Here is the full article translated to English.
https://premierleaguebrasil.com.br/premier-league-bastidores-ineditos-crise-manchester-united/
Sleepy lectures, training sessions that cause injuries and more: behind-the-scenes behind-the-scenes of Manchester United's crisis
It was still midway through the second half when Michael Olise hit the corner with a beautiful shot from outside the box, leaving goalkeeper André Onana with no chance. It was his second goal of the day for Crystal Palace against Manchester United — it was his fourth in total. Before him, Jean-Philippe Mateta and Tyrick Mitchell also didn't have much trouble breaking through the Red Devils' defense.
The scene accurately symbolized what a broken giant is.
Onana , brought in to be the starting goalkeeper, kneels. Casemiro , an almost incomparable winner in football, standing up after being disarmed on his own pitch. Mason Mount, the season's biggest signing, holds his head in his hands as he looks up at the sky. Three pillars of the first team who are unable to bring the success they had at other clubs to Old Trafford.
Not to mention the 10 absences due to injury – Rashford, Lisandro Martínez and Varane among them – whose reactions from the sofa at home were not exposed, but could not have been better.
After all, the defeat suffered by the current 14th place in the Premier League is far from being just an accident on the road. On the contrary: it is the most recent episode of the crisis experienced by Manchester United in the 2023/24 season.
Manchester United's moment
In the Premier League , the biggest winner in English football is in 8th place in the table. If it ended now, it would be the worst campaign since 1989/90 , when Sir Alex Ferguson was just a promising manager.
In the Champions League , the team finished last in its group;
In the League Cup , they fell without offering any resistance to Newcastle;
In the FA Cup , the last gasp: they are in the final, but only after beating the modest Coventry City on penalties, after seeing a 3-0 in favor turn into 3-3. The players didn't even have the courage to celebrate qualifying .
There are 81 goals conceded in all competitions, the highest number in almost 50 years.
A giant who, after average years, ended last season champion and with a great third place. He maintained the base of the squad and the work of a coach who seemed ideal to make them protagonists again. Until the train derailed.
United's crisis
What you read below is an investigation by PL Brasil with exclusive information about United's internal environment. Material that, in addition to pointing the finger at individual performances, shows how the relationship between players, Erik Ten Hag and other club employees took the Red Devils to hell.
Too many difficult and sleepy tactical meetings
The way Erik Ten Hag approaches preparing for matches is the subject of complaints in the Manchester United dressing room. What we heard is that the Dutch coach has a habit of holding tactical meetings before each game in an unusual way. They tend to be long, lasting 30 to 40 minutes, and are repeated three or four times weekly — a frequency that bothers and surprises the locker room.
More than one athlete in the squad says they had more talks of this type with Ten Hag at United than in the rest of their career. Reports are of players' lack of concentration and even drowsiness during the sessions.
Studies indicate that long and repeated meetings are not the best way to convey instructions to a group of people .
“ The players do not assimilate Ten Hag's instructions. It’s a difficult and tiring method ,” said a source close to the United dressing room.
This in itself would explain the difficulty United have against teams that are unmatched in terms of talent. There were 12 goals conceded to Palace, Burnley, Sheffield, Coventry and Bournemouth, for example, in the last five games.
Episode against Everton undermined the squad’s confidence
But, as if bad teaching wasn't enough, there are still cases where the problem was bigger than assimilation. PL Brasil heard that a specific episode undermined the coach's credibility with the squad.
Before the game against Everton, on March 9, Ten Hag spent long hours explaining to the team that the Toffees would play at Old Trafford with low lines, without putting pressure on the home team to get the ball out. The game started and it was exactly the opposite: Everton stifled United's defense from the first second.
There were at least four good chances created in the opening 15 minutes. Before the end of the first half, Dalot lost a ball in the defense field that was not a goal because Onana avoided it. Evans was another tackled near the area, in a move that Varane saved the team.
United ended up winning the game. Garnacho found two penalties in individual plays in the first half, which were converted by Bruno Fernandes and Rashford. But the case was enough to increase the distrust of those under command towards the commander.
Manchester (dis)United: group management heavily criticized
Regardless of his ability as a coach, Ten Hag's relationship with the players is not a strong point of his time at United.
There is no shortage of recent evidence of this. Just remember how Cristiano Ronaldo was “kicked” from the club, in the middle of the 2022/23 season. Recently, Jadon Sancho had a public fight with the Dutchman before being loaned to Borussia Dortmund — and reaching the Champions League final. Rashford also added cases of indiscipline.
