Erik ten Hag | 2022/23 & 2023/24

Status
Not open for further replies.
Good thing social media did not exist during the 98/99 season otherwise all of you guys will be saying we are doomed for relegation based on the opening match results. ETH made a mistake with the formation and position of players which he knows how to fix it in the next game. At least give him some more time before you guys decide its the worst season ever.

As for Arnautovic and Rabiot, i am not sure if it is the press just creating rumours based on our defeat (Doubt these articles will come if we had won) but even if it is true, there are no issues as they are a stop-gap measure till we can find the long terms ones or develop one from the academy. Manchester United needs to compete for top honours every season, so ETH might not have a choice in terms of waiting for long term solutions.
 
::sonny:: said:
Players signed by van gaal at barca

Hesp
Reizeger
F. de Boer
R. de Boer
Bogarde
Van Bronkorst
Zenden
Cocu
Van Bommel
Davids
Overmars
Litmanen
Kluivert

The whole holland national team + litmanen
Click to expand...
I'm quite sure Van Gaal didn't sign Van Bommel. He was there quite a bit later. Maybe it was Rijkaard?

Gio was definitely Rijkaard.
 
OpenIntrovert said:
Good thing social media did not exist during the 98/99 season otherwise all of you guys will be saying we are doomed for relegation based on the opening match results. ETH made a mistake with the formation and position of players which he knows how to fix it in the next game. At least give him some more time before you guys decide its the worst season ever.

As for Arnautovic and Rabiot, i am not sure if it is the press just creating rumours based on our defeat (Doubt these articles will come if we had won) but even if it is true, there are no issues as they are a stop-gap measure till we can find the long terms ones or develop one from the academy. Manchester United needs to compete for top honours every season, so ETH might not have a choice in terms of waiting for long term solutions.
Click to expand...

This mess can’t be blamed on the manager, he’s going to make mistakes and we’re going to drop a lot of points this season. People are going to turn on him because it’s going to be very crap at timea.

He’s making a huge mistake if he starts bringing in stop gaps like Rabiot and Arnautovic though because it’s not solving any problems. We’ve seen how bad club is at buying and selling players so you just can’t afford to waste money ans collect deadwood. Relying on these type of signings might save your job short term but medium and longer term it just makes it so much harder.
 
Daslogisch said:
You can critisize all you want, but it's not quite showing support to the coach. If moral issues were anything to go bye there are few players you can sign. If you only want perfect posterboys you can be quite sure United will never be back to winning, that's for sure. However, of course you can not like Arnautovic for whatever he's (alledgly) done in his carreer. He got a ban for whatever happened in the Euro's and for me that's that. But if you want to give someone the death penalty for walking through a red light be my guest. Just not my cup of tea.
Click to expand...

The euros wasnt the only time he has two other occasions he called black players the n word. Being an active racist isn't going through a red light and it's an absolute joke to compare the two. And if ETH does bring him in then I will have huge questions for him and rightly so.
 
Roboc7 said:
This mess can’t be blamed on the manager, he’s going to make mistakes and we’re going to drop a lot of points this season. People are going to turn on him because it’s going to be very crap at timea.

He’s making a huge mistake if he starts bringing in stop gaps like Rabiot and Arnautovic though because it’s not solving any problems. We’ve seen how bad club is at buying and selling players so you just can’t afford to waste money ans collect deadwood. Relying on these type of signings might save your job short term but medium and longer term it just makes it so much harder.
Click to expand...

The reason why we have an issue with selling players is due to the lack of success and our expectations of the fee. We can increase the stock value of Rabiot and Arnautovic if we are successful in the next 2 seasons, making it easier to sell them. The club must also be reasonable in terms of pricing.

Anyway we are just looking at rumours now, so lets wait for the official confirmation before we decide to blast the club on making moves for these 2.
 
MiracleInMadrid said:
ETH is dead man walking if the expectation is that we'll see such such improvement this quickly.

If he's here to implement the way his Ajax team played, I believe it'll take at least a season to see consistent improvement and chance of playing style. He's inherited a unbalanced squad who the majority of their time with us has had little to none consitency in terms of playing philosophy and tactics. Our squad is a complete mess filled up with out of form players with low confidence.

And when all that has been said. We are one match in this season against a well-drilled and coherent Brighton team. We aren't the only supposed top team who are gonna struggle against them this season.

I fondly remember Klopps first season at Liverpool. They finished 8th in a historically weak season for the top teams, which gave way for bloody Leicester to win the league. Our squad is just as much a mess as the team he inherited back then. In his first season they spunked over 100m on the likes of Benteke, Firmino, Clyne, Ings, Grujic and Joe Gomez.

