Erik ten Hag | 2024/25

Erik ten Hag

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Chairman Steve said:
Why does Gary Neville treat us like some unique entity that’s not like any other football club? Why until Christmas when he’s already had two full seasons and hundreds of millions to spend? No other club operates like this.

Are we supposed to have a collective amnesia after last season as we got beat soundly at home to mid table teams and not carry forward into this season?

There’s been god knows how many clubs that change managers early in the season over the years and go on to have good to even successful seasons. Neville just wants to keep the plane headed toward the mountain and not pull up. Enough with the borderline sanctimonious ‘we back our managers no matter what’ mentality.
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Neville's loyalty is primary to his employers and his viewers, who finance his lavish lifestyle. It's important to remember him being controversial and pissing off United fans as a former United player is his job and it pays his bills - Sky has rightly figured out Neville will bring a lot of engagement and the more absurd he goes the more clicks he generates. We've seen that so many times over the last years, him and United doing terrible bad are the money machine for Sky (and Gary earns a hefty fee, too)
 
Sarni said:
I don't know why anyone would prefer to be us, and suffer pain week in week out, knowing you will get casual battering from mid table teams pretty much every month but win the occasional cup competition, rather than be Arsenal winning almost every week, playing great football, being competitive both domestically and in Europe. That sounds utterly ridiculous.

Domestic cups aren't even that important. I bet most on here would not be able to name the last 3 winners of German, Italian or Spanish cups. They hold much more weight to smaller clubs because they are usually their only chance at silverware but the big clubs truly care about league and CL.
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Arsenal are one of the best teams in the world, top 4 IMO, and have been basically since the start of the 2022/23 season, so over 2 years now, despite not winning one of the two major trophies: CL or PL. In fact, they haven't won anything, but are still infinitely more likely to win one of the big trophies than we are, even if we make the CL.

The 38-game league season will always give a much better indication about where your footballing project is, and how the future is looking like, than a knockout cup competition, especially domestic ones, where you often only have to face one or two truly good teams in order to win it. I'm not going to deny that ETH isn't a good knockout tournament coach, as we've deservedly beaten Barcelona, Liverpool, and Manchester City in such competitions under him. However, United's ambitions ultimately are winning the Premier League and Champions League, and not by fluking them, but by being the best team in the world. Arteta has done much more for that objective at his current club than ETH. No doubts about it.
 
saik said:
They didn't offer him a new contract. They just triggered the +1 option in his existing contract to make it appear that they're backing him. I'm pretty sure they know what they were doing back then.
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They triggered the extension because he wouldn't agree to the new terms they had offered him, which presumably reduced his input and made it easier to sack him. After doing a tour of Europe to find his replacement and coming up with nothing, they had to trigger the extension for the sake of appearances.
 
Red Star One said:
Neville's loyalty is primary to his employers and his viewers, who finance his lavish lifestyle. It's important to remember him being controversial and pissing off United fans as a former United player is his job and it pays his bills - Sky has rightly figured out Neville will bring a lot of engagement and the more absurd he goes the more clicks he generates. We've seen that so many times over the last years, him and United doing terrible bad are the money machine for Sky (and Gary earns a hefty fee, too)
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That’s the biggest load of nonsense I’ve read today. Finance his lavish lifestyle? Sky is nothing more than a side gig for Neville.
 
Bobade said:
It's actually crazy how much Ole got slated for that quote as everyone just got hung up on the fact that he apparently said "trophies are for egos". He was absolutely spot on in what he said.

We're actually seeing the result of trophies are for egos now. Ten Hag's comments post match are ridiculous. He seems to think that we have no problems in our play because he took away two trophies in two seasons. I'm glad we did, but it doesn't take away from us being embarrassed nearly every week in the league. I still have a soft spot for him myself, but I genuinely don't know why that is. It would be ridiculous for Ineos to sack him so early into the season, but is it any worse than waiting until say Christmas, at which point we will have almost certainly sacrificed another league campaign?
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It’s eerie how true they ring in a hindsight. It’s exactly what we are experiencing now, a couple of trophies masking absolutely zero progress made in his two years (actually, a steady decline).
 
The Hilton said:
Well of course the club will sack him with a view to replace him with a manager that they'll have a good idea about why that manager will make things better. I have a lot of faith in the new structure to engage in some sensible succession planning.

