Erik ten Hag | 2024/25 | Sacked

Erik ten Hag

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Pep I would have no issues with, City isn’t a real club, its not even the same club, their history starts from the FA Cup semi final in 2011.

But Klopp? He is so deep rooted in the Scouse folklore I wouldn’t even trust him, I would genuinely believe every loss would be self sabotage to decimate whatever is left of this great club.

No thanks, we would have to find our own Klopp, they’re out there.
Its just really hard to find one when every manager we hire gets 2-3 years and millions to spend even if their incompetence is obvious 6 months in.

Life is too short for that.

There isn't and we need to get away from that thinking.

Head coaches should be evaluated on a season by season basis. 2+1 year contracts. Sack them as soon as someone better aligned or promising is on the market. Sack them as soon as they look like their trajectory has stalled.

That should be the entire point of a structure. It should allow you to react and move rapidly. We need a ruthless attitude of continuous improvement where it comes to the managers job.
 
Of course my brief summary of why various candidates would be better than Ten Hag isn’t enough for you - I could write paragraphs and paragraphs and you’d still find objections to each one. But that’s because your focus is a negative, fear-based case against hypothetical replacements, rather than a positive case for keeping Ten Hag.

Thankfully that’s completely irrelevant to the deep dive the Ineos team will have been doing on replacements since May. As I predicted many pages ago, you’re only asking for names so you can pick holes in any and every alternative because you’d rather stick with the failure that Ten Hag has proved to be. Fair enough, but focussing on possible future failings of hypothetical replacements over the actual, current failings of the guy who’s currently overseeing relegation form is bizarre. Actual failures are more damaging to our club that hypothetical failures. And that’s where we seem to differ.

You could find some similarity between every single candidate and every single failed ex Utd manager since Fergie, but I can more easily counter with the fact that Ten Hag has already lead us to a worse PL and CL performance than any of them. So again, that seems to me to be a fundamentally flawed argument in favour of keeping him. You could use that exact same justification to never ever change the manager, which is obviously an absurdity.

It’s been pointed out to you again and again that there is no formula or criteria that will determine success for new appointment. Failure is more likely than not for any of them, because success for Ud means the PL and CL, and that’s an incredibly hard level to get to. Someone can have an impeccable record and experience and CV and still fail. Someone could have a much more limited CV and succeed. Whoever is ultimately chosen, there will be enough potential positives about their candidacy to make them more attractive than keeping someone who we know for a fact is not cutting it.

As for attainability, it’s easy to propose hypothetical obstacles for every single possible candidate on the planet, but that’s just not a sound basis for concluding that not a single one is attainable. We don’t even know if any of the names suggested are on their list, and you have no more insight on them being unattainable than I do on them being attainable. Unless you’ve been reaching out to their agents to check, it’s nothing but baseless speculation on either side. And that is also not a sound argument for not replacing a failing manager.

When you look at the bigger picture, it’s hard to imagine that Ineos wouldn’t be able to lure a replacement, no matter what time of season it is. Big clubs finding new managers mid season is a perfectly normal and routine thing that happens in football and there’s no reason to think doing so will be peculiarly elusive only for Utd. That’s just something you seem to have pulled from thin air because you’d rather see Ten Hag sink another season first, at which point you seem to think all your hypothetical objections to possible replacements will magically disappear.
There‘s a thread for this discussion, take it there.
 
Having an attitude like that only hinders progression. If Klopp and say Pep were available you wouldn’t talk to them at least because of the teams they managed previously? Its nonsense.
Klopp wouldn't come here. Love or hate him but he's somewhat of a romantic in terms of his football views. He won't come to us after spending almost a decade at Liverpool. Maybe there might be a tiny, tiny chance after enough time passes, but this soon? It won't happen. It's almost as unlikely as Fergie leaving us and then joining Liverpool.

Pep probably would join if he thought we were best suited to become the best in the world with the best players and most money.
 
We say that there was no Klopp but at the same time Tuchel was available and interviewed, as far as I know nothing suggests that Simone Inzaghi was unavailable and there was a number of other decent options. I like Klopp a lot but people are inflating his achievements and resume especially before 2015.

'Decent options' and Tuchel, perhaps, but not the contrast between Rodgers and Klopp.

