The same way detectives solve murders. You look at the clues to point you to the right direction. So let's look at the clues:
- He likes to build teams from scratch
- He integrates the youth
- He is good at rebuilding his own team
- He doesn't just jump ship when a better job is available(i.e. Spurs, he's also been pretty cool with the Newcastle links)
- It's already his 3rd+ season at Ajax
- Every time there is speculation about the future, he immediately shuts it down, reiterates that an exceptional offer has to be made
Now compare that to the behaviour of a Conte or a Mourinho and you'll get your own answer. Also I didn't say he was going to be the next Sir Alex. Long term these days is 5+ years, not 20.
I rate Ten Hag, I think he plays wonderful football and he's definitely Tactically astute. My point was not for Ten Hag, it was for this idea that our fans/owner/boardroom seems to love, the idea of long term, we want a manager for 10+ years. Sorry, but those managers are a dime a dozen. We keep looking for the next Fergie like that's the only blueprint to success, it's the reason why we kept Ole so long when quite frankly he's a crap manager. You never know what will happen in a long term plan, long term plans are too variable and tbh there aren't many managers in the world that are like SAF. We need to start acting like a big club and get the best manager with the best CV and best experience available. Someone that has been in his prime at least within 2 seasons (not like Mourinho and LVG).
The reason why I don't want Ten Hag is quite simple. Look at our squad, If it was 3 years ago I would've taken Ten Hag. But right now our squad is ready to win and ready to win now. We're not a team that needs building from scratch and quite frankly our team is not capable of playing Ten Hags style of football without at least ripping up a fundamental part of it. If you get Ten Hag in right now you basically admit to ripping up the squad and accepting the process of another 3 years.
Which proves our boards incompetence of hiring Ole in the first place and wasting 3 years under him. We're not supposed to be in a rebuild, we're supposed to be the finished product or 1/2 players away from the finished product. For some reason at United since Fergie we've been in an eternal rebuild.
That being said, I know how dumb and terrible our board is at picking a manager so if the rumours are true that we want Pochettino instead of Conte. I hope we get Ten Hag instead because I don't rate Poch at all and the fact that they find Poch to 'tick all the boxes' and not Conte is frightening. I'd rather have a guy that can rebuild and know what he's doing (Ten Hag) than someone who will rebuild us to be a top 4 team that we already are (Poch).
My ideal scenario would be Conte for 2 years then Ten Hag after that, by then, hopefully he'll be done with Ajax but that's wishful thinking knowing our incompetent management.
Does it matter? A lot thought Guardiola would only start 3 seasons but he’s happy and winning so he stuck around longer. Klopp has mentioned leaving by x date but what’s to say he won’t continue on as he seems to have such a good relationship with the club and fans.
If Ten Hag is successful at Man Utd there isn’t much need to go elsewhere. If he still chooses to go after having success then we’ll have a winning team and our pick of the best managers.
It does matter unfortunately, because we keep looking for a long term manager a 'new' Fergie it's what has kept Ole in the job so long even though it's been evident for at least a year that we're going nowhere under him. SAF was one in a billion we need to let it go and move on. Zlatan said it best he said United are still hanging on to the legacy of SAF and if they want to become successful again they have to let it go.