Erik ten Hag | 2024/25 | Sacked

Erik ten Hag


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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 he's got to have 5 years for them to settle along with the new structure.
 
I'm not sure if this is the correct thread for this but it fits into tactics.

Watching the Overlap episode that was out today. Carra and Neville are having it out again with difference of opinions with both talking sense. Wright made a good point and something we already know. When Onana has the ball, United are too slow to be in positions for Onana to pass it to a player where they can play out from the back to transition into attack. Then we have the ball and no options are on or a wrong pass is made and the other team gets themselves in better positions etc... For a start we aren't getting the best out of Onana. That might change after a while with the new defence so maybe improvement can happen there.

Neville is pretty much saying, how about keep it a little more simple. Carra is saying hoofing the ball up all the time to target man no longer works.

I agree with Neville in terms of maybe we are overcomplicating play. He accepted the game is a lot more technical but it got me thinking maybe United are being too technical. Under Ole, the football was simpler and we were attacking better but that led to problems against one too many teams playing that way. I understand where Carra is coming from.

Keane made a good point also. Too many passes are going just to the player rather than the player running onto the ball to make an attack happen.

What do you think, do you think United should just try play a little less technical by not overcomplicating tactics?
I think we should just get a new manager who can coach. That would be a good start.

The manager before him couldn’t coach at all and he played better football than ETH.
 
Style of play and results need to go hand in hand....

We need to start being brutal...ETH is in no worse position than Chelsea, Spurs or AV manager....

If they can finish above him, he needs to go, simple.

Minimum goal this year is top 4 and with a good style of play not bcoz others are shite..
 
Neville on the Overlap regurgitating the same drivel about United fans being tired of replacing managers, because 'we cant possibly be turning all these great managers bad'. Except they were already bad when we hired them. Because we hired Jose at his lowest point and LVG after he'd retired from club management. Then we hired someone who's total experience consisted of relegating Cardiff. And the next guy was another big gamble who had never managed outside of the Netherlands. So painfully dumb.
He always subscribed to manager=God ideology. But only when it comes to United. Don't ask him what he does at his own club.
 
I backed him hoping the summer window and return of players like Martinez would change results bigly but im not so sure now. Even though there have only been 3 games it's looking quite grim.
 
The game model talk from a few posters is hilarious.

I am sure that Wilcox has an idea of what he would want a dominant United side to look like and he'll judge managers based on that(or whether they can progress to that).

But the idea that he's got a complex system specifically for the manager to use and therefore ETH has only had 3 games to implement it is hilarious.

I mean the excuses are now never-ending.
 
Neville on the Overlap regurgitating the same drivel about United fans being tired of replacing managers, because 'we cant possibly be turning all these great managers bad'. Except they were already bad when we hired them. Because we hired Jose at his lowest point and LVG after he'd retired from club management. Then we hired someone who's total experience consisted of relegating Cardiff. And the next guy was another big gamble who had never managed outside of the Netherlands. So painfully dumb.
I do feel that United fans are tired of replacing managers, but why should United listen to those babies? United aren't replacing managers at some crazy pace. Apart from Moyes, every manager has gotten 2 seasons at least despite the vast sums of money spent, crap football to watch, and not being close to having a title challenge past December.

Our fanbase has this insane thought that we're recycling managers and that couldn't be further from the truth. If 2 seasons for every manager counts as recycling managers, than our fanbase is deluded.
 
I do feel that United fans are tired of replacing managers, but why should United listen to those babies? United aren't replacing managers at some crazy pace. Apart from Moyes, every manager has gotten 2 seasons at least despite the vast sums of money spent, crap football to watch, and not being close to having a title challenge past December.

Our fanbase has this insane thought that we're recycling managers and that couldn't be further from the truth. If 2 seasons for every manager counts as recycling managers, than our fanbase is deluded.
Agreed. Ferguson did genuinely warp many fans standards of what's normal in football. It's fine for managers to work for a couple of years and move on. It's not a monarchy where they get the job for life.
 
