Fair enough, but what sort of things would indicate he would be going for you?
Erik ten Hag | 2022/23 & 2023/24
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Fair enough, but what sort of things would indicate he would be going for you?
Kind of my thoughts as well. Have no other choice than to accept it if he stays, though personally I don’t see any light at the end of the tunnel.
When we were going for Mourinho (before LVG was sacked) it was obvious, there was too much smoke. Similar with Ten Hag.
We're not seeing anything like it, just tenuous links to Southgate most strongly who won't even be available until after the Euros.
I'd be despondent in the unlikely scenario that he stays. My biggest issue is his football is genuinely one of the worst I have seen, and the man himself is delusional. And then there are the transfers of Mount and Antony. A shite package overall with very little redeeming it. I don't hate him, but he is so, so far from what is needed. I'm neutral on INEOS now but I'd very seriously begin to question their "plan" if they stick with this guy.
I don't understand why "Klopp and Arteta got 8th and didn't get fired" is used as arguments for not getting rid of ETH. It's just not comparable other than the league position.
With Arteta and Klopp you could at least see their fingerprints and what they were trying to do with the team on the pitch. That's not the case with ETH.
If you watched us play football this season you'd know why he needs to go. 2,5 good team performances in 12 months is not enough to keep the job. We've looked utterly clueless without even a hint of a visible red thread, plan or direction, his man management and charisma has been non existant and our results have been extremely flattering (despite being 8th) and doesn't come close to reflect how bad we've actually been.
With Arteta and Klopp you could at least see their fingerprints and what they were trying to do with the team on the pitch. That's not the case with ETH.
If you watched us play football this season you'd know why he needs to go. 2,5 good team performances in 12 months is not enough to keep the job. We've looked utterly clueless without even a hint of a visible red thread, plan or direction, his man management and charisma has been non existant and our results have been extremely flattering (despite being 8th) and doesn't come close to reflect how bad we've actually been.
Klopp and Arteta made season upon season improvement. Ten Hag has gone massively backwards having only won the League Cup, so there is no comparison there.
Anyone think Ten Hag would still have given his end of match speech if Utd had lost?
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Relatively speaking, compared to the dross served in the last few weeks, sure.
I do not think it was a good overall performance though. We still conceded over 20 shots, we had only 45% possession, Newcastle had the better chances (including a 3 on 1 chance when we were 1-1), they had a much higher xG.
Better than most matches this season, but still not a good performance.
I said it against Arsenal and it's the same after last night, if he parked his pride and played this more defensive structure earlier, we'd be better off.
We just don't have the players to play the attacking way he wants, especially during the injury crisis. I just wished he realised that earlier.
We just don't have the players to play the attacking way he wants, especially during the injury crisis. I just wished he realised that earlier.
Neither the same amount of investment/backing that EtH had. When they started spending huge, they (especially Klopp) started winning/competing.
Did either of them take their club from 3rd to 8th in the space of one summer?
Correct, they didn’t, and comparing this season with the start of Arteta and Klopps reigns is as stupid now as it was in October when people started doing it to excuse our pathetic results.
Did Klopp or Arteta have 70 odd injuries in those seasons?
Whether people want to see it or not, injuries ruined this season. We've been playing bloody Casemiro as a CB for nearly a month! Had no proper full backs for a lot of the season. Having to play players OOP. Martinez, Mount, Malacia MIA. Rashford having a stinker, Bruno being run into the ground.
I also think financially it makes more sense to get rid of some of the players and their wages, and have another year with ETH rather than having to pay him off AND pay for a new manager as well as the players instead and outs.
If he puts up a strong showing in the cup final he’ll probably continue. Options to replace him are dwindling
I will always come across biased because even if I give the slightest bit of context (like questioning why people think Mount was only a Ten Hag pursuit and not wanted by anyone else at the club), there will be some familiar posters coming out calling me a c*ultist, a sympathiser etc
That being said, one thing I do like is that he's always fighting and always going out swinging whilst broadly defending his players. He's not thrown anyone under the bus unless they've taken a royal pisstake. But you consider the Rashford clubbing incident, the general shite performances, the media suggesting players are feigning injury and hide in games - he has come out constantly and defended them. He's also said some bat shit crazy things in pressers that I disagree with, but he's clearly a fighter and saying everything that should keep the players on his side. He's not fighting in a mourinho/conte destructive way, mugging off the structure, the players and the fans.
I wasn't surprised he was capable of giving a good message to the fans, because he genuinely wants to fight for everything and has no problem accepting the season isn't good enough for his own standards in the process. I thought he came across honest and likeable, and I think its clear the stadium thought the same.
