Next permanent manager | Poll updated

Who should be the next permanent manager?

  • Luis Enrique

    Votes: 113 7.4%

  • Erik ten Hag

    Votes: 1,300 84.7%

  • Julen Lopetegui

    Votes: 10 0.7%

  • Mauricio Pochettino

    Votes: 79 5.1%

  • None of the above

    Votes: 32 2.1%
  • Total voters
    1,534
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Devil may care said:
It's bringing our former players in specifically that I have an issue with, not the general concept, as I don't think any good has come from the involvement of Giggs, Carrick and Fletcher over the last decade, and the likes of Neville and Scholes haven't shone in the media coverage of our club either.
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United have so many former players.

There will be great technical coaches who have played here or previously worked here.

Any of RVP & RVN I wouldn't have a problem with.
 
I'd like it to be Stam if possible just so he can bring some order in that dressing room by just looking at them.
 
Mickson said:
Let alone the fact that Rio comes across as incredibly dumb.
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Haha I wouldn’t go that far :lol: but I know what your referring to.

He never seems to have his own opinion, always seems to agree with whatever is most popular. The fact that he endorsed Ole for manager is an example. He is a good football analyst but has no sense of long term strategy.
 
Who's gonna be his ex United player assistant manager? Rio Ferdinand, Paul Scholes, Gary Neville?

It's a fecking joke this is even entertained. What are their credentials in management or being a coach, besides playing for United?

We'll have another chancer learning on the job. Didn't we learn anything with Ole. No ex United player can offer any help to Ten Hag except talk about United DNA

This job for the boys garbage needs to stop. Fletcher is another leech who should be thrown out of the club because he's got no credentials other than being a player. The guy was learning his coaching badges at Stoke, before his mate Ole promoted him to be technical director at one of the biggest clubs in the world.

We need to stop treating this club like it's a work experience charity place for ex players
 
Real Name said:
Why dont you just say you have an issue with ex British players?
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I'm English and I have a lot of issues with them. They have to decide what the hell Fletcher is for a start. I just think the likes of Stam or RVP could work, also don't want people who will be the ones who go behind the managers back on behalf of the players.
 
Wednesday at Stoke said:
I can't see Rio being up for an assistant coaching position. He has way too many things going on with his media jobs, other business ventures etc to be committed to a job that requires a shit ton of work for relatively far less pay. It'll likely be Phelan being retained or someone like Fletcher doing a dual job like he is doing now.
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I also think it's nonsense. Rio has said on multiple occasions (on his YouTube page) that he wouldn't take a job in management due to past experiences and circumstances which are personal. Then he used the examples of the demand as well with friends he has in management roles being consumed with the work load.
 
L1nk said:

Nothing seems imminent though which js annoying because it gives them more time to mess it up. Still got a horrible sinking feeling it will be Pochettino
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I think it's been their plan and/or the media's preference all along.

The club will want to look like it's conducting a thorough recruitment process, yet why is there always a catch to these stories in MSM? "they like him but..", "Ten Hag is now joint favourite with Poch" when he should be miles ahead as an option, "the players choice is Poch", questions of "whether Ten Hag can handle the pressure", "Sir Alex loves Poch", "He's handled big ego's".

There are too many of these headlines to ignore. I'm hoping it's just the media wanting us to appoint the wrong man in order to keep us shit for as long as possible, which is definitely their preference over us competently building for the future.
 
Real Name said:
@UnitedSofa explained it.
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So not a good idea to have him having yet another job. Rio hasn't any coaching experience. He also has far too many outside interests to distract him. Butt left apparently because he had a row with Murtough. Neville is a windbag and Scholes has proved he is not a great manager or coach. Giggs is an arsehole.
 
It's going to be a week of leaks about interviews, so I wouldn't get too worried or carried away.

By all accounts we wanted RR, but still interviewed 5 interims and I see no problems with doing that again for the full time role.