I do feel that United fans are tired of replacing managers, but why should United listen to those babies? United aren't replacing managers at some crazy pace. Apart from Moyes, every manager has gotten 2 seasons at least despite the vast sums of money spent, crap football to watch, and not being close to having a title challenge past December.

Our fanbase has this insane thought that we're recycling managers and that couldn't be further from the truth. If 2 seasons for every manager counts as recycling managers, than our fanbase is deluded.
Great post
 
Mates, we need to give the new “game model” a chance to work, at least a full season.
 
I would have called time on him after Liverpool personally but going forward I'd basically challenge him to win all the matches from Southampton up to Spurs Away. A top 4 team will win them games and getting top 4 isn't really enough at the end of the day. Its the minimum expected. Spurs could be a slip up and you might not hold it against him but he needs to win the others.
We do need to cycle through managers faster than we have been.
 
Here the real issue, he’s won a couple of trophies, Came 3rd in the first season and hasn’t really developed from that first season as a coach or manager.

He’s never really managed an Elite top 10 European team that have huge financial resources, he seems to be much better at managing up with young players and having a £25-30m transfer budget for the whole summer not £200m.

He clearly doesn’t know how to integrate more than 13/14 players in his team talks, he can’t manage big squads and therefore alienates other squad members.

His teams do not attack quickly enough and look to mostly score goals on quick transitions, however due to the inexperience of our attackers and no real true elite striker in our 6 options, we often miss chances, don’t create as they are all too selfish or players are frequently offside when they score.

The team has no confidence because they lose far too many games for a big club that havs a £300m wage bill every year, the most these professionals players should be losing is 9-10 games per year from 50 played not 20 which is 40%, he’s not the right man so give him the impossible task tell him that by November 1st after playing 8 PL games and 3 Europa League games plus a carabo cup 3rd Round match, his target is simple

He must be in top 6 of Premier League with no more defeats and at least 14/15 points and a positive goal difference

He must have qualified for next round of Carabo Cup

He Must have at least 6/7 points from first 3 Europa League Matches and a positive goal difference.

A review will take place after the first 12 games of the season and he needs to have a win percentage of 60%.

Failure to achieve these targets will result in ETH termination of the club and RVN will take interim control until January 1st 2025.

There is no other way to manage ETH he only seems to produce expected results when he’s under intense pressure and Man United have been the laughing stock of the Premier league for long enough, from now on whomever comes in, if the owners and fans can’t see huge improvements on the training ground after 3/4 months and results follow, then we should constantly look to change until we get the right coach who plays wining attacking football, nothing else will suffice for this club!
 
Bingo! The players at ETH's disposal are not inclined to press and when they do it's half-hearted and disjointed. In the American West there's a saying that goes you can lead a horse to water to you can't make the horse drink. I have no no doubt that ETH instructs his players in training to press but they just don't do it in actual competition and when they do, they're easily bypassed and find acres of space in front of them and score goals for fun, like shooting fish in a barrel.

I can understand keeping ETH for a few more months while INEOS recruit a suitable successor but ETH needs to understand that what his tactics aren't working. Were he to man up and bench Rashford and adjust his tactics to suit the players he has who are willing to put in the effort and win some games he might just dodge the bullet and see through the "long run". But the direction he has us going in now, which is the wrong direction, he'll be replaced with an interim manager by mid-October.

I would actually like to see what Ruud can do with this squad. It's painfully obvious now that ETH has lost the players -- if he ever had them -- but it's open question whether Ruud or anyone else could command their respect.
Hojlund, Bruno, Mount, Amad, Garnacho, Dalot, Martinez and De Ligt are all inclined to press. Admitted not all of them may be the best at knowing when or how to do it properly (looking at Bruno mostly), but that's where coaching is supposed to come in. More importantly, the way we press as a team is poor and often leaves large gaps, which once again is where coaching is supposed to set up proper pressing traps and patterns of play.