The way Ten Hag deals with these personal situations has not gone down well with the squad leaders since his termination with CR7. There is a view in the dressing room that he does not have enough experience to manage the squad of a club the size of Manchester United.
Another complaint concerns the “heavy” atmosphere that the coach creates after the team’s defeats. It is not uncommon for him to opt for “exaggerated” individual demands while still in the locker room, including with athletes who arrived in Manchester at the Dutchman’s request.
Even in episodes where the punishment is fair and the attitude is condemned by the majority of the cast, the lack of criteria is highlighted. We found that other players committed indiscipline “of the same degree” as Sancho and were not close to the same “conviction”.
(Preventable) unprecedented injury crisis
A survey by the “Mirror” shows that the number of physical problems at Manchester United since August last year exceeds 60. It is more than double that of recent years. Although there is some credit to the bloated English calendar, internally, many athletes credit Erik Ten Hag's training for the excess of injuries.
According to some, he makes the mistake of maintaining the same training load throughout the season, even if the accumulated fatigue is much greater in the final stretch.
“He blows everyone away” , PL Brasil heard.
Exhausting sessions, canceling days off and complaining about training have been pertinent topics at United for some time.
In December, “Sky Sports” did an article about how the Dutchman had already lost the support of half the squad due to his questionable methods. It was already clear how much his choices were “blowing out” several athletes.
But if Ten Hag makes so many mistakes, is no one capable of correcting it? There are two main problems that go beyond the Dutchman's drawing board.
The first is that United is going through a transition phase at the club in which it does not have a sporting director.
Without a director, Ten Hag commands and dismantles
The club made a deal with Dan Ashworth, from Newcastle, but the target is still spending his final weeks at the club in the north of England. This means that there is no one strong enough to prune Ten Hag in the football hierarchy.
And the second involves a structural problem at the club. The new owner, Jim Ratcliffe, has already given interviews about the precariousness he found in United's facilities. The medical department is no exception.
Medical department generates complaints
Manchester is seen as a football team that has fallen behind its rivals when it comes to scientific methods and modernization. Poor DM performance is also cited as a cause of recurrent injuries.
We found out that, not surprisingly, players sometimes prefer to consult a private specialist or ignore the injury rather than opting for treatment from the club's physiotherapists.
In addition to quantity, rarity. This season, Casemiro injured his hamstring – it was the first muscle injury in the 32-year-old midfielder's entire career. He got injured in training, came back, had the same injury and missed important commitments for the Brazilian team.
Luke Shaw was another who was injured in August, returned in November and had the same injury in February. They were the most serious muscle injuries of his career. The left-back missed 30 games this season. Last year, he was only out of three.
What has changed in one year?
What is striking is that none of this can be treated as new. Ten Hag was already at the club when United had their most successful recent season in 2022/23. League Cup champion , third place in the Premier League. The structure did not regress either. So what has changed?
PL Brasil understands, based on internal reports, that the context has changed. In the first season, working in England for the first time, Ten Hag chose a less abrupt and more conciliatory stance — although episodes like Ronaldo's happened.
The same happened on the part of the players, who were “feeling the style” of the coach upon his arrival. A sum of concessions that, combined with good results on the field, got the team going.
However, what was an advantage turned into a shot in the foot. Empowered by the title and morale, the coach felt more comfortable imposing his style in the second year. And the players, meanwhile, found themselves increasingly worn out. Therein lies the recipe for decadence.
Ratcliffe is also named
It is true that United are going through a transition phase. The Glazer family, which has owned the club for the past few decades, sold its controlling interest to billionaire Sir Jim Ratcliffe. What this means in terms of change is still unclear.
Ratcliffe makes no secret of the fact that he wants to carry out renovations, ranging from the Old Trafford stadium to the squad, including the training center. But he does not believe in Ten Hag staying or leaving, nor any player.
The impression given is that the new owners do not feel comfortable taking drastic action before the end of the season. Especially because, in the event of failure — which is almost a certainty in the current context — they will already bear the weight of their mistakes.
The distance is so great that Ratcliffe only met the cast once. And the meeting still took place at the request of the players, and not the boss. Symptomatic.
Trying to save the worst campaign in history in the Premier League, United hosts Arsenal this Sunday (12), in the third to last round. It is difficult to imagine a more difficult confrontation at a more turbulent time than this. We await scenes from the next chapters at Old Trafford.
https://premierleaguebrasil.com.br/premier-league-bastidores-ineditos-crise-manchester-united/
Sleepy lectures, training sessions that cause injuries and more: behind-the-scenes behind-the-scenes of Manchester United's crisis
It was still midway through the second half when Michael Olise hit the corner with a beautiful shot from outside the box, leaving goalkeeper André Onana with no chance. It was his second goal of the day for Crystal Palace against Manchester United — it was his fourth in total. Before him, Jean-Philippe Mateta and Tyrick Mitchell also didn't have much trouble breaking through the Red Devils' defense.