Ultimately, if ten Hag was able to communicate his vision for the club I see no reason why he wouldn't be favourite. Added to that, we have a good relationship with Ajax and the buy out is low. He ticks a lot of boxes.
 
Real Name said:
@UnitedSofa explained it.
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Thanks mate! :)

@Adnan gives a much more detailed explanation of both the role that Murtough and Fletcher do. As they compliment each other well.

I'll bold the part about Fletcher in the Murtough explanation below and the Fletcher explanation is in a separate quote beneath.


Adnan said:
Fletcher's not doing the role to assist Murtough in keeping the wheel moving when it comes to keeping the data, scouting, youth and other departments at a optimum level, so having someone experienced to assist Murtough who understands the process would be a welcome help. Fletcher's role in helping parents make a decision to have their child join the club and coaching at youth and now first team level is normal. Rangnick wants him at first team level and the new head coach will probably have his own people. Jason Wilcox who is currently the academy director at City (ex Blackburn) joined them in 2013 straight from a role working in the media.

Murtough has the experience in turning the wheel, because he's the one who has created the departments, which has modernised the club from having one full-time scout and a non existent data analytics department and everything being stored in Jim Lawlor's head. I can provide the references for that as well. So now Murtough has to juggle the first team with everything else he's been doing after the sacking of Solskjaer, from the Women's teams to the youth teams, coaching at youth level, logistics, scouting departments etc. And contrary to what's been written on this forum by certain deluded posters, Murtough was brought to the club by David Moyes who did understand how a recruitment structure worked in the modern game. Moyes also brought scouts to add to the one full time scout we had at United from Fergie's days, but after he (Moyes) was sacked, Man City wasted no time in poaching some of those scouts and James Smith who was a technical Chief scout and brought to United by Moyes was snapped up by City. And they (City) could do this to us along with enticing several of our youth players to jump ship to their club, because we didn't have the mechanisms and processes in place, which meant we couldn't provide the tools for recruitment staff to do their job at a optimal level and provide the facilities for the youngsters. City were taking advantage of this, Murtough came in to provide the tools and revamp the youth academy to stop this. And he's done a good job where if you just look at the youth teams, then we have interesting prospects in every single position, from the GK Vitek, fullbacks Fernandez, Laird, Williams, Pye, midfielders, Hannibal, Mainoo, Hansen Aaroen, wide forwards, Elanga, Garnacho, Chong and centre forwards McNeill, Hugill and many more that I haven't even mentioned. He's also turned the tables on City where we've poached 4 or 5 of their scouts, including head of youth recruitment David Harrison and their lead youth scout Stephen Ajewole, who was regarded as the best in class along with David Harrison's team.

And as far as Mitchell is concerned, I haven't seen anything that he's done thus far in his career that would make me sit-up and take notice. Even the list of players he's signed as a scout/head of recruitment have been a mixed bag. There's obviously some good players in the list, but also some really poor signings that were huge flops. And he's been at Monaco as DoF coming up to 2 years soon and I'm not seeing a noticeable improvement in their team. And even their biggest talent, Tchouameni was signed before Mitchell arrived at the club. I'd be happy if Mitchell arrived but I'd also be equally happy if we appointed someone else who has the experience of making sure the departments on the football side are functioning at a optimal level.

Below are links to some of the stuff I've mentioned about City poaching a prominent Scout after Moyes's sacking. How Moyes inherited a out dated recruitment structure with everything stored in Lawlor's head, and a detailed article from 2013, which sheds light on Moyes and his approach to technology/data science, when it came to recruiting players. And that approach went as far back as when he was managing Preston. Moyes wasn't a elite head coach but his knowledge on the modern day recruitment structure was elite, hence he approached John Murtough who was the Head of Elite development at the Premier League to restructure United's out dated recruitment structure. This is why I say to certain posters, 'tell me what the structure is' and they then go on the defensive and accuse me of patronising them.