To be fair the central midfield roles have been a bit of an issue in that sense. Ugarte has now been signed, so once he's up to speed that'll be one less excuse.
 
The game model talk from a few posters is hilarious.

I am sure that Wilcox has an idea of what he would want a dominant United side to look like and he'll judge managers based on that(or whether they can progress to that).

But the idea that he's got a complex system specifically for the manager to use and therefore ETH has only had 3 games to implement it is hilarious.

I mean the excuses are now never-ending.

To be fair, this excuse has been used for a while now, and predates ETH, that the managers somehow can't coach and set up the team properly because of the lack of structure from the Glazers. It never made sense to me then, and it doesn't make sense to me now.

Wilcox has this 'model' that ETH has to use. In which case what exactly is the point of ETH? Wilcox might as well be the manager if this 'game model' of his is so important :lol:

It's just another stupid excuse.
 
There was a time when a manager was given 100% freedom to manage UTD as he wished.

If Moyes signed Fellaini because he thought he was good enough for United - surely that shows a weakness of Moyes & an incapability of the manager to judge talent.

For me, it's not even about tactics - its about Ten Hag buying Antony, Onana, Malacia, Mount, Weghorst, an aged Casemiro&Eriksen & Amrabat because he deemed them good enough both for him and the club itself.

Maybe its unfair comparing him to Guardiola or Klopp, but can anyone see these 2 buying all these players? I can maybe see one getting bought but not this whole lot.

I think Ten Hag has the ability to focus & help improve a players weaknesses more so than focusing on helping to get the best out of a players strength's. Likewise we have seen improvement with our younger players like Mainoo, Dalot, Garnacho, Amad, Wan Bissaka and seen players more one directional strengths like Rashford, Antony, Maguire & Bruno Fernandes, Onana, Mount struggle because he is poor at judging a players strengths and therefore cannot get the best use out of them.

Just as he struggles to judge a players true quality as seen with his subpar signings he had worked with before - i think this has shown he potentially has a weakness of actually judging a players best quality and therefore struggling to get the best out of them as players both individually & tactically.

Considering that he grew up as a secondary coach/assistant manager this does make sense. Helps improves a players weakness rather than being a top level manager of 11 players on the pitch.

I think he could really help improve the likes of Yoro , Amad, Hojlund, Zirkzee, Mainoo & Garnacho - but yet i don't think he is good enough to make us title winners with them either because he is simply not good enough at judging a players best qualities and therefore not good enough to get us playing as a top level team. Ten Hag got to work with one of the best youth development clubs in Ajax and both him & the club benefitted from that as seen with the rise of De Ligt, De Jong & VDB - but he never was an exceptional manager & looking back at that CL loss to Spurs with a final moment Lucas Hattrick; i find our ability to lose matches out of nowhere & no control is not too dissimilar either.
 
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To be fair, this excuse has been used for a while now, and predates ETH, that the managers somehow can't coach and set up the team properly because of the lack of structure from the Glazers. It never made sense to me then, and it doesn't make sense to me now.

Though I never heard the phrase 'game model' until the linked Jackson article, your conclusion is ominous.

The Glazer's neglect of the club, from maintenance to recruitment and beyond, is notorious. If you cannot see how it's effected United, you are blind or you are an enemy agent.

Think of this: who hired ten Hag?

Ineos have been around five minutes and the primary reason EtH lives is the lack of successor. Ineos are terrified, rightly, of continuity Glazers.

I do feel that United fans are tired of replacing managers, but why should United listen to those babies? United aren't replacing managers at some crazy pace.

It's more about succession. We change managers and, at best, only marginally improve.

There must be something else going on in the club's overall structure for this to continue, as it has.

I think we should just get a new manager who can coach. That would be a good start.

Who did you have in mind?

It's not three games in the winder scheme of things though, is it? Everyone and their granny knew he had to start this season flying after the disgrace of a season he overseen.