We need to calm down. Let the man learn about his team, and slowly build it up from the ground.
Click to expand...

Well, it's not like it's a choice between bovine sanguinity or fuming, vengeful rage and I think the discussion is a bit pointless if pursued on such terms. For my part, I absolutely agree we must expect that it will take time for ETH to make the team good and progress it towards being a contender, and that even if we have a bad season this year, sacking him probably isn't the answer. Also I do not expect to see the squad fixed in a single window. However, I don't see why that should mean I shouldn't be worried by the performance against Brighton, and still less why I should think the club's response this summer should be viewed favorably, or why it couldn't reasonably be expected to be better. So while I'm perfectly happy to let ETH slowly build it up from the ground, I am not prepared to believe that what we're seeing reflects a capable DoF, a Scouting department that fills the role it's supposed to fill or a clear and workable plan for progress. Because it clearly doesn't. And if those things aren't working, ETH is not going to fix this club single-handedly, and all the time in the world isn't going to help us.

In fact, if there is one specific time where it makes sense to place high and immediate expectations on the football operations, scouting and transfer parts of the organisation, it is right now. Right now is the time when the club either makes the good choices that in time will turn into results, or make the bad ones which will leave ETH treading water. The team needs patience, ETH needs patience, but those parts of our organisation do NOT need patience.
 
OpenIntrovert said:
The reason why we have an issue with selling players is due to the lack of success and our expectations of the fee. We can increase the stock value of Rabiot and Arnautovic if we are successful in the next 2 seasons, making it easier to sell them. The club must also be reasonable in terms of pricing.

Anyway we are just looking at rumours now, so lets wait for the official confirmation before we decide to blast the club on making moves for these 2.
Click to expand...

That’s total nonsense if they join we’ll be paying a fee we’d never get back and wages no one else will ever pay them. Their journeyman with attitude problems, it’s dumb, hopefully it doesn’t happen.

These are signings you make out of desperation with little thought for anything beyond this season. There’s no quick fix here, looking for one is not going to be of any benefit.
 
Roboc7 said:
That’s total nonsense if they join we’ll be paying a fee we’d never get back and wages no one else will ever pay them. Their journeyman with attitude problems, it’s dumb, hopefully it doesn’t happen.

These are signings you make out of desperation with little thought for anything beyond this season. There’s no quick fix here, looking for one is not going to be of any benefit.
Click to expand...

So you’d gamble on McFred, Martial and Ronaldo playing all fixtures this season?
 
Roboc7 said:
That’s total nonsense if they join we’ll be paying a fee we’d never get back and wages no one else will ever pay them. Their journeyman with attitude problems, it’s dumb, hopefully it doesn’t happen.

These are signings you make out of desperation with little thought for anything beyond this season. There’s no quick fix here, looking for one is not going to be of any benefit.
Click to expand...

The press is making us look desperate. Nobody knows what the club's true intention is until we are spotted talking to somebody. The press work based on the general online sentiment, which for our case is extremely negative. So its not surprising that we are starting to see such articles.
 
Let's see how he responds in the next game.

I'd be happy with any kind of change in the starting lineup - that alone would show he's not an idiot.
 
As one poster rightfully pointed out, why didn’t the scousers & Klopp get the same level of criticism when Liverpool made all those stop gap signings in Klopp’s first season???
 
Rams said:
As one poster rightfully pointed out, why didn’t the scousers & Klopp get the same level of criticism when Liverpool made all those stop gap signings in Klopp’s first season???
Click to expand...

Who?

Mane? Gini? Matip? Karius?
 
The big switch up in quality when Eriksen dropped deeper to replace Fred was obvious to see. I don't expect to see a McFred midfield in the next game
 
Rams said:
As one poster rightfully pointed out, why didn’t the scousers & Klopp get the same level of criticism when Liverpool made all those stop gap signings in Klopp’s first season???
Click to expand...

They were all cheap / free.
 
Rams said:
As one poster rightfully pointed out, why didn’t the scousers & Klopp get the same level of criticism when Liverpool made all those stop gap signings in Klopp’s first season???
Click to expand...

They did. There's also the issue with ETH trying to buy a racist. Liverpool definitely got stuck and bought theirs before they knew he was a racist. We are actively trying to buy one.
 
Rams said:
As one poster rightfully pointed out, why didn’t the scousers & Klopp get the same level of criticism when Liverpool made all those stop gap signings in Klopp’s first season???
Click to expand...
What difference will it make to us?
 
Rams said:
So you’d gamble on McFred, Martial and Ronaldo playing all fixtures this season?
Click to expand...

