What are your expectations for Ten Hag's first season?

KikiDaKats said:
Again my Expectation.
A Title Challenge or Top4 and a Trophy. This was not unrealistic because we got to two finals with a trophy already in the bag, top 4 nearly secured. Where was I wrong?
Going forward my expectations remains the same for Manchester United be it next season or the season after. A league title is just an added bonus but it never wakes me up every Saturday till late April.

We agree on Arsenal and after 3 years of rebuilding, they are given a bye to sacrifice competitions in a quest to challenge. Like you mentioned United will always be expected to keep at it to a point. These are the standards that set my expectations and not what or how others are doing it. I will not lower my expectations to mirror lesser clubs.

This is why you’ll never hear me blame players for a lack of success or call for a manager to get sacked because they should all know the expectations. ETH has said it himself all season and play to win every game. If we fail at it this season(which did not happen), we will go again next season with the same expectations.

This was a successful season with the usual hiccups in football, players not delivering as expected, injuries, congestion, suspensions and bad patches. These are all expected every season and won’t change but I’ll always expect us to navigate with a competent manager(ETH) because at Manchester United players and coaches historically had to deal with this, whilst deliver some level of success.
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Fair enough. Maybe just definition of title challenge is where we differ. For me, a serious title challenge with City is what Liverpool did with Klopp for years. Arsenal this season yes but also I think it's very flukey that their level led to a title challenge for so long, with how many things fell their way and they still will finish 10 pts off. So like, can't say "expect a year like Arsenal's" as they massively overperformed their actual level points wise for most of the season to be in it, until they dropped now. Their actual level isn't really more than a normal top 4 side IMO, and no telling how added fixture congestion will impact them.

So for me, yeah Arsenal's level this season absolutely should be expectation, but I don't expect that level to lead to a title challenge. Liverpool's level the past 5 years isn't realistic yet for me, and that's a pretty much serious title challenge level.
 
He’s done well. Marginally surpassed my expectations. Was off to a rough start but dealt with it all well - Ronaldo, Maguire etc. Away form needs to improve but I’m sure it will. Being a World Cup year and an extremely thin squad - competing on multiple fronts, has really taken its toll. I think it was marginally naive of him to compete across so many competitions, with the squad that we have.

Injuries at key moments also haven’t helped and the lack of a reliable or quality CF has almost been crippling. Hopefully we can add some more quality and shape the squad even further for him and we can kick on next season and try and mount a challenge.

Assuming we finish top 4 now….Winning the FA cup would just be oh so sweet though :drool:
 
KikiDaKats said:
I don’t think this Arsenal team is better than ours and they had a good run this season. This bunch of players should have an 80pts season in them, catering for -/+3 and that is challenging tally.
Being there about and expecting to win the lot are different in my opinion, I’m not thinking go out and win the lot.
All I expect at start of each season is beat middle to bottom clubs and compete against the top quarter clubs, that should expectedly put us in a challenging position.
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Arsenal's front 3 and Odegaard are much better as a whole than United's, which is what currently separates both teams, even if United have just completed 1 full season under EtH.

United would be better than Arsenal this past season if we had comparable players as CF and RF. But Odegaard is arguably the 3rd best player this season behind Haaland and KDB.
 
edcunited1878 said:
Arsenal's front 3 and Odegaard are much better as a whole than United's, which is what currently separates both teams, even if United have just completed 1 full season under EtH.

United would be better than Arsenal this past season if we had comparable players as CF and RF. But Odegaard is arguably the 3rd best player this season behind Haaland and KDB.
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All that is subjective and I don’t subscribe to it. Ronaldo, Rashford, Antony and Bruno at the start of the season were higher rated.
 
Ish said:
He’s done well. Marginally surpassed my expectations. Was off to a rough start but dealt with it all well - Ronaldo, Maguire etc. Away form needs to improve but I’m sure it will. Being a World Cup year and an extremely thin squad - competing on multiple fronts, has really taken its toll. I think it was marginally naive of him to compete across so many competitions, with the squad that we have.