Klopp was a wanted man in 2015 (by us) and Liverpool snapping him up was (wrongly given their financial heft) considered a coup.

Revising him downward is not going to work.
 
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We say that there was no Klopp but at the same time Tuchel was available and interviewed, as far as I know nothing suggests that Simone Inzaghi was unavailable and there was a number of other decent options. I like Klopp a lot but people are inflating his achievements and resume especially before 2015.
didn't klopp win the BuLi and reached the CL finals as well before 2015?
 
Having an attitude like that only hinders progression. If Klopp and say Pep were available you wouldn’t talk to them at least because of the teams they managed previously? Its nonsense.

I don't want us to just get everyone who made our rivals great. What's the point of that? It's soulless in my opinion, and Ineos can surely use their brains a bit more, than to just get the best personnel from other big teams in England. We already took Berrada and Ashworth from City and Newcastle, that's enough for me.

I want us to get the next Premier League "super manager" in early, and let them make a name for themselves at United.

Arteta has done that at Arsenal. Klopp to a certain degree as well, but obviously was already an established name among the best managers around. Pep at least didn't join City from a domestic rival. Chelsea and Spurs have decided to go that way too with Maresca and Ange. Liverpool are continuing down that route too with Slot.

I'd much, much prefer to go with any of van Nistelrooy, McKenna, De Zerbi, or even Tuchel (1 year at Chelsea with only 1 trophy to show for it is vastly different to an almost decade long era at Liverpool where Klopp elevated himself to a mini-Ferguson stature for them) over fecking Klopp, who's one of the biggest legends of United's biggest rivals, and by far the biggest reason Liverpool had their only successful period in the modern era between 2017 and 2022. No, thanks. But we are the last club he would ever go to, so it's thankfully a pointless discussion.
 
didn't klopp win the BuLi and reached the CL finals as well before 2015?

He did which doesn't separate him from a range of current potential candidates. Klopp wasn't a serial winner before 2015, he looked like a brilliant head coach but on paper there isn't the massive difference that people want to see today with managers like Tuchel, Inzaghi or even Luis Enrique.
 
didn't klopp win the BuLi and reached the CL finals as well before 2015?
He did. He did also defend the title and set the record for the best ever BL season. Although that record was broken in the following season by Heynckes' Bayern and in most of the following seasons and by now it's not even the best non-Bayern result anymore (Alonso's Leverkusen came within one point of the actual record last season).
 
He did which doesn't separate him from a range of current potential candidates. Klopp wasn't a serial winner before 2015, he looked like a brilliant head coach but on paper there isn't the massive difference that people want to see today with managers like Tuchel, Inzaghi or even Luis Enrique.

Luis Enrique is far more established and successful than Klopp was - surely?
 
You don’t mention we beat Liverpool and Cheaty to win the FA cup. Also, we were the better team in the FA cup final the year before. I guess that doesn’t fit your agenda.
Sorry, maybe I am confused but are you saying we were the better team against Newcastle in the previous seasons final? the Carabao cup? I mean if you are did you watch the match? we won is about the best thing you can say because apart from the result we were clearly not the best team in that final, I am Man Utd through and through but we robbed Newcastle that game, or the final against City, again better performance but hardly the better team/
 
Sorry, maybe I am confused but are you saying we were the better team against Newcastle in the previous seasons final? the Carabao cup? I mean if you are did you watch the match? we won is about the best thing you can say because apart from the result we were clearly not the best team in that final, I am Man Utd through and through but we robbed Newcastle that game, or the final against City, again better performance but hardly the better team/

The win vs City was deserved. The way we played is just how everyone plays against them. You can't beat them with a proactive, dominant approach. They are the best team in the world and are capable of making any team bar Arsenal look like a Championship side for 180 minutes, like we've seen with Real Madrid last season. The approach ETH went with is one that gave us the highest chances of winning, and it was a very good, organized and disciplined performance. We didn't rob anyone of anything, unless in your opinion every final Pep Guardiola has lost in the last 15 years was a robbery.
 
If 2015 Klopp had a modern equivalent it'd obviously be Alonso. Achieved the same feats in the same league.
Alonso had the higher peak, but he did not yet retain the league title. So not exactly the same feats.
 
'Decent options' and Tuchel, perhaps, but not the contrast between Rodgers and Klopp.