Well we do actually have other players so they don’t have to play all our fixtures and believe it or not we could actually sign different players to ones being mentioned.

This is what it is, a massive shit show with no signs of ever changing.
 
I sometimes wonder why those disgruntled fans remain disgruntled for ever? Why do they not get fed up and switch their allegiance to another club, like Pool or City for instance.

I now know their situation is similar to our so called deadwood players - Other clubs won't accept such moronic fans!
 
Roboc7 said:
Well we do actually have other players so they don’t have to play all our fixtures and believe it or not we could actually sign different players to ones being mentioned.

This is what it is, a massive shit show with no signs of ever changing.
Click to expand...

Who are these other players? And why is it that posters on here don’t understand that building the blocs for future succes takes time and that transfers are complicated and difficult. For a long term vision it will take at least 3 transfer windows to start seeing the improvements. It took Fergie 5 seasons and there were even no such things as transfer windows back then. Patience is required.
 
jamesjimmybyrondean said:
The big switch up in quality when Eriksen dropped deeper to replace Fred was obvious to see. I don't expect to see a McFred midfield in the next game
Click to expand...

The last time I remember seeing such a gulf in class/upgrade was when we first signed Matic. Eriksen was hitting hard, straight passes between the opposition from deep instead of stroking curved passes at a leisurely pace over them like we seem to do so often. Suddenly the opposition have to drop deeper and don't have another half a second to make up the ground on the player receiving the ball. I don't know if he can play that role again every team but it made a massive difference in the second half.
 
Rams said:
As one poster rightfully pointed out, why didn’t the scousers & Klopp get the same level of criticism when Liverpool made all those stop gap signings in Klopp’s first season???
Click to expand...

They signed Mane, Matip and Gini. The rest were cheap punts to get them through till January. You fancy us to spend money in January?

If United can sign 2 more midfielders, a striker and a right back we'd be much more content and willing to wait. The problem is we're being castigated into action because the hierarchy are taking the beating in the press they've deserved for a long time.
 
Rams said:
Rabiot is a quality player, with him it’s more between the ears. He’s a moody cnut. Will that be a problem with ETH? We’ll let’s say, ETH track record with difficult personalities is 2nd to none.
As for Arnautovic, the player that McLaren & ETH gave him his breakthrough at Twente?
We need to fill holes in the squad so, contrary to previous seasons, these stop gap signings are now required unfortunately. Just as Klopp had to make them in his first season at the scousers.
Click to expand...

When the fans and media are questioning the transfers you as a manager are putting yourself in a bad position. I get all that you are saying but there is more to lose than win for ETH with these transfers. Anything negative that comes as a result of these transfers will fall completely on ETH even if they maybe shouldn't.
 
Rams said:
Who are these other players? And why is it that posters on here don’t understand that building the blocs for future succes takes time and that transfers are complicated and difficult. For a long term vision it will take at least 3 transfer windows to start seeing the improvements. It took Fergie 5 seasons and there were even no such things as transfer windows back then. Patience is required.
Click to expand...

Look at the squad if you don’t know but why have you whittled it down to two options as if that’s all anyone can do?. Are you naive enough to think that it’s only two options on the table.

I think most people understand it’s going to take time and it’s not even likely we’ll be successful once more time has elapsed. At some point you have to start building a team though, bringing in dross for extra bodies is just delaying actually tackling the real problems.

Buying and selling players is difficult which is exactly why you don’t saddle yourself with other people’s deadwood on big wages. If the club are finding it hard now it’s only going to get more difficult.
 
Roboc7 said:
Look at the squad if you don’t know but why have you whittled it down to two options as if that’s all anyone can do?. Are you naive enough to think that it’s only two options on the table.

I think most people understand it’s going to take time and it’s not even likely we’ll be successful once more time has elapsed. At some point you have to start building a team though, bringing in dross for extra bodies is just delaying actually tackling the real problems.

Buying and selling players is difficult which is exactly why you don’t saddle yourself with other people’s deadwood on big wages. If the club are finding it hard now it’s only going to get more difficult.
Click to expand...

Deadwood is your opinion, obviously the coaching staff at United think these players will fit in the system they want to play. As far as Arnautovic is concerned (if there’s any truth in the rumours) they should know very well about the player as he’s already played under McClaren & ETH. Do your f-ing research and don’t be as lazy as the f-ing journalists or so called f-ing football pundits who are on 6 figure salaries at Sky whilst not even bothering to do any research or homework before coming out with their hot air cheap crap.
 