Injuries at key moments also haven’t helped and the lack of a reliable or quality CF has almost been crippling. Hopefully we can add some more quality and shape the squad even further for him and we can kick on next season and try and mount a challenge.

Assuming we finish top 4 now….Winning the FA cup would just be oh so sweet though :drool:
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I agree that it was marginally naive to compete across all four competitions, with the squad we have. Fatigue has certainly played a part in some of the heavy reverses. That said, I also think it’s important to put down a marker as to the standards expected from the very beginning. How demanding the expectations should be. So in that regard he’s absolutely right to do what he did, and it has helped him further weed out the players just not up to it. A club like United should set out to win every competition they enter, and he’s set that standard, in some regards not having the squad for it is immaterial to the bigger picture. I think the danger was that he risked unravelling performances at the end of the season due to exhaustion and missing out on key objectives.
 
simonhch said:
I agree that it was marginally naive to compete across all four competitions, with the squad we have. Fatigue has certainly played a part in some of the heavy reverses. That said, I also think it’s important to put down a marker as to the standards expected from the very beginning. How demanding the expectations should be. So in that regard he’s absolutely right to do what he did, and it has helped him further weed out the players just not up to it. A club like United should set out to win every competition they enter, and he’s set that standard, in some regards not having the squad for it is immaterial to the bigger picture. I think the danger was that he risked unravelling performances at the end of the season due to exhaustion and missing out on key objectives.
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Yeah you make some good points in there and I agree with it. I think from my perspective the nativity comment possibly refers to maybe a lack of rotation (iirc) and utilising the entire squad and hence, as you said, risking extreme fatigue/injuries at the business end of the season. I agree with him in principle but he should have rotated a bit more.

But in the end, all is well that ends well!
 
KikiDaKats said:
All that is subjective and I don’t subscribe to it. Ronaldo, Rashford, Antony and Bruno at the start of the season were higher rated.
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Ronaldo and Rashford couldn't coexist last year, that is so obvious and clear and it rolled into this past season, with Ronaldo not even wanting to play according to the principles and rules laid out by EtH.

Antony was a total unknown in England, while Saka had already established himself as a much more accomplished player for his PL club.

Then Gabriel is a much more functional CF for Arsenal than Ronaldo was for United. EtH then played on with Martial, but we all knew he'd be one injury away from a long term absence.

I think it will be difficult for Arsenal to replicate this past season, in seasons to come because teams will be ready and know what is to come.
 
If you had offered me 4th place, winning the League Cup, and making the F.A. Cup final back at the start of the season, I would have been thrilled.

Barring a spectacular disaster in the next 6 days, I will consider this season a success, regardless of what we do at Wembley.
 
edcunited1878 said:
Ronaldo and Rashford couldn't coexist last year, that is so obvious and clear and it rolled into this past season, with Ronaldo not even wanting to play according to the principles and rules laid out by EtH.

Antony was a total unknown in England, while Saka had already established himself as a much more accomplished player for his PL club.

Then Gabriel is a much more functional CF for Arsenal than Ronaldo was for United. EtH then played on with Martial, but we all knew he'd be one injury away from a long term absence.

I think it will be difficult for Arsenal to replicate this past season, in seasons to come because teams will be ready and know what is to come.
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You’re are not wrong in your accessment.

I actually rate our players highly and when ETH came in, we were stepping up from Ole. Knowing the levels Ole got it wasn’t a far reach for me. Its usually clear from me I don’t like certain players in our squad but it doesn’t mean I don’t think them good footballers.

We all accepted Ragnick half season was an anomaly and Ole was fired for doing slightly better than what Ralf gave. Generally you’d think we will develop ahead of Arsenal due to our season ending positions and circumstances around it.

So coming into the season my expectation was well placed. Generally expectations are set on the basis things align right.
 
pcaming said:
I think he has done a decent job, maybe, just the minimum. I am willing to give the benefit of the doubt due to the deficiencies in GK, midfield and attack. However, I think he holds some blame for not being able to sort it out and get a better tune out of the players. The hammerings are a red flag as well, but I also expected more from our play. Lesser teams have looked more cohesive and structured, while many times this season, we have looked in our usual state of disarray. Next season I expect a lot more control and purpose in our play.
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The problem is he still won't be able to address all of those deficiencies this summer
 
Kag said:
Couldn’t be any lower.