I would say he'd have to end it better than start it, but a better candidate has yet to emerge.

We're going about in circles.

The sacking-ayes cannot find a replacement whereas the sacking-noes cannot justify poor
performance.

Nobody has the best argument no matter how many times they parody.
 
Which made sense with the players he had at the time, it was still mostly Ole's squad. So he basically played the same as Ole did but with the added benefit of Casemiro and Martinez. Our problems have occured when he tried to move away from that style and introduce his own. People think it didn't work last season because of personel and/or injures, which may well have been the case.

This season the squad is now virtually all his own signings and promotions and we should have less injuries. So if we're still playing shite over the next 10 or so games then he really has no excuses. By October/November we should have an idea if it's going to work out. I hope it does but I wouldn't put any money on it if I'm being honest.
This 100%. People say ETH doesn't have any style of play. Oh, he certainly has one. It's just uneffective.
 
I endorse the long run argument, but on what basis can it be argued that ETH is right man for the long run? It can't just be that he won the FA Cup, because apart from that his tenure as manager of United our performances and results have been rather shit. I went through this point a few months but I'll just state briefly we won a lot of games last season by one goal against supposedly inferior opponents. We were thrashed out of the CL group stage. We were nowhere near touching the top four at season's end.

Moreover, ETH's recruitment has been remarkably ridiculous. I can go through the names but everyone here is familiar with the tragedy of the ins prior to this summer. As for this summer, that remains to be seen. As for the tactics, his tactics don't suit the players he has at his disposal.

Still, I don't see a good option to turn to right now so slog on with ETH we must.

The argument I think is if that you give any manager a lot of time, they will come good. And the FA Cup win.
 
Pick your poison:

- 3 games
- No qualified replacement
- We've improved
- Unlucky losses
- Referee positioning vs Liverpool
- Individual mistakes
- Superior xG
- Ugarte not available
- Arteta struggled too
Klopp was appalling for the first 5 years before he turned good at Liverpool. Or even 10 years.
 
For me it's simple: you give him the proverbial rope to hang himself. If you're really giving him a 'fresh start' this season then you can't judge after those 3 matches. We should have won 2 and lost 1, and given the fixtures that would be 'okay'. The start to the season is brutal, you have to give a dozen matches before making any decisions this year.

Or you're not giving him a fresh start, and you view these 3 as a continuation of last season.

Either way, you should also be out there looking at options at the same time. Because best case you've invested some time and energy and created some links with candidates, which you don't use right now because ETH sorts it out. Worst case you're well prepared.

Personally I think so much of it comes down, depressingly, to Rashford. If ETH can somehow get him playing again, we'd be transformed, but without that goal threat the entire system falls apart.
 
Neville on the Overlap regurgitating the same drivel about United fans being tired of replacing managers, because 'we cant possibly be turning all these great managers bad'. Except they were already bad when we hired them. Because we hired Jose at his lowest point and LVG after he'd retired from club management. Then we hired someone who's total experience consisted of relegating Cardiff. And the next guy was another big gamble who had never managed outside of the Netherlands. So painfully dumb.
I have to partially disagree with you here. You can view each of those managers in a better light:
Jose at his lowest point still delivered good league results and an EL (still the biggest title past SAF for United)
LvG was able to clearly implement a style which could have been a good foundation for the future (look at how Bayern evolved based on his time there, it was quite similar)
Ole is often dismissed as a manager and he clearly had his limits, but as an interim he was able to brilliantly leverage what Jose had built for some time.
EtH indeed was a gamble that could have paid off.
Moyes could be added to the list in the same bracket as EtH.

None of them are bad managers as such (not sure about Ole here). But the main issue always was, that United changed everything when they signed a new manager. They never looked for natural progression but for a total rebuild. For example Bayern never would have become the uber-dominant force had they signed Jose after LvG. But they went for Heynckes, who smartly took what was there and just tweaked it, and after that they went for Pep who did the same. It resulted in them shattering records and winning everything.