Rams said:
Deadwood is your opinion, obviously the coaching staff at United think these players will fit in the system they want to play. As far as Arnautovic is concerned (if there’s any truth in the rumours) they should know very well about the player as he’s already played under McClaren & ETH. Do your f-ing research and don’t be as lazy as the f-ing journalists or so called f-ing football pundits who are on 6 figure salaries at Sky whilst not even bothering to do any research or homework before coming out with their hot air cheap crap.
Click to expand...

Wow you knew he played for them at Twente, that’s some top drawer research. Thanks for sharing that nugget, God knows the time and effort needed to find that out and definitely new information for us all.

Great little hissy fit though, thanks again for the research.
 
Roboc7 said:
Wow you knew he played for them at Twente, that’s some top drawer research. Thanks for sharing that nugget, God knows the time and effort needed to find that out and definitely new information for us all.

Great little hissy fit though, thanks again for the research.
Click to expand...

Well, clearly Gary f-ing Neville didn’t know that he played for Twente under McClaren when he was slating the club he’s supposed to love the other night. And he’s being paid a unhealthy salary yet he can’t even be bothered to put any research in before he opens his big gob. The only UK journo I’ve seen actually do his research on the player is Simon Stones, one of the very few UK journo’s to be taken seriously unfortunately.
 
Rams said:
I don’t think ETH wanted to play him their, yet was left with no other option considering the situations with Martial & Ronaldo (hence the interest in Arnautovic).
Click to expand...
I think he could have quite easily just played Elanga LW and Rashford ST. Pointless discussing it now though. Eriksen just didn't work and that's fine, I understand he had limited options.
 
Rams said:
I don’t think ETH wanted to play him their, yet was left with no other option considering the situations with Martial & Ronaldo (hence the interest in Arnautovic).
Click to expand...

He had choices.

--------------------------------Rashford
Sancho/Garnacho----Bruno---Sancho/Amad/Elanga
--------------------------Fred------Eriksen


The gamble that he took surprised me because it wasn't needed and the risk didn't seem warranted.
 
Last edited:
JPRouve said:
He had choice.

--------------------------------Rashford
Sancho/Garnacho----Bruno---Sancho/Amad/Elanga
--------------------------Fred------Eriksen


The gamble that he took surprised me because it wasn't needed and the risk didn't seem warranted.
Click to expand...
Maybe he just underestimated the strength of Brighton and their tactical flexibility.
 
With all the doom and gloom aside, we will end up the season after the 38th game with over 80 points and with healthy GD. What place it brings us in the Premier League table, that's another story. Thing is, we are seeing what our manager wants from the team, we saw it all pre-season, and Brighton showed us what we are lacking - the ability to break down the low-block organized teams. That's what we are aiming to fix now, by bringing in more quality players who could develop that into wins.
 
Berbaclass said:
Maybe he just underestimated the strength of Brighton and their tactical flexibility.
Click to expand...

I think that he overestimated the need for an industrious midfielder instead of a technically superior one.
 
tyunited said:
Didnt Mourinho also create a new award for McTominay. The sooner these guys are out of this club the better.
Click to expand...
Jose was taking the piss. He clearly was sabotaging the season and also put McTominay as CB in one game. It was an act to put pogba in his place and its a joke that we have elevated 'McTerminator' to first name on the team sheet.
 
I’m almost depressed. Such a good preseason with EtH saying and doing all the right things and then he gets it completely wrong in the first game. I just read the interviews after the game and damn he just sounds clueless.

Bruh defended Eriksen as false 9 because he played it a couple of times when he was a teenager for Ajax. I know cause i watched them and back then Eriksen was just a completely different player and Ajax was a completely different team to us.

He also got surprised that Brighton played with long balls. God damn i just can’t take these dumb excuses.

EtH needs to turn it around and show that he actually is a great manager. Right now his decisions in the last game were an anchor around our legs.
 
-Sudden adoption of a false 9 tactic outta nowhere
-McFred, Maguire and Shaw still first choice
-Not vetoing, potentially even suggesting, signing Arnautovic and/or Rabiot

Really testing my patience here. He better know what he is doing.
 
Berbaclass said:
That too :lol:

He did see this in-play and swapped it around and we looked much more comfortable.
Click to expand...
Brighton also decided to sit back and counter.

I would actually drop bruno and play fred as AM. Then put Garner and Eriksen in CM. I don't know but that might bring some balance.
 
I would rather he gets it wrong while he feels out what these players can and can't do and then comes up with something moving forward that will get the best out of what we have.

Whether that will happen remains to be seen - cut price deals for Arnautovic who wasn't good enough for PL's top sides in his prime, never mind mid-30s, are very depressing developments though.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.