The club haven't done that yet, so the natural conclusion is that they aren't able to identify a manager who will make us better that's available. Given that your post is deferring to the knowledge of the club, I assume that you're happy with that decision?
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I’m deferring specifically and only to their choice of a replacement. They have yet to appoint their own man and I have zero doubt they will have been succession planning since the moment they took over, because that’s what any club would do when their current manager is failing. Them deciding not to sack Ten Hag at the end of the season does not mean they aren’t actively discussing his replacement right now. So if they decide to replace them Hag with Ruud, for example, I don’t think it’ll be “change for the sake of change”. I think it’ll be because they’ve assessed their options and think he might be an improvement and is therefore worth a try.
 
We need a world class manager, but who is available? If we do move on from Ten Hag we need a long term solution and is there a Klopp, Guardiola, Ancelotti out there that's not just a flavour of the month?
 
BluesJr said:
That’s the biggest load of nonsense I’ve read today. Finance his lavish lifestyle? Sky is nothing more than a side gig for Neville.
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If you read my post again you'll notice it's not just Sky financing his lifestyle, but the general audience/viewers and it's absolutely true. Neville makes a living being a pundit and creating engagement, it's not really a secret is it
 
It won't happen but would be big move if club sack him over next few days. We shouldn't put up with a 3-0 loss at home in manager's 3rd season. It happened with Mourinho and Ole, we wasted 4-6 months delaying the inevitable. I remember how worrying were some performances vs Roma and Liverpool under Ole. Then a defeat in EL final which should've been it. Same with Mourinho after his relationship with board was broken in summer 2018.
 
Red Star One said:
If you read my post again you'll notice it's not just Sky financing his lifestyle, but the general audience/viewers and it's absolutely true. Neville makes a living being a pundit and creating engagement, it's not really a secret is it
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It’s not reality. Neville makes his living through his various business ventures, not being a pundit.
 
We should totally bin him off before the international break. Not just a big club move, but a logical one - if the shoe doesn't fit, it doesn't fit, he's been trying it on for 2+ years and it'll never fit.

He's been found out. Read my post earlier in this thread about how he managed Ajax - it won't work at United and we are only on a downward spiral with him in charge.
 
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Red Star One said:
If you read my post again you'll notice it's not just Sky financing his lifestyle, but the general audience/viewers and it's absolutely true. Neville makes a living being a pundit and creating engagement, it's not really a secret is it
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I think his investments and hotels and buildings are far more profitable for him than some skysport pundit gig
 
TheNewEra said:
We need a world class manager, but who is available? If we do move on from Ten Hag we need a long term solution and is there a Klopp, Guardiola, Ancelotti out there that's not just a flavour of the month?
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Why don't we just start with a manager that will improve us and go from there? We can always sack them in a couple of seasons if progress stalls. Absolutely no one would have said Emery at one point and look how he transformed Villa. Just hire someone like Tuchel and see what happens. If we have to sack him in a couple of seasons then so be it, you don't know who will be available at that point, could be Alonso or the next upcoming manager, maybe Xavi, Zidane or even a Klopp could be convinced at that point. We simply don't know, but we do know this isn't working at a change needs to be made.
 
TsuWave said:
Neville - possibly due to PTSD from his managerial stint - is always hustling against United/United’s best interest. In his head sacking a manager is a cardinal offence - to the point he frames is as “stupid”.

Carragher couldn’t believe what he was hearing and even said “why would that (sacking him) be stupid?!”
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To be fair, letting him stay after finishing 8th, extending his contract, bringing him new coaching staff, letting him do pre-season, and then sacking him after 3 games of the season does sound pretty stupid.

I guess the stupid decisions were made during the summer though, and we're probably going to compound that by waiting till we're 8th in December before we take action.
 
Frankly speaking, I am tired of his excuses. Erik always blame the loses to a couple of careless mistakes, he always thinks United was playing as good as our opponents. Why other top managers loses less games? Does top managers cares about the League or FA cup? Top managers only want to win the league title and champion league. That's what Alex aims for every years so does Jose, Pep, Wenger and etc. At United, we have a delusionalml manager who set his target like a mid table team. Seriously, please the F out of United.
 
TheNewEra said:
We need a world class manager, but who is available? If we do move on from Ten Hag we need a long term solution and is there a Klopp, Guardiola, Ancelotti out there that's not just a flavour of the month?
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Do we really need a world class manager at this stage? We are worse than half the teams in the league, our goal for the next couple of years will probably be to get back into CL, we could probably do with just a good manager. No reason why Brighton and Bournemouth can identify good managers who can get them to play attractive football and progress and we cannot.
 