So in my opinion the issue really isn't that fans are tired of changing managers. They are more tired of changing directions. Had the club managed to diminish the managers influence early after SAF left, it could have been much smoother. But they weren't able to.
 
I have to partially disagree with you here. You can view each of those managers in a better light:
Jose at his lowest point still delivered good league results and an EL (still the biggest title past SAF for United)
LvG was able to clearly implement a style which could have been a good foundation for the future (look at how Bayern evolved based on his time there, it was quite similar)
Ole is often dismissed as a manager and he clearly had his limits, but as an interim he was able to brilliantly leverage what Jose had built for some time.
EtH indeed was a gamble that could have paid off.
Moyes could be added to the list in the same bracket as EtH.

None of them are bad managers as such (not sure about Ole here). But the main issue always was, that United changed everything when they signed a new manager. They never looked for natural progression but for a total rebuild. For example Bayern never would have become the uber-dominant force had they signed Jose after LvG. But they went for Heynckes, who smartly took what was there and just tweaked it, and after that they went for Pep who did the same. It resulted in them shattering records and winning everything.

So in my opinion the issue really isn't that fans are tired of changing managers. They are more tired of changing directions. Had the club managed to diminish the managers influence early after SAF left, it could have been much smoother. But they weren't able to.
We had a board who basically knew feck all about building a formation/style and had a scattergun approach to managers, the next shiny new toy. If after VG we had kept hiring possession based managers. We may have had as competent team now, as the squad was already adapting to keeping the ball.
 
People not understanding the importance of the new game model. I'm sorry for you.
 
I think till the next International break (6th Oct) we have 7 games coming up within 21 days or something, its sink or swim for ETH,
as away games are tough and with our record in the past two seasons, we could actually loss all of them (league matches).

Southampton Away,
Barnsley Home,
Crystal Palace Away,
Twente Home,
Spurs Home,
Porto Away
Aston Villa away.

He needs 4W - 3D or 4W - 2D - 1L to survive, anything less than that i think he will be sacked.
 
It's more about succession. We change managers and, at best, only marginally improve.

There must be something else going on in the club's overall structure for this to continue, as it has.
Yes, and probably the single biggest part of that is that the club hierarchy chose the wrong managers. Certainly not the only part and even someone like Pep or Klopp would have had serious problems, but we could have had the best set-up in the world and the managers we did have ultimately wouldn't have been good enough (although they may have won a few more cups here and there).

Moyes clearly wasn't good enough.
LVG was past his best and wasn't going to be good enough himself, but he did set in place some building blocks for the next manager to take and improve on further.
Mourinho was past his best and basically the exact opposite of LVG, so any benefit we got from the Dutchman was ripped up and discarded instead of being built on.
Ole wasn't good enough.
ETH was the first and only time that we signed the right profile of manager, but it's now almost certain that he isn't going to be good enough.

The idea that we've been changing managers and it hasn't worked so therefore the managers aren't at fault only works if you think any of them actually would have succeeded with a better set-up above them. In our case, none of them would have.

We've signed the correct manager once. It hasn't worked which is unfortunate, but managers who are doing good work at smaller clubs often fail when they step up. It's not a big deal. You just sack them and hire another. Keeping that failing manager until somebody comes along who is almost a 100% certainty of succeeding is the worst possible thing you can do, not least because a manager of that pedigree will have much better offers than a club who has shown such poor decision making. By keeping a failing manager and allowing him to keep failing we are actively making our club less attractive (to top managers and top players), and makes it that much harder to turn things around.

The next manager we sign does not have to be the one to take us back to being one of the best in the world. Obviously it'd be great if they do, but the more likely scenario is that they will be a stepping stone. They set in place the right tactics and style, they improve things and develop the players, and just simply move the team as a whole into a much healthier position. And the fanbase has to learn that even a manager who does all that, may not be the best for the longterm and should ultimately be sacked if they've taken us as far as they can. Which is going to be difficult for the fans, considering how much support the manager who took us to our worst ever league and CL performance somehow still has.
 
