford to sack him.
 
RedRover said:
They're entertaining for fans who love to see United playing so poorly. Not so much for the rest of us.

This is the worst we've been since I started following United, in my opinion. The stats bear it out. The squad is awful and frankly, I think the manager is miles out of his depth and his own worst enemy all at the same time. It's painful both on and off the pitch.
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And when did you start following? This season? Last season? I quite remember the season under Moyes has being worse than this. He inherited squad who just won the league.
 
Shady said:
He is horrible to listen to.
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I know right? This is suppose to be a piece I suspect, to pacify the critics. Yet, he comes across as a bad communicator. Yes, I know english isn't his first language but that doesn't change the end outcome. You can tell Gary is just pushing through because he didn't challenge any of the answers.
 
MadDogg said:
13/14 - 7th with 64 points. Scored 64, conceded 43 in the league (goal difference of +21). In the CL we topped our group before going on to lose to Bayern in the quarters.
21/22 - 6th with 58 points. Scored 57, conceded 57 (goal difference of 0). In the CL we topped our group then lost against Atletico in the Round of 16,

Considering our current form and our last four fixtures, there's a fairly strong chance we end the PL season in 8th with lower points, lower goals scored, more goals conceded and a negative goal difference, all while finishing last in our CL group. What's almost worse is that based on our actual performances we should be significantly lower, and we're being bailed out by individual moments and a lot of luck.

It's clearly up there with 21/22 as our worst season in the PL era, and by most metrics it's worse. If we turn things around and get some decent results in the last four games then maybe that'll change, but it's not looking good.
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Fair point. IMO though I think the moyes season was worse. Just in terms of going from winning the title to finishing 7th. This season is worse if your going of GD etc. but that still may have us finishing higher than we did in the Moyes season.
 
He's completely right on Kane and Hojlund.

There was a reason PSG only moved for Ramos and Kolo Muani after they missed out on Hojlund.
 
Iker Quesadillas said:
Ronaldo wasn't at Real Madrid in any of the seasons mentioned. But that's not my point.

My point is that it's not true that United have a uniquely poorly assembled squad, whereas every other top club diligently signs two perpetually fit players per position and moves them on as soon as they are bad. Most cubs have failed transfers, players who are past (or never) it and refuse to move, long-term injuries, holes in their squad, and their managers are expected to manage around this.

Just three days ago Real Madrid lined up against Bayern with a substitute GK, a 4th choice CB, and a reconverted winger as right-back.
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It’s not that Madrid don’t make mistakes or don’t have any unwanted players in their squad. It’s that their managers usually have quality alternatives and/or a quality fiest team in general that can cope with missing out on a player or two.

That Real Madrid team against Bayern had world clsss players throughout. Ones that have won leagues at their current club. A league winning team can afford to have a couple of lessor quality players jump in because the team is used to winning leagues, team is full of confidence and everybody is comfortable with their roles.

Its not the same as a club that’s won f**k all in a decade and can’t even build a solid starting 11.
 
It would be quite something if a manager swap were to happen. But maybe this is the most likely such a wild deal has ever been. Tuchel definitely leaving Bayern and would happily come to United and I'm pretty sure Bayern is Ten Hag's dream job.

Honestly could be a win for everyone. I think Ten Hag's project has failed here and he's making daft decisions, but maybe he would do things differently at Bayern? Imagine if he goes there and says he can implement the same style he did at Ajax, which for some reason he hasn't tried to do here and gets them chugging nicely :lol::(.
 
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