Bobby_2024 said:
More than his bad signings, his stubbornness of not changing formation is causing his downfall,

I am bit surprised he is so thick not to see this but hell bent on something doesn't work by leaving middle of the park so open by "not having enough bodies in midfield and pushing full backs so forward" .

We can talk about players 24x7, but first we need to stick together to make sure opposition wont attack our goal with so ease.
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I think it's really difficult to react in after first 20-30 minutes into the game.
Our starting approach is THE problem. Most managers don't even need to adjust so drastically after half an hour.
 
MadMike said:
He needs to be given more time to instil his football philosophy and the board need more time to shift all the deadwood. He also needs more good players, specifically:
  • One LB because Shaw and Malacia are always injured and Dalot is not a LB.
  • One CB to replace Maguire and Lindelof who are on their way out.
  • Two CMs, a defensive one to replace Casemiro and a more all-rounder to replace Eriksen, since they are both cooked.
  • Two wingers to replace Rashford and Antony who's are also done

Use the season purely to bed the new/young players we got in. Then make 6 transfers, corresponding to the above positions between now and next August (incl. January window). Use the preseason without international football to get all the players (including new arrivals) singing from the same hymn sheet. Make a proper go of it next season. He needs more time.
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There is absolutely no way INEOS will hand ten Hag more money to spend. Either he gets it together after the international break or he’ll be gone by November. Given the tricky run of fixtures, my guess is that Ruud will be interim manager soon enough.
 
Dominos said:
To be fair, letting him stay after finishing 8th, extending his contract, bringing him new coaching staff, letting him do pre-season, and then sacking him after 3 games of the season does sound pretty stupid.

I guess the stupid decisions were made during the summer though, and we're probably going to compound that by waiting till we're 8th in December before we take action.
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They already look stupid 3 games in. If we are not top 6 by Christmas and playing better football, he is 100% gone.
 
TheNewEra said:
We need a world class manager, but who is available? If we do move on from Ten Hag we need a long term solution and is there a Klopp, Guardiola, Ancelotti out there that's not just a flavour of the month?
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We keep chopping and changing managers till we find the right one? I'll settle for a new manager bounce for now and some smiles back on our players faces.
 
FrenchRed said:
We should totally bin him off before the international break. Not just a big club move, but a logical one - if the show doesn't fit, it doesn't fit, he's been trying it on for 2+ years and it'll never fit.

He's been found out. Read my post earlier in this thread about how he managed Ajax - it won't work at United and we are only on a downward spiral with him in charge.
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If it doesn't fit, Ineos must acquit (ten Hag of his duties).
 
JPRouve said:
It's a forum where you shared your opinions, where you have conversations. Not being credible defeats the purpose of interacting on a discussion forum but I could be mistaken.
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I gave him a pretty generous benefit of the doubt at the end of the season as I thought the FA cup win and the way was accomplished looked like progress. In the tactical sense anyway, I thought we played that game really well and was intrigued to see what might happen going forward.

That was a mistake and probably let my emotions get the better of me in all honesty.

I thought at the time he deserved a crack under INEOS and the new structure and I was wrong. No shame in admitting that.

There has been no progress and his arrogance and constant refusal to acknowledge this has just worn me down.

I don't see any scenario where he makes it to Christmas at the moment.

Honestly think if INEOS had anything about them and were ruthless he'd be gone today as he embarrassed us and himself yesterday with both the performance and the bizarrre comments afterwards.
 
He needs to be sacked ASAP. It won't happen because INEOS will look like absolute idiots, but the matter of fact is that he is a dead man walking anyway. Three games in and a shit show already. Circus never ends at this club.
 
Also the cup wins argument is weak as Wenger won the Fa Cup towards the end. Still finished outside of top 4 in his last 2 seasons and fans were pissed off.
 
football fans are fickle, especially at Utd, as a fan base we seem to react to each match with a few that see the bigger picture. Ultimately we had a shite season but won a cup, any team can raise their game for an fa cup final, fortunately for Eric it was the last game of the season and we have several months before it restarts. We as fans have a lovely memory that will carry us all through summer until next season. I’d be amazed if he can turn it around (hope he can) but I don’t see it and I suspect after 3 games next season the majority that wanted him gone , then changed to him staying after the the fa cup win will be again against him, he will be gone by Xmas.
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This is what I posted in this thread during the euros, quelle surprise
 
Drifter said:
His Dutch rival seems to have gotten to grips with the PL
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Unfortunately only managers of other clubs are expected to hit the ground running. Manchester United managers have to be given a season to get to grips with the league. And then another season because there were injuries. And then another half season to bed in new players.