The scene accurately symbolized what a broken giant is.
Onana , brought in to be the starting goalkeeper, kneels. Casemiro , an almost incomparable winner in football, standing up after being disarmed on his own pitch. Mason Mount, the season's biggest signing, holds his head in his hands as he looks up at the sky. Three pillars of the first team who are unable to bring the success they had at other clubs to Old Trafford.
Not to mention the 10 absences due to injury – Rashford, Lisandro Martínez and Varane among them – whose reactions from the sofa at home were not exposed, but could not have been better.
After all, the defeat suffered by the current 14th place in the Premier League is far from being just an accident on the road. On the contrary: it is the most recent episode of the crisis experienced by Manchester United in the 2023/24 season.
Manchester United's moment
In the Premier League , the biggest winner in English football is in 8th place in the table. If it ended now, it would be the worst campaign since 1989/90 , when Sir Alex Ferguson was just a promising manager.
In the Champions League , the team finished last in its group;
In the League Cup , they fell without offering any resistance to Newcastle;
In the FA Cup , the last gasp: they are in the final, but only after beating the modest Coventry City on penalties, after seeing a 3-0 in favor turn into 3-3. The players didn't even have the courage to celebrate qualifying .
There are 81 goals conceded in all competitions, the highest number in almost 50 years.
A giant who, after average years, ended last season champion and with a great third place. He maintained the base of the squad and the work of a coach who seemed ideal to make them protagonists again. Until the train derailed.
United's crisis
What you read below is an investigation by PL Brasil with exclusive information about United's internal environment. Material that, in addition to pointing the finger at individual performances, shows how the relationship between players, Erik Ten Hag and other club employees took the Red Devils to hell.
Too many difficult and sleepy tactical meetings
The way Erik Ten Hag approaches preparing for matches is the subject of complaints in the Manchester United dressing room. What we heard is that the Dutch coach has a habit of holding tactical meetings before each game in an unusual way. They tend to be long, lasting 30 to 40 minutes, and are repeated three or four times weekly — a frequency that bothers and surprises the locker room.
More than one athlete in the squad says they had more talks of this type with Ten Hag at United than in the rest of their career. Reports are of players' lack of concentration and even drowsiness during the sessions.
Studies indicate that long and repeated meetings are not the best way to convey instructions to a group of people .
“ The players do not assimilate Ten Hag's instructions. It’s a difficult and tiring method ,” said a source close to the United dressing room.
This in itself would explain the difficulty United have against teams that are unmatched in terms of talent. There were 12 goals conceded to Palace, Burnley, Sheffield, Coventry and Bournemouth, for example, in the last five games.
Episode against Everton undermined the squad’s confidence
But, as if bad teaching wasn't enough, there are still cases where the problem was bigger than assimilation. PL Brasil heard that a specific episode undermined the coach's credibility with the squad.
Before the game against Everton, on March 9, Ten Hag spent long hours explaining to the team that the Toffees would play at Old Trafford with low lines, without putting pressure on the home team to get the ball out. The game started and it was exactly the opposite: Everton stifled United's defense from the first second.
There were at least four good chances created in the opening 15 minutes. Before the end of the first half, Dalot lost a ball in the defense field that was not a goal because Onana avoided it. Evans was another tackled near the area, in a move that Varane saved the team.
United ended up winning the game. Garnacho found two penalties in individual plays in the first half, which were converted by Bruno Fernandes and Rashford. But the case was enough to increase the distrust of those under command towards the commander.
Manchester (dis)United: group management heavily criticized
Regardless of his ability as a coach, Ten Hag's relationship with the players is not a strong point of his time at United.
There is no shortage of recent evidence of this. Just remember how Cristiano Ronaldo was “kicked” from the club, in the middle of the 2022/23 season. Recently, Jadon Sancho had a public fight with the Dutchman before being loaned to Borussia Dortmund — and reaching the Champions League final. Rashford also added cases of indiscipline.
The way Ten Hag deals with these personal situations has not gone down well with the squad leaders since his termination with CR7. There is a view in the dressing room that he does not have enough experience to manage the squad of a club the size of Manchester United.
Another complaint concerns the “heavy” atmosphere that the coach creates after the team’s defeats. It is not uncommon for him to opt for “exaggerated” individual demands while still in the locker room, including with athletes who arrived in Manchester at the Dutchman’s request.