We need at least six or seven players, but the reality is that we’ll piss around and bring in three. Gaps create more gaps.

Lots of us noted prior to last summer that we needed a new midfielder (possibly two) because Matic and Pogba would be off within the year, leading us to a situation in which we’ve got Fred, McTominay and Bruno to choose from. Shock horror; we were right. I mean, how fecking useless can this club be? Arseholes on the internet like me can see it, so why can’t they?

Ask me again in September. As it stands, I don’t think the poor bastard has a chance.
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Just as well we lost the first two games in such amazing fashion.

Ten Hag has done some bloody job with this crop of shite.
 
Todd said:
If you had offered me 4th place, winning the League Cup, and making the F.A. Cup final back at the start of the season, I would have been thrilled.

Barring a spectacular disaster in the next 6 days, I will consider this season a success, regardless of what we do at Wembley.
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Agreed.
We let ourselves carried away by the possibility of winning the EL and the FA cup which was always going to be difficult. The disaster we were in last season can't be erased so fast, the progress is there.
 
Todd said:
If you had offered me 4th place, winning the League Cup, and making the F.A. Cup final back at the start of the season, I would have been thrilled.

Barring a spectacular disaster in the next 6 days, I will consider this season a success, regardless of what we do at Wembley.
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Yes but if you’d have offered me a 2-0 lead heading into the 80th minute of the 1st leg of a Europa Leg Quarter Final I’d have expected us to reach the Semifinal.

I get the ‘if you’d have offered me’ way of thinking but why bother playing the season? There’s no regardless when it comes to a Cup final, in particular one versus a local rival. Win or lose they have to perform, we need to rid these players of the it’s ok to fail mentality, we probably won’t win but I expect them to damn we’ll try.

3rd place plus the FA Cup sounds a lot better than 4th & a thrashing.
 
pcaming said:
I think he has done a decent job, maybe, just the minimum.
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To be fair, minimum has to be "what would you have taken before the season if it was offered to you?"

For me minimum would be top 4 no trophies, or CL qualification through winning Europa whilst finishing outside top 4.

If we finish top 4 + League cup, that has to be more than minimum. Top 4 + league cup + FA cup, definitely more than minimum.
 
pcaming said:
We say this, but honestly, we keep looking at blockbuster signings to solve our problems. Where has our scouting gone?
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Wasn't our scouting ripped up when Bout & Lawlor left and we are currently revamping
 
bosnian_red said:
There are no signings that make a serious title challenge next season an expectation IMO. A hope is our limit still. Even if we handpicked a whole new squad, we would need a long bed in period, coaching time to make a team, not a group of new individuals.

The situation where I can see us challenge for the title is:

Transfer wise I think our squad needs a GK that suits the system, a top CF (elite player), a press resistant midfielder who can move with the ball, and then depth for Casemiro. We also need luck in terms of fixture congestion and injuries. So if we get out of FA Cup and League Cup early, have luck with injuries and get a run of form in the league with the signings above, I can see us push City close to the end and the squad overturn surpass the time needed for extra coaching that we need. Unfortunately, it's not a realistic transfer window, especially given as we are just like 3 weeks away from the transfer window opening and we have no idea who our owners will be, when they will change, and when and how that will impact our transfer business. Can we even do any transfers if they enter the buy/sale phase? When can we spend money? How much money do we have to spend?

Arsenal had 3 years of Arteta, excellent recruitment for a few years, dropped every competition early, and will still finish 10 points behind City.
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Is this unique for United, the only club in the world that must feel inferior even if it spends more money than anyone else.

We saw Arsenal going from an Europa League team to title challengers without as much money spent. We saw Chelsea with Conte winning the title with 90+ points on his first season (93 points or whatever he had are always enough for a title.