There's a lot of people saying "he has until Christmas". Why on earth would you give him another week let alone 3 months to magically accomplish something he's failed to do in 2 years?

Ten Hag would have been sacked months if not years ago by our so called top 6 rivals. INEOS have to behave like every other big club in the world and stop clinging onto the childish notion that things will turn out good eventually.
 
Drifter said:
His Dutch rival seems to have gotten to grips with the PL
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I like both Slot and ETH and think they are both good managers but this is just too easy. Slot joined a stable club in Liverpool with a squad that's done well for years and hasn't had to change much at all. He only slightly tweaked the tactics but largely carried on Klopps work. EtH joined United and has had to deal with a tonne of crap. No vision from the club, mutiny from players, a rapist, big injury crisis, etc.. Which isn't to say EtH is the right man for the job at United but the job Slot took was so much easier it's almost beyond compare.
 
I think whatever good will he has had among fans at the end of the season has well and truly gone.

Its not even the losing, becuause defeats happen but its the manner of the defeats and repeating the same mistakes over and over and over again.

We are arguably worse now than when he first came.
 
All the optimism I had at the start of the season is gone. After the FA cup final, I (naively) bought into the theory that last season was just a blip. But this was just more of the same. I'm sick of being embarrassed by Liverpool.

I don't think we've ever had as tactically naive a manager as Ten Hag. We're three seasons in now and it still feels like he doesn't understand the league. It's as if he still thinks he's managing Ajax in the Eredivisie. He's been given more of a chance than any of our past managers had. Even Old wasn't afforded this level of respect and understanding.

Even if we beat Southampton, I've got no confidence that we can build on it. We've got Palace away the week after and we all know how that went last season. At this point, it feels inevitable that he'll be gone before Christmas.
 
ArjenIsM3 said:
I like both Slot and ETH and think they are both good managers but this is just too easy. Slot joined a stable club in Liverpool with a squad that's done well for years and hasn't had to change much at all. He only slightly tweaked the tactics but largely carried on Klopps work. EtH joined United and has had to deal with a tonne of crap. No vision from the club, mutiny from players, a rapist, big injury crisis, etc.. Which isn't to say EtH is the right man for the job at United but the job Slot took was so much easier it's almost beyond compare.
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I posted this earlier in the thread, and it highlights what is different between ETH and a lot of the other Dutch managers:

"At Ajax, ETH set up his teams to take advntage of the other teams weaknesses, he didn't have any style of play of his own. He didn't build a team to play a certain way and force other teams to react like SAF did, or City and Liverpool have. He'd change every week to take advantage of the opposition weaknesses - he let them determine how he played. This is exactly what we see him doing here, and it's not viable.

In the Dutch league the standard is much lower, and generally Ajax have very good technical players that can adapt to the challenge of the opponent that week - this won't work at United, where we need a strong team identity, patterns of play and viable system."

He never built a strong identity or style of play at Ajax, he coasted on the tails of the club, and just adapted to the opposition. Other Dutch managers built teams with styles to beat Ajax - they developed their patterns, style, attitude etc because they had to as underdogs. This for me is why Ruud, Slot etc would.will do better than ETH who is effectively a football chamelion.
 
ArjenIsM3 said:
I like both Slot and ETH and think they are both good managers but this is just too easy. Slot joined a stable club in Liverpool with a squad that's done well for years and hasn't had to change much at all. He only slightly tweaked the tactics but largely carried on Klopps work. EtH joined United and has had to deal with a tonne of crap. No vision from the club, mutiny from players, a rapist, big injury crisis, etc.. Which isn't to say EtH is the right man for the job at United but the job Slot took was so much easier it's almost beyond compare.
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You’re making Ole look like the best manager in the Universe.
 
ArjenIsM3 said:
I like both Slot and ETH and think they are both good managers but this is just too easy. Slot joined a stable club in Liverpool with a squad that's done well for years and hasn't had to change much at all. He only slightly tweaked the tactics but largely carried on Klopps work. EtH joined United and has had to deal with a tonne of crap. No vision from the club, mutiny from players, a rapist, big injury crisis, etc.. Which isn't to say EtH is the right man for the job at United but the job Slot took was so much easier it's almost beyond compare.
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It's actually funny that people don't appreciate all that.
 
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