All a DoF model is, is that it provides a buffer between the board and first team head coach. The head coach gets sacked and it should be the DoF backed by several recruitment departments working under him who provide the stability and continuity. The board can't do this and the first team manager just can't juggle 20-25 departments and also conduct training sessions in preparation for match days. And then if he gets sacked, you're in a position where the board has to make decisions unless you have a up to date recruitment department, which we didn't have until 2018. Everything was left to Fergie in the past and even though he kept winning titles, structurally we had fallen way behind many many clubs.


Moyes and his approach to backing up his scouts with technology data.
https://www.independent.co.uk/sport...em-that-reveals-david-moyes-mind-8756011.html

City poach James Smith from United after the sacking of Moyes.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/f...s-United-scout-s-European-talent-spotter.html


Moyes overhauls the recruitment structure after it was discovered everything was stored in Lawlor's head.

https://www.manchestereveningnews.c...vid-moyes-overhauls-manchester-united-6751601

From the above article: "It is understood that when he arrived at United, his predecessor Sir Alex Ferguson’s system and research wasn’t as detailed and the key information was allegedly in chief scout Jim Lawlor’s head rather than an easily accessible database for the backroom staff".
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Fletcher:

Adnan said:
With all due respect, I'm not fooled by what titles are given to certain people. Because the first thing I did when Fletcher was given the title of Technical Director, was to look up what his role at the club entailed. And it was very clear that his remit at the club was one where he assisted the recruitment/coaching staff at youth level. Similar to Jason Wilcox at City, who joined them in 2013, straight from a media job. Wilcox has now been promoted into a prominent role in their academy. Sebastian Kehl at Dortmund from what I read, spent a year back packing in Australia before he was appointed Technical Director at BvB. And they didn't appoint him because he was the most experienced candidate, but rather because of his association to the club, where they could mould him into one day taking over from Michael Zorc. So for me the title isn't important but what the person's remit is. Jason Wilcox is also a football director in City's youth setup. Anybody who oversees a particular department on the football side of a club, is a director of football.

I've followed Rangnick's career for many years and watched his RB Leipzig team regularly for 3 years. So I have a basic idea on how he developed the football side of the club. And how he (imo) developed the football side was first through having one of the richest owners in the game, in Dietrich Mateschitz, who is worth £20b, and then with that financial backing he brought scouts, video analysts, etc and built up a recruitment structure and set out a blueprint for the recruitment departments to target players for a particular way of playing the game. And that particular way, was to set out to play in a compact high block, with high intensity, fast transitions in a very direct vertical approach, which would also help in creating conditions for controlled chaos (counter pressing) off the ball. So the Leipzig scouts were targeting players with a specific profile who were either first contract players (16/17 year olds) or second contract players (18/22 year olds). And the appointment of a head coach would fit into the above way of thinking. He did similar at Hoffenheim under their billionaire owner Dietmar Hopp. And without the financial backing of the sugar daddy owners, he wouldn't have been able to do what he did at either club.

You also talk about Rangnick wanting control at other clubs hence him leaving etc. I agree, for any 'head of football' to be successful he needs control. You can't be successful as a DoF if the first team manager/head coach is setting the football directive independently from a club's recruitment team whilst being allowed his own personal scout(s). That's what United's biggest issue has been since Fergie retired, because even though the structure was outdated under Fergie, Fergie had the structure on the football side of the club working for him. Which created two of the 3 conditions to succeed in a manager model type setup, which are alignment - (streamlining operations) and stability - (as long as the manager is in his job). But what that setup doesn't give a club is continuity and hence when Fergie retired and his scouts also went with him, which included his brother and his coaching staff, we were left with Derek Langley as the head of recruitment and Jim Lawlor as the only fulltime scout with everything stored in his head.