Or are we setting the expectations deliberately low? If we buy a top striker, a good midfielder and a keeper, there is no reason why a title challenge and/or a deep run in UCL shouldn't be expected. By that stage, ten Hag would have spent over 400m and essentially bought close to an entire team.
 
Revan said:
Is this unique for United, the only club in the world that must feel inferior even if it spends more money than anyone else.

We saw Arsenal going from an Europa League team to title challengers without as much money spent. We saw Chelsea with Conte winning the title with 90+ points on his first season (93 points or whatever he had are always enough for a title.

Or are we setting the expectations deliberately low? If we buy a top striker, a good midfielder and a keeper, there is no reason why a title challenge and/or a deep run in UCL shouldn't be expected. By that stage, ten Hag would have spent over 400m and essentially bought close to an entire team.
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Its very unlikely we can do it in 1 transfer window.

We need 6 or 7 high quality players to get there, if all of them are established we need shit tons of money..
 
Swordsman said:
next season is to challenge for title ??
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I assume it depends on the transfers. And to some degree how good are the other teams (will the champions have 90 or 100 points). But with 3-4 good signings, a semi-decent challenge should be possible.

I think just another barely reaching top 4 (assuming good signings) won't be enough. At the very least, we should target above 80 points and nice football (for what is worth I was for firing Mourinho after his second season despite reaching 81 points but really bad football).

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For what is worth I do not think that we need 6-7 new players to become competitive. No club has 2 teams, not even City despite the legend, and we do not need that to challenge. Every club in the world has some weaknesses, we saw City last season winning the league without a striker. A striker, a midfielder, and a goalkeeper should allow us to challenge (an extra backup midfielder and a backup striker would be nice but not mandatory).
 
I think we had a good season overall. Ten Hag started the season by trying to play in his style, but then switched as he didn't have enough time to implement nor had the players to play it.

Most matches in Europe still I guess, 3rd/4th in the league, 2 cup finals, very very unfortunate to go out of EL. Had very good periods in the season, had some bad ones, not very lucky with injuries/suspensions, but we don't have a very good squad to be competing for all.

Next season, if we sign wisely, 1 ST, 1 GK, 1 CM and 1 CB, we'll be competing for title, and we will also try to play more in EtH style.
 
Revan said:
Is this unique for United, the only club in the world that must feel inferior even if it spends more money than anyone else.

We saw Arsenal going from an Europa League team to title challengers without as much money spent. We saw Chelsea with Conte winning the title with 90+ points on his first season (93 points or whatever he had are always enough for a title.

Or are we setting the expectations deliberately low? If we buy a top striker, a good midfielder and a keeper, there is no reason why a title challenge and/or a deep run in UCL shouldn't be expected. By that stage, ten Hag would have spent over 400m and essentially bought close to an entire team.
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A deep run in the CL is more realistic than a title challenge IMO. Conte didn't compete with this City team and the PL was nowhere near as tough as it is now at that point. It was a fluke that Arsenal were even where they were for much of the season. Their play wasn't that of a title team, and they had 0 distractions outside of the prem which led to by far the fewest lineup changes and injuries out of anyone in the league. That makes it considerably easier to get league consistency in terms of overperformance... And they'll still finish 10 points off ultimately.

You have to compare to your competition. A real title challenge is 90 points essentially. I don't think we are capable of it no matter what signings we make, because we also have to take the proper coaching steps in implementing the system. We are competing with a team which spent a feck ton over the years and have the best squad, the best players, and one of the greatest managers of all time to perfect it. Liverpool are far more likely to compete with them next season and that this is just a one off bad season. United needs to show we can string good results together, develop the system consistently and address our needs before we can expect a real title challenge. Because it isn't happening until then. The chance it happens is if all things click for us with our main needs addressed properly, and with City having a down year. Which is fine, but no need to be impatient because I think we're on the right path but it does take time and you can't just buy your way when the competition is what it is.
 
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If CL is assured, League Cup won then it's been a success, regardless of FA Cup result.

Next season, I'd like to see us perform well in the CL.