Even in episodes where the punishment is fair and the attitude is condemned by the majority of the cast, the lack of criteria is highlighted. We found that other players committed indiscipline “of the same degree” as Sancho and were not close to the same “conviction”.
(Preventable) unprecedented injury crisis
A survey by the “Mirror” shows that the number of physical problems at Manchester United since August last year exceeds 60. It is more than double that of recent years. Although there is some credit to the bloated English calendar, internally, many athletes credit Erik Ten Hag's training for the excess of injuries.
According to some, he makes the mistake of maintaining the same training load throughout the season, even if the accumulated fatigue is much greater in the final stretch.
“He blows everyone away” , PL Brasil heard.
Exhausting sessions, canceling days off and complaining about training have been pertinent topics at United for some time.
In December, “Sky Sports” did an article about how the Dutchman had already lost the support of half the squad due to his questionable methods. It was already clear how much his choices were “blowing out” several athletes.
But if Ten Hag makes so many mistakes, is no one capable of correcting it? There are two main problems that go beyond the Dutchman's drawing board.
The first is that United is going through a transition phase at the club in which it does not have a sporting director.
Without a director, Ten Hag commands and dismantles
The club made a deal with Dan Ashworth, from Newcastle, but the target is still spending his final weeks at the club in the north of England. This means that there is no one strong enough to prune Ten Hag in the football hierarchy.
And the second involves a structural problem at the club. The new owner, Jim Ratcliffe, has already given interviews about the precariousness he found in United's facilities. The medical department is no exception.
Medical department generates complaints
Manchester is seen as a football team that has fallen behind its rivals when it comes to scientific methods and modernization. Poor DM performance is also cited as a cause of recurrent injuries.
We found out that, not surprisingly, players sometimes prefer to consult a private specialist or ignore the injury rather than opting for treatment from the club's physiotherapists.
In addition to quantity, rarity. This season, Casemiro injured his hamstring – it was the first muscle injury in the 32-year-old midfielder's entire career. He got injured in training, came back, had the same injury and missed important commitments for the Brazilian team.
Luke Shaw was another who was injured in August, returned in November and had the same injury in February. They were the most serious muscle injuries of his career. The left-back missed 30 games this season. Last year, he was only out of three.
What has changed in one year?
What is striking is that none of this can be treated as new. Ten Hag was already at the club when United had their most successful recent season in 2022/23. League Cup champion , third place in the Premier League. The structure did not regress either. So what has changed?
PL Brasil understands, based on internal reports, that the context has changed. In the first season, working in England for the first time, Ten Hag chose a less abrupt and more conciliatory stance — although episodes like Ronaldo's happened.
The same happened on the part of the players, who were “feeling the style” of the coach upon his arrival. A sum of concessions that, combined with good results on the field, got the team going.
However, what was an advantage turned into a shot in the foot. Empowered by the title and morale, the coach felt more comfortable imposing his style in the second year. And the players, meanwhile, found themselves increasingly worn out. Therein lies the recipe for decadence.
Ratcliffe is also named
It is true that United are going through a transition phase. The Glazer family, which has owned the club for the past few decades, sold its controlling interest to billionaire Sir Jim Ratcliffe. What this means in terms of change is still unclear.
Ratcliffe makes no secret of the fact that he wants to carry out renovations, ranging from the Old Trafford stadium to the squad, including the training center. But he does not believe in Ten Hag staying or leaving, nor any player.
The impression given is that the new owners do not feel comfortable taking drastic action before the end of the season. Especially because, in the event of failure — which is almost a certainty in the current context — they will already bear the weight of their mistakes.
The distance is so great that Ratcliffe only met the cast once. And the meeting still took place at the request of the players, and not the boss. Symptomatic.
Trying to save the worst campaign in history in the Premier League, United hosts Arsenal this Sunday (12), in the third to last round. It is difficult to imagine a more difficult confrontation at a more turbulent time than this. We await scenes from the next chapters at Old Trafford.
. That was an appalling season, much like this one and it was only three seasons ago. Have things changed? I don't think these current players- and there are many newer ones- are 'toxic' or 'downing tools' but they're just not suitable to take the next step to become anything more than top 4 challengers. By the looks of things the manager isn't either but it doesn't have to be one or the other, it can be both and a part of the article unintentionally reflects that despite it being a criticism of EtH. If someone has leaked this it actually reflects quite badly on their quality, particularly in that passage about the first season. It seems he tried to get them to take the next step and they found it impossible to step up.