It doesn't matter who Ten Hag really is as a manager though, that's where you are going wrong. What matters is what he is implementing right now and it's nothing like what Nagelsmann would do. So your whole point is moot.
Football simply doesn't work that way. Otherwise going by THAT argument what Nagelsmann haa produced since taking over the mess he is trying to clean up with Germany is how he should be judged over his entire body of work as a manager. A period Germany have neither looked as well drilled, coached to press nor compactvl enough defensively. Frankly, It's who who really doesn't have a leg to stand with that tangent
And Nagelsmann has played a lot of games with 3 and 5 at the back. Would you be unhappy if he came in and did that here?
I already stated in my first post that unlike most modern managers Nagelsmann football isn't wedded to one singular formation. So I don't understand such a question as a reply to anything I've said earlier.
And I don't know what you find strange about "pretending last season never happened" - is anybody even doing that? I see it mentioned a lot in the context of how long we've looked poor. Last season ETH was even further away from the type of football you are taking about. He was far more pragmatic and there were many already questioning what type of football he was trying to implement.
You're taking as though we were great to watch last season, I think you're confused. I remember it very well though. We were pretty poor to watch for the vast majority of it but we got results through a lean defence, a double pivot sat in front etc. Zero possession football, that was the thing everyone claimed we'd see one we signed a ball playing goalkeeper. He's (Onana) played practically every game this season and there's still no sign of it.
THAT right there is the pretending I'm talking about:
1. We DID play possesion football the majority of last season. We were out possesesed strictly 6 times by an epl opponent of which 4 of those were from matches vs Liverpool, Arsenal, City and Newcastle. The ONLY reason that couldn't leapt to above 54% was because we had a keeper who literally couldn't use his feet in goal making consistent possession out the back. Impossible
2. The idea 'our football was poor' is straight up beans. I'd agree it wasn't tremendously exciting for Everyone's taste. But Poor? Straight up beans!
Last season not only were United 3rd in big chances created. United sat with Brighton on top of the key passes per 90 minutes metric over the entire season above everyone. Even in terms of PPDA United were 3rd overall. No team can have those statistics whilst being poor in the football.
At the very least you have to be solid defensively, possess control in games thanks to your defence and midfield structure and agressive and incisive enough in attack to generate those chances.
The issue is not only do people insist on conflating how we played last season with his ETH Ajax, to buttress their claim "we didn't play possesion football/were poor" rather than against United before. They simply pretend the superior defending, control, team structure generation of chances last season as compared to this or before last season NEVER happened. Worst of all they make the disingenous argument "our possesion hasn't improved with Onana at the back". As if our playing out the back hasn't been more consistently used and improved upon this season with Onana in goal as compared to De gea.
Even our posesssion has consistently failed to establish control strictly thanks first to a raft of injury to key components to any hopes of us playing it competently plus the change in team build and defensive shape from last season, because the coach has publically admitted he is trying to turn this side into the best transition, not best possesion side in the league. Yet his detractors insist on acting like his Ajax team is the template he has been working with and unsuccessfully trying to implement this season.