Klopp was a wanted man in 2015 (by us) and Liverpool snapping him up was (wrongly given their financial heft) considered a coup.

Revising him downward is not going to work.

The point isn't to downgrade Klopp, as I said I like Klopp a lot and rate him very highly. The point is to not overestimate Klopp in 2015 when we evaluate managers in 2024, it's a bit silly to suggest that Klopp is a no brainer in 2015 compared to the potential managers that are Enrique, Tuchel or Inzaghi because their achievements are at least very close to Klopp's in 2015.
 
Sorry, maybe I am confused but are you saying we were the better team against Newcastle in the previous seasons final? the Carabao cup? I mean if you are did you watch the match? we won is about the best thing you can say because apart from the result we were clearly not the best team in that final, I am Man Utd through and through but we robbed Newcastle that game, or the final against City, again better performance but hardly the better team/
I'm going purely off memory so might be completely wrong, but didn't Newcastle have more possession but otherwise never looked like hurting us? It was kind of similar to how we were playing against Arsenal for a while under Fergie, where they might have more of the ball but we'd be the ones in control of the match.
 
Klopp is a big enough character to handle it. I could imagine him saying something like:

“Yes, I loved my time at Liverpool and I will always be immensely proud of the success we had. They will always be a part of me.

But I’m refreshed, feeling good and this challenge that I’ve accepted, how could I turn it down? Sir Jim and Dan Ashworth, they’ve sold the Manchester United project to me and we will work hard to get them back to the levels that this huge club deserves. “

There's absolutely zero chance of this ever happening. Whether you like him or not, Klopp would never ever do that to Liverpool. And this "reasoning" would be nothing but shamelessness, and not one Liverpool fan would buy it either :lol:

Like another poster said, there's maybe a world where Pep would come to United, if City basically disappears after a hefty punishment, and we present him some incredible project, and he would like to stay in England and the Premier League, but that's also obviously an incredibly unlikely scenario too. And then Klopp is a hundred times more unlikely than that.
 
The win vs City was deserved. The way we played is just how everyone plays against them. You can't beat them with a proactive, dominant approach. They are the best team in the world and are capable of making any team bar Arsenal look like a Championship side for 180 minutes, like we've seen with Real Madrid last season. The approach ETH went with is one that gave us the highest chances of winning, and it was a very good, organized and disciplined performance. We didn't rob anyone of anything, unless in your opinion every final Pep Guardiola has lost in the last 15 years was a robbery.
Obviously not last seasons result against City, was discussing the finals the season before that 22/23
 
The point isn't to downgrade Klopp, as I said I like Klopp a lot and rate him very highly. The point is to not overestimate Klopp in 2015 when we evaluate managers in 2024, it's a bit silly to suggest that Klopp is a no brainer in 2015 compared to the potential managers that are Enrique, Tuchel or Inzaghi because their achievements are at least very close to Klopp's in 2015.
I’d agree that Klopp at the time wasn’t an obviously better candidate than someone like Mourinho or Ancelotti, but he was better than the rest.

People forget what Bayern team his Dortmund team won the title against, back to back.
They’ve had peak Lahm and Schweinsteiger, young Muller, Ribery, Robben.
It wasn’t this current Bayern team with washed up Goretzka, Kimmich, Kane and excellent Musiala.

That Bayern team that Klopp had to compete against became one of the greatest teams in the history of world football, Klopp won a title against that Heynckes led Bayern.

Not to mention that CL SF tie against Real Madrid in 2013.

He was a more obvious and proven candidate than Alonso would be right now.
 


Yeah OK that's good to hear but I don't think there is anything in the article that suggests it is based on fact or word he has got from insiders. Feels Jackson just said that. The article itself is short and is basically he just needs to get better
 
People forget what Bayern team his Dortmund team won the title against, back to back.
They’ve had peak Lahm and Schweinsteiger, young Muller, Ribery, Robben.
It wasn’t this current Bayern team with washed up Goretzka, Kimmich, Kane and excellent Musiala.

That Bayern team that Klopp had to compete against became one of the greatest teams in the history of world football, Klopp won a title against that Heynckes led Bayern.
You do the same, at least a bit.