It's clear you did not get what he was trying to say given the bold bit. He's not saying 8th is acceptable, he agrees it's terrible. But he is saying it was terrible by the same standards of say, Liverpool and Arsenal who have as much ambition as we do, who were in a better place than us, and they knew it was a temporary blip.
Yeah, I see where you're coming from. My view is that he's made some massive errors but I want to see how he fares given a chance to fix them going into next season. If Tuchel is staying at Bayern I think I'm cemented in my view further because I don't really think McKenna is ready and I genuinely think I'd be depressed with Southgate. Xavi/Enrique/Tuchel were my picks becuase they've won something big in their own leagues. 2 of them have CLs too.
He's learned to stop taking shots at players publicly over time.
It contributed to Sancho leaving the club. He once made a comment about taking Casemiro off at HT for Eriksen because he wanted more football. Not the best words to use. He fell out with Varane earlier in the season. He kept playing Evans over him. Despite Varane being available.
I get that you want him to get another season, but I don't see how anyone can defend what's arguably our worst season in PL history. And we've been poor going back to last February/March. It's been a sustained run of bad form. He doesn't deserve the opportunity. I hate seeing failure rewarded.
Since winning The League Cup, we've played 51 PL games.
Our record:
25 wins
8 draws
18 defeats
49% win rate
72 GF
73 GA
-1 GD
Meaning that we have a negative GD spanning 51 PL games! Newcastle have scored 81 goals from 37 PL games this season alone. We've only scored 72 goals across our last 51 league games.
The PL table over the last 51 games:
| Club | GP | Wins | Draws | Losses | GF | GA | GD | Points |
| Man City | 51 | 39 | 8 | 5 | 127 | 42 | +85 | 125 |
| Arsenal | 51 | 35 | 8 | 8 | 125 | 53 | +72 | 113 |
| Liverpool | 51 | 31 | 14 | 6 | 119 | 60 | +59 | 107 |
| Aston Villa | 51 | 29 | 11 | 11 | 97 | 64 | +33 | 98 |
| Spurs | 51 | 24 | 9 | 18 | 97 | 89 | +8 | 81 |
| Chelsea | 51 | 20 | 13 | 18 | 90 | 84 | +6 | 73 |
| Newcastle | 51 | 26 | 9 | 16 | 114 | 76 | +38 | 87 |
| Man Utd | 51 | 25 | 8 | 18 | 72 | 73 | -1 | 83 |
Not really. His payout would be pocket money compared to fees we pay for players, and you don't achieve anything by keeping him and just removing players from his squad as that makes us even worse than we already are (and we are terrible). You need to invest and buy him new players to have any hope, and given where we've gone so far with his acquisitions I do not think that is the best use of resources.
There's obviously this idea of keeping him and other people managing transfer business but I don't know whether that has any chance of working either as he still has the veto plus he's struggled to work with players he handpicked himself, I can imagine it only getting worse when he's given players he doesn't even pick.
The sensible thing to do is keep him and let him have a season with a fit defence - start the squad refresh with Ineos people in charge and assess him next summer after a (hopefully) less freakish year. Unfortunately most people here don’t have enough patience for that. As Ratcliffe himself said, walk to the right solution instead of running to the wrong one.
Just on the shots at players thing, he literally doesn't do this unless it's taking the piss. Sancho deserved to be disciplined and so did Ronaldo.
The fall out with Varane is guesstimating. I think he got sick and tired of Varane only being available for one game a week in a period where we needed continuity and games were every 3 games.
Casemiro has played at CB for 3 games. Stop this injury exaggeration bullshit. Varane or Maguire have played in the vast majority of games. Dalot has played in every game and AWB the majority - “no proper full backs”
Our two longest running injury concerns, Malacia and Mount, were both signed by ETH. Shaw and Martial were already known quantities for being crocked. The only real bad luck we have had was Martinez and his knee ligament injury.
If ETH is here next season all the injury problems will keep happening because they are largely down to his training methods and his system that pointlessly exhausts the players.
We have two seasons to assess him on already, what is one extra season really going to do?
Also the plan goes out the window if Martinez picks up another injury (which is possible), and then you may need another season.
Was thinking this after the game.
Reminded me of 1st Batman film where the doctor patches up Joker with a scalpel and forceps.
"You see what I have to work with!"
Harry Maguire, Varane, Evans and Lindelof have effectively rotated with each other in terms of availability. Wan bissaka isn't a left back, and he's barely competent as a right back.
But you say the injuries will keep happening because of training, I find that odd. You're not in the training? What we do know is Varane was injury prone pre ten hag, that licha needed surgery and Lindelof needed surgery. Evans is also 38 and injury prone. I don't know why you have hanged on to training methods here.