The ‚new game model‘ whatever it is, is different from the previous one. Maybe someone with tactical nous can weigh in here.

What I‘m seeing: we are pressing with a front four instead of a front three, the back line is higher, no man marking. We play gk long ball less and prioritize playing out the back more.

Same as last season: pressing isn‘t consistently good, mistakes in playing out from midfield, not putting away big chances.

We have many new players that need integrating (and a couple that need outtagrating) into the squad, that doesn‘t help with consistency.

Despite all that, we should perform better than we have.
 
I think till the next International break (6th Oct) we have 7 games coming up within 21 days or something, its sink or swim for ETH,
as away games are tough and with our record in the past two seasons, we could actually loss all of them (league matches).

Southampton Away,
Barnsley Home,
Crystal Palace Away,
Twente Home,
Spurs Home,
Porto Away
Aston Villa away.

He needs 4W - 3D or 4W - 2D - 1L to survive, anything less than that i think he will be sacked.
I reckon 3W 3L 1D
 
Yes, and probably the single biggest part of that is that the club hierarchy chose the wrong managers. Certainly not the only part and even someone like Pep or Klopp would have had serious problems, but we could have had the best set-up in the world and the managers we did have ultimately wouldn't have been good enough (although they may have won a few more cups here and there).

Moyes clearly wasn't good enough.
LVG was past his best and wasn't going to be good enough himself, but he did set in place some building blocks for the next manager to take and improve on further.
Mourinho was past his best and basically the exact opposite of LVG, so any benefit we got from the Dutchman was ripped up and discarded instead of being built on.
Ole wasn't good enough.
ETH was the first and only time that we signed the right profile of manager, but it's now almost certain that he isn't going to be good enough.

The idea that we've been changing managers and it hasn't worked so therefore the managers aren't at fault only works if you think any of them actually would have succeeded with a better set-up above them. In our case, none of them would have.

We've signed the correct manager once. It hasn't worked which is unfortunate, but managers who are doing good work at smaller clubs often fail when they step up. It's not a big deal. You just sack them and hire another. Keeping that failing manager until somebody comes along who is almost a 100% certainty of succeeding is the worst possible thing you can do, not least because a manager of that pedigree will have much better offers than a club who has shown such poor decision making. By keeping a failing manager and allowing him to keep failing we are actively making our club less attractive (to top managers and top players), and makes it that much harder to turn things around.

The next manager we sign does not have to be the one to take us back to being one of the best in the world. Obviously it'd be great if they do, but the more likely scenario is that they will be a stepping stone. They set in place the right tactics and style, they improve things and develop the players, and just simply move the team as a whole into a much healthier position. And the fanbase has to learn that even a manager who does all that, may not be the best for the longterm and should ultimately be sacked if they've taken us as far as they can. Which is going to be difficult for the fans, considering how much support the manager who took us to our worst ever league and CL performance somehow still has.

Great Post mate that is 100% correct.

Too many are still hanging onto the romantic hope that we'll find the next Fergie. We just need to have faith and give them 5 years because that's what happened once 4 decades ago.
 
Doesn't make much sense (what you are saying). You claim to support every manager but are now actively asking for the current manager's sack?

I don't get what doesn't make sense to you, I said I support every manager from the time that they sign with the club, no matter my feelings about them previously. (I.e. I'm not sold on Tuchel, I think it will be too short term).

But that doesn't mean I will support them forever if I feel the results are going in the wrong direction, because of choices made by the manager.
 
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.
I said it at the time that the whole way INEOS handled it smelt like Glazers 2.0. Funny that we have come full circle.

They weren’t courageous, they didn’t make a statement after the FA Cup that the new owners would not tolerate 8th place finishes and +1 goal difference, injuries and a minor trophy be damned.
 
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