I'm also one trying to understand the genesis of a lot of your "concern" regarding Ten Hag.
Your argument that he is forcing players to play a way that is not suited to them is a weird one. Because if we suddenly switched to a low block, low possession, counter attacking style that too would be forcing players like Martinez, Eriksen, Sancho etc to play a style that is not suited to them. That is not a Ten Hag issue, that is an issue relating to the fact that we have a mix of different style/profile of players at this club which is a problem. Martinez is suited to high line/possession football, Maguire on the other hand would be better in a low block. But this is something that we knew coming into the season and will only be solved by successful recruitment geared towards one style of football, which has already started.
In regards to EtH sticking to his style, when Pep joined city in his first year and just about scrapped top 4 with arguably the best squad in the league and best manager and best finances, a lot of people were saying similar things about forcing his style on players and that it was easy to play his style in weaker leagues like Spain and Germany but he would struggle to replicate it in England and we know how that turned out. If Ten Hag's goal is to create a team in his image, which the recruitment has been centered around, why waste a season playing in a completely different style? Which based on past performances only really guarantees a top 4 result if those around us perform poorly. If anything I think its important EtH does not steer away from his style and sticks with it. Eventually if he keeps identifying the right profile of players the makeup of the squad will lend itself to possession football.
Despite the above, even with players who according to you are not suited to possession football guess what? They've started to have consistently more possession against teams.
In regards to EtH's substitutions, rather than quoting criticism of him from his Ajax days, just base it on what you have seen of him at united. To me and a lot of people he has made substitutions in a few games at points which have turned the games around (Martial v pool, subs v arsenal, martial v omonia etc). I would imagine if there was a stat for managers this season who have made subs that have impacted games he'd probably be pretty high in the list. The other reality is the majority of the time subs don't really have an impact. Even under SAF.
So in short these weird criticisms that you keep pivoting to just fall flat when using both the eye test and stats. Now I'm not going to judge your intentions but to me it just seems like you have an issue with EtH because there is not one argument that you have made so far where I can even go "fair enough you have a point".
Who said he needs to transition to low block low possession? We've already been doing that when we've come up against top teams
City had 70% possession when we played them Arsenal had 60% possession at old trafford where we rode our luck, Leiscter City had 53