Hmmm no big fan of ETH Ball at the moment but saying you could see what Arteta doing is stretching it a bit. They were an utter shambles, the fan base calling for his head and the football had no clear identity. Lego Pep really helped by the fact he had some competent people above him.
I suppose that not even you can find a way to spin a negative GD from 51 PL games. Hence why you conveniently brushed over it.
Varane was available for 10 out of 12 PL games between gameweek 6 and 17. ten Hag only started him in 2 of those games. Something clearly went on.
Are you not "guesstimating" with your take?
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It at least feels odd how many players get injured in training and I don't think (but didn't check the numbers, so really just a feeling) that other clubs have the same ratio of injuries in game vs in training.
How many of the rotations in our back four are because ETH failed to settle on a replacement left back? Cycled through Amrabat, Reguilon and Lindelof earlier in the season. How many are because he randomly decided to drop Varane for about 8-10 games in the autumn because Evans was 'better on the left side'.
Even this month he still swaps Dalot and AWB on a game by game basis, when it's pretty obvious to all of us that, except for AWB man-marking Salah, Dalot should be playing left back.
It's not odd at all to suggest that injuries will keep happening. What is odd are all the ETH supporters who claim he deserves a chance next season when there aren't going to be any more disruptive injuries. Apparently by magic.
I didn't spin over it. You are talking about two different points. I'm in agreement that the stats are bad, and that has absolutely nothing to do with our discussion on how he handles players.
Yes I know he was available in those games but we also had cup games and European competitions. Ten Hag had spoken about the need to have chemistry at the back and it couldn't be built by changing the backline all the time. It's quite clear he wanted to get sustained chemistry which Varane couldn't offer, as he can only do one game a week without getting hurt.
Worth noting when Varane was dropped we had Maguire come in and our form was good. I agree one game we really missed Varane was the Bournemouth loss though.
Funnily enough Varane was dropped to get some continuity as a partnership, since Varane can't play in congested fixture lists and that's well known.
He had Reguilon for half a season and regulon himself missed 3-4 weeks himself so naturally there's rotation there.
Dalot was left back vs Newcastle and only RB vs arsenal to pocket Saka (which was the right move).
I think the extra season allows the Ineos appointments to come in and evaluate and make a more informed assessment, not just on TenHag but also on what we need if we are replacing him. Ashworth & Berrada have not worked with Ten Hag yet, Wilcox barely, and as much as we think we know what’s wrong looking in from outside, there’s no substitute for seeing things first hand on the ground.
Agree on the Martinez point, an aggressive ball playing CB is number 1 priority in my mind this summer.
Still think he's gone after the final. If not, it pretty much sends a message that INEOS haven't analysed every game this season, including that CL campaign, because putting it solely down to injuries is ludicrous. I'd actually really lose faith that anything will change if a manager can have a season like this and continue.
Why do they need to give him an extra season to evaluate the idiot when he's had since the end of the cup run and all of this season to show he's bloody awful? Wilcox has been "evaluating" him since last month, how much longer do they need to realise he's shite?
We're discussing the manager. There are many things to discuss. You brushed over it because you didn't have a good excuse to defend it.
ten Hag was talking shite to justify starting Evans over him regularly. He went crawling back to Varane eventually. Varane remained professional. Fair play to him.
There's also the fact that we can't afford to miss out on CL football next season as our financial situation isn't too healthy right now. It's too risky to keep him.
True. While I agree the candidates availabile right now are a bit grim, it still makes no sense to keep on a manager that's overseen this season. Again though I do get the sentiment that Potter or Southgate would be an equal abomination Tuchel less so, but not ideal. But surely there's other candidates that have been identified outside of what's being reported also.
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No, I was answering a question about how he spoke to the fans, and said his general demeanour of a fighting spirit was a positive. I then said he's broadly backed his players in public unless they've taken a royal pisstake.
You then came out and spoke broad things, which were mutually exclusive to the point I was making. I didn't address them because they had feck all to do with the point I was making.
I should not defend something I agree with - I said that the stats are bad. I've said that he takes blame in the way we were set-up. Your insistence to cherry pick comments is not my problem.
You think Ten Hag's desire to want a more consistent partnership at the back was talking shite, but you're more than comfortable in talking shite assuming they 'must' have fallen out, because hey feck it, that has to be the only reason?
Ah yeh, funnily enough it completely slipped my mind that Varane was dropped for Evans for the City game and beyond because of a congested fixture list.
Unexpectedly dropping your best fit centreback famously a good way to improve continuity.
How many PL games did Varane miss in that period and what was our form?
Also, he wasn't fit. He could only play every other game. It was very well known he can't do games every 3 days since even under Ole. Stop saying he was fit
I didn't see his speech, was he booed?
By Newcastle fans.
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