It was a generally weak Bayern team in those years, but LvG had laid the foundation for greatness with them. But it took time and needed some adjustments before that team peaked. Klopp's Dortmund reached their peak right before 2010s Bayern did, and he had no response when they did. Alonso had to win the league against a Bayern team that despite their struggles performed much better than what Klopp had to face when he won the league.
 


Been backed better than any of his predecessors yet the results keep getting worse and worse over time.

I'd also argue that amongst that list, we also play the worst brand football.
 
I don't want us to just get everyone who made our rivals great. What's the point of that? It's soulless in my opinion, and Ineos can surely use their brains a bit more, than to just get the best personnel from other big teams in England. We already took Berrada and Ashworth from City and Newcastle, that's enough for me.

I want us to get the next Premier League "super manager" in early, and let them make a name for themselves at United.

Arteta has done that at Arsenal. Klopp to a certain degree as well, but obviously was already an established name among the best managers around. Pep at least didn't join City from a domestic rival. Chelsea and Spurs have decided to go that way too with Maresca and Ange. Liverpool are continuing down that route too with Slot.

I'd much, much prefer to go with any of van Nistelrooy, McKenna, De Zerbi, or even Tuchel (1 year at Chelsea with only 1 trophy to show for it is vastly different to an almost decade long era at Liverpool where Klopp elevated himself to a mini-Ferguson stature for them) over fecking Klopp, who's one of the biggest legends of United's biggest rivals, and by far the biggest reason Liverpool had their only successful period in the modern era between 2017 and 2022. No, thanks. But we are the last club he would ever go to, so it's thankfully a pointless discussion.
RvN does not have the required experience.
Neither does McKenna yet.
DeZerbie shot himself in the foot when he made a jibe at United recently. Tosser
Tuchel I feel we’d have the same 3rd season syndrome as Jose etc.

Your reasoning to not even talk to Klopp doesn’t make sense to me. But anyway this is the ETH thread so if you want to continue it let’s do it in the right thread
 
I’d agree that Klopp at the time wasn’t an obviously better candidate than someone like Mourinho or Ancelotti, but he was better than the rest.

People forget what Bayern team his Dortmund team won the title against, back to back.
They’ve had peak Lahm and Schweinsteiger, young Muller, Ribery, Robben.
It wasn’t this current Bayern team with washed up Goretzka, Kimmich, Kane and excellent Musiala.

That Bayern team that Klopp had to compete against became one of the greatest teams in the history of world football, Klopp won a title against that Heynckes led Bayern.

Not to mention that CL SF tie against Real Madrid in 2013.

He was a more obvious and proven candidate than Alonso would be right now.

You can state that he was better than the rest but the comparison I made wasn't Alonso but Inzaghi, Tuchel and Luis Enrique. Also Bayern were rebuilding, their team in 2010-11 was shoddy, you are largely judging them based on what they became after a few years of coaching and team rebuilding which led to Dortmund not being remotely close to them.
 
Klopp is a big enough character to handle it. I could imagine him saying something like:

“Yes, I loved my time at Liverpool and I will always be immensely proud of the success we had. They will always be a part of me.

But I’m refreshed, feeling good and this challenge that I’ve accepted, how could I turn it down? Sir Jim and Dan Ashworth, they’ve sold the Manchester United project to me and we will work hard to get them back to the levels that this huge club deserves. “

How did a professional troll manage to become a staff member of the biggest football forum in the world. Surely no one is this delusional?
 


Been backed better than any of his predecessors yet the results keep getting worse and worse over time.

I'd also argue that amongst that list, we also play the worst brand football.

And this Summer just gone he has spent more than any team which finished above us last season. Dare say we will still finish below all of them again.
 
Funny when some people were trying to say the game model would be devised by Wilcox and ETH would just abide by it.
 
Funny when some people were trying to say the game model would be devised by Wilcox and ETH would just abide by it.
It's generally how it works but that's also why clubs executives get rid of the current manager when they try to implement a new philosophy.
 


Been backed better than any of his predecessors yet the results keep getting worse and worse over time.

I'd also argue that amongst that list, we also play the worst brand football.


I was thinking this the other day, Sky Sports I think had his spend at £616m. He could have bought a new first eleven with over £55m for each position with that.

It's staggering how in his 3rd year and after this massive outlay that we still look like a team with a new manager with players who don't fit his system.
 