What we need is the board to give the recruitment department the control, which has never happened until possibly now, that Solskjaer has been sacked. If Rangnick is on board then fantastic. But if he isn't, then it's no big deal imo. Because for me it's about streamlining everything and working towards a common goal. And that goal I'm hoping will be to recruit for a particular way of playing the game. And that will then reflect in who is hired as the head coach and the type of profile we target via the transfer window. It's a simple approach to recruitment that I've spoken about on here for years. Why do we need Rangnick to tell us that we need to streamline football operations, which have not been streamlined since the days of Fergie.

The DoFs take all the credit at clubs, but the bulk of the work is done by the scouts on he ground who then feed into their respective head of departments, who then collate the information passed on before feeding the filtered information to the DoF. No DoF can be successful if the departments below him/her are not functioning to a optimal level.
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UnitedSofa said:
Strange to take a job away from Fletcher which he doesn’t actually have.

He’s technical director and he’s the link between first team and youth team set up and he’s also a part of the process to help identify if the new players coming in have the mentality to play for Man Utd, if they’re the right fit.

Murtough is the Sporting Director and he’s doing rather well if you ask me.
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Clearly I didn’t think he was our DoF which is what I call that role. Give me some credit.
 
Even though the Stretty News source is highly questionable, they do mention Robin Van Persie as a potential incoming to unite the dressing. And Van Persie and Erik ten Hag are represented by the same agency.
 
Class of 1902 said:
So before the interview most people saw him as the favourite. After his interview, we're now briefing there is no favourite.

Should I be worried :nervous:
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We're not briefing that. Sky are saying that so that they can put about 5/6 more stories out over the course of this week about us approaching others.
 
Why hire ex players? The manager should be able to bring his own team who he thinks are capable and he is comfortable working with them.
 
Surely there's too much smoke now? They say United will interview other candidates as well but will the leaks be like this as well when the others are interviewed. And all this news could just be because he's the first to be interviewed, but if we've already interviewed other candidates without anything leaking then surely that puts him in a very good position?
 
Ahmer Baig said:
Why hire ex players? The manager should be able to bring his own team who he thinks are capable and he is comfortable working with them.
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As a lot have said I would not object to somebody used to the Dutch way of doing things. Don't want somebody who is always chiming up 'Oh we don't do that over here'. If we are hiring a Dutch coach let him coach his way.
 
Absolute piss take if Fletcher is involved in the manager search
 
altodevil said:
Absolute piss take if Fletcher is involved in the manager search
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Yep, remains a joke that Fletcher has a job beyond some youth coaching. Zero qualifications for the role and even less qualified to be involved in hiring new manager. Apparently having Utd DNA and being a nice bloke get you a cushy nunber at OT. And we wonder why the club is in the state it is?

Compare his CV to Ralf's and then answer simple question which is best placed to assist in this process. Hint, its not Darren
 
altodevil said:
Absolute piss take if Fletcher is involved in the manager search
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It's not like he's making the final decision. Go up and read @Adnan's post that I quoted, then you'll understand why the Fletcher/Murtough combination is such a crucial part of our set up going forward.

Why do we hate on our own players so much. As if they're just good at football and literally nothing else.

A large portion of people involved in teams going forward are going to be ex-players or have been ex-players, it's just because they've played for our own team you write them off, if Fletcher was Spanish and came from Valencia's set up or if he was German and came from Dortmund, you'd be a lot more positive about it. Cut him some slack.
 
Gordon Godot said:
Yep, remains a joke that Fletcher has a job beyond some youth coaching. Zero qualifications for the role and even less qualified to be involved in hiring new manager. Apparently having Utd DNA and being a nice bloke get you a cushy nunber at OT. And we wonder why the club is in the state it is?

Compare his CV to Ralf's and then answer simple question which is best placed to assist in this process. Hint, its not Darren
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well we've got a technical director who had 2 promotions in 6 months, a DOF with no experience as a DOF and a CEO with no experience in leading a club.
 
Adnan said:
You're talking utter nonsense.

Butt was only in charge of the academy temporarily and was replaced by Nick Cox who is far more experienced at actually managing a academy and was a outside hire.