Never should we be seeing these 7-0 aberrations against Liverpool. That's just not acceptable imo and it's on the board to provide the resources to maintain an appropriate squad.

Away performance needs to improve.

Deal with these problem squad areas where we've got very expensive but misfit players.

I appreciate that EtH seems to have a mentality that a club like us should aim to win every single game it plays. For the amount of money in the game, the history of the club, I think that's right.

I hope our ownership issue is resolved as I think that is lurking around and unsettling the club.

Onwards and upwards!
 
Challenging for every trophy is what we did this season. We don‘t have the squad to play all those games, I believe Ten Hag squeezed everything out of them.

We could not compete for the title and no one thought we would, but competed for everything else.

I don’t agree with the criticism of a lack of rotation, as our bench is not good enough.

I’m looking forward to next season.
 
A mix of brilliance and frustration. On one hand he has delt with certain situations in the club amazingly well and is taking us in the right direction. On the other hand, he still keeps playing a 6'7 striker who can't win a header and offers nothing to the attack but a lot of running around...
 
At the start of the season, most pundits expected us to finish in 6th. We'll most likely finish 3rd or 4th with at least one trophy. He's clearly exceeded expectations, and considering the number of games we've played, the disgraceful behaviour of Cristiano Ronaldo and the lack of resources in January, it's nothing short of an excellent first season.
 
Just realised there are a couple of important things that are really quite similar between ETHs first season and Ole's first full season.

Our investment profile was really similar, in terms of cost: Maguire/Antony, Bruno/Casemiro, AWB/Martinez, James/Malacia - all roughly similar-sized investments. And, like that season, we'll be going into the final round of the season with a chance to finish third.

Quite a few differences too, of course (you don't have to tell me :) ).
 
I said we will get third place last June, and challenge Liverpool and City next season.

We may get third place but challenging for the title may take longer. Unless we get an amazing striker.
 
justsomebloke said:
Just realised there are a couple of important things that are really quite similar between ETHs first season and Ole's first full season.

Our investment profile was really similar, in terms of cost: Maguire/Antony, Bruno/Casemiro, AWB/Martinez, James/Malacia - all roughly similar-sized investments. And, like that season, we'll be going into the final round of the season with a chance to finish third.

Quite a few differences too, of course (you don't have to tell me :) ).
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Who becomes the Ronaldo of this team?
 
Revan said:
93 points or whatever he had are always enough for a title.
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Some Liverpool fans probably died inside right about now.

(I get what you're saying, don't worry. That performance level is always enough for at least a challenge)
 
RiqCantona said:
Squad:
Filtering out the deadwood (phase 2)
Select players who want to play for United.
Get rid of the lazy ones and those who don't fit his tactics - one by one.
Improve all the average players.
Play youth players from time to time.

Style of Play:
Develop a distinct style of play and character.
Irrespective of results, change on the pitch should be noticeable.
Get players to fight till the end give 100% every week.
Strong defensively.
Plug gaps and improve over the course of the season.
Regain control of the team.

Results:
Beat teams we should be beating.
Improve performance at home.
Get a couple of wins over our main rivals (City, Liverpool, and Chelsea).

Final Finish:
A fighting 4th place finish wouldn't be bad. Semi-final run in cups. No trophies expected.

By the end of 2023 season, we should have a clear idea about where the team is going and what else we need to do to get back top.
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Thanks for bumping this thread. Seemed to have ticked all boxes in my book. Also won a trophy with another final coming up.
 
Most people were hoping for better football. In all honesty our football in that first half was complete trash. If Chelsea had not wet themselves anytime they came within site of our goal we could possibly even be losing this game.
But Champions League qualification and a cup is a decent season.
 
- Top 4
- 1 Cup and final
- No more Maguire and Mcfred
- Rashford, AWB clear improvement in players

All the above without a proper striker. Exceeded the expectations and will be a very good season. Win FA Cup and will be a great season
 
He's achieved just above the bare minimum. Top 4 was the minimum. Winning the league cup is a bonus.

Unfortunately our football is still rather dreadful which is disappointing. That will need to improve next season
 
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