I was thinking this the other day, Sky Sports I think had his spend at £616m. He could have bought a new first eleven with over £55m for each position with that.

It's staggering how in his 3rd year and after this massive outlay that we still look like a team with a new manager with players who don't fit his system.

That’s because his system is fundamentally flawed. He could have Real Madrid’s squad at his disposal and the results would still be the same, everyone running around like headless chickens offensively and being cut to shreds defensively.
 


How not to run a football club. It’s a complete circus.

Just sack the man and get an alternative in since you’re clearly completely unconvinced by him considering you spent weeks sounding out alternatives before deciding to stick with him - and preferably do it silently and without briefing the media every 15 minutes?

I’d assume this sort of approach which involves a) micromanaging the coach’s every move and b) briefing the media every morning on your current feelings about the coach can’t be conducive to convincing a decent alternative to take up the job either.
 


Been backed better than any of his predecessors yet the results keep getting worse and worse over time.

I'd also argue that amongst that list, we also play the worst brand football.

The ROI for Liverpool is great. The one for Madrid is out of this world.
 


INEOS are honestly sounding no different to the previous regime here. This "we'll wait and see if things improve" strategy is fine if a manager is in his first or early second season, but when you've a manager that's been here for two full seasons, and has started his third like we have it makes them sound incompetent. If the idea that they're assessing things from when they started to run things is true, it would be incredibly gullible. No serious ownership can be that stupid to not take into account the way United have been stylistically playing and performing on the pitch since around March 2023.
 
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Neville misses his point.

Carraghers point - the fact that they were openly looking for another manager shows that they are not convinced by him.

Fair point which Neville doesn’t acknowledge.

Neville’s point that they looked around but the market was bereft of good options is also fair, but they are 2 different points
Neville disagree’s with him, he doesn’t miss his point.

Carragher stated ”they lost their nerve”, having earlier said (according to Neville) that they “bottled it”.

Carragher then exclaims ‘EXACTLY’ when Neville, by reply, agrees that they were looking for a manager but that doesn’t mean they bottled it - clearly articulating where Carragher has made a leap - how does ‘looking for’ equate to ‘losing their nerve’ / ‘bottling it’?

If I go looking for shoes but don’t find a pair, does that prove ‘EXACTLY’ that I’ve bottled it or lost my nerve?

Anyhow, we can see it differently, no big deal.

Carragher isn’t intelligent enough to be consistent over the course of a 1 minute discussion. It’s maddening to see folks in here parrot his Tom Kite, but I’m not wasting any more pixels on the imbecile today and this is veering off topic!
 
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Crazy how he started with teaching the players to control the match with a bit of ball possession and managing tempo.

And now 2 years later with better players and better feet (apparently), he threw almost everything out and become what Ole wanted us to be..... which was also his biggest criticism.

The next time the club gets a new manager, the manager needs to have a style and persist with it. I'm so tired of managers abandoning whats good to revert back to gung ho, gamble football. Why bother asking for players with specific strengths if you wanna gamble? Just sign players that are fast as feck like Dan James and play on the counter every day, all day.

The best transition team my arse.... it all started there. That vision ruined everything.
 
INEOS are honestly sounding no different to the previous regime here. This "we'll wait and see if things improve" strategy is fine if a manager is in his first or early second season, but when you've a manager that's been here for two full seasons, and has started his third like we have it makes them sound incompetent. The idea that they're assessing things from when they started to run things would be lunacy. No serious ownership can be that stupid to not access the way United have been stylistically playing and performing on the pitch since around March 2023.
It is massively concerning. They're worried about the bad optics of sacking him after bottling the decision to sack him after the FA Cup. It's plain as day weak leadership.
 
It is massively concerning. They're worried about the bad optics of sacking him after bottling the decision to sack him after the FA Cup. It's plain as day weak leadership.

Some of us predicted this problem. They needed to sack in the summer when there were very strong arguments for sacking him. If they have to sack him at any point during this season then they've opened themselves up for criticism now, as they've fundamentally thrown away another year.
 
How did a professional troll manage to become a staff member of the biggest football forum in the world. Surely no one is this delusional?
How am I trolling?

Our new structure is professional. They wouldn’t be doing their job at least having a conversation with him if they were planning to have a new guy next season
 
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