Fletcher's role at the club has been defined and we know his remit at the club, which involves working with the youth and assisting in bringing youth players to the club.
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I'm not, and you clearly have no idea about the history between Butt and Murtough or Butts body of work in the reserves. He was more qualified for the position Fletcher is holding. He wasn't 'temporarily' in charge of the academy, he spent three years as academy chief and two as head of first team development.
 
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Gordon Godot said:
Yep, remains a joke that Fletcher has a job beyond some youth coaching. Zero qualifications for the role and even less qualified to be involved in hiring new manager. Apparently having Utd DNA and being a nice bloke get you a cushy nunber at OT. And we wonder why the club is in the state it is?

Compare his CV to Ralf's and then answer simple question which is best placed to assist in this process. Hint, its not Darren
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Huge Hint: Darren isn't actually signing off the managerial position.

Just thought I'd point that out.
 
United in sin said:
I'm not, and you clearly have no idea about the history between Butt and Murtough or Butts body of work in the reserves. He was more qualified for the position Fletcher is holding.
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....and yet Butt would be getting the VERY same stick that Fletcher is getting now. For no reason at all, I might add.
 
Ah the Darren Fletcher bashing. After the McKenna bashing. And the Carrick bashing. And the Phelan bashing. We want football people making football decisions but they can’t be British or have any ties to United right!? Absolute fecking bellends.
 
FrankDrebin said:
Why ?
He's involved in potentially bringing in the guy you want.

Moan, moan, moan.
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UnitedSofa said:
It's not like he's making the final decision. Go up and read @Adnan's post that I quoted, then you'll understand why the Fletcher/Murtough combination is such a crucial part of our set up going forward.

Why do we hate on our own players so much. As if they're just good at football and literally nothing else.

A large portion of people involved in teams going forward are going to be ex-players or have been ex-players, it's just because they've played for our own team you write them off, if Fletcher was Spanish and came from Valencia's set up or if he was German and came from Dortmund, you'd be a lot more positive about it. Cut him some slack.
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Sorry I must have missed the tangible improvements/benefits of having Fletcher involved with club.
 
If someone rates both ETH and Rangnick, and the club actually hire both ETH and Rangnick, it would seem strange to me that they would then level criticism at Murtough & Fletcher, the people who did that hiring.
 
FrankDrebin said:
Why ?
He's involved in potentially bringing in the guy you want.

Moan, moan, moan.
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So assume you are happy with the current state of the club? IF we want change it starts with clear football structure and hiring experienced professionals. Fletcher has no qualifications for his role.
 
Adnan said:
I think what will happen mate, is that the new manager will select one person from the club to assist him and guide him regarding the youth at the club etc. That is one of the biggest reasons LVG and Guardiola selected Hermann Gerland at Bayern due to his extensive knowledge of the club. The new guy will also bring in his own people.
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I hope so as I don't want Ten Hag to start off saddled with someone the board want on the inside, as opposed to his own choice to join his staff.

Real Name said:
Why dont you just say you have an issue with ex British players?
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Because I don't, just the clique that played for us that can't keep their nose out and who are detrimental to the club with either their lack of coaching nous or gobbing off in the media with clear agendas favouring certain players, and that includes Keane and his Fred hate, and I don't rate Fred, but it's toxic having that out there from a legend almost every time we are on Sky.

We Need Another Rebuild said:
United have so many former players.

There will be great technical coaches who have played here or previously worked here.

Any of RVP & RVN I wouldn't have a problem with.
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Sure, which is why I said I had less issue with Mata of Matic.
 
If Fletcher and Murtough end up hiring both Rangnick and ETH, then they've earned my full confidence, irrespective of their qualifications.

Sir Alex is seemingly the most qualified person ever for us and rightly so, yet his role in hiring Moyes and keeping Ole at the club longer than he needed to be hasn't covered him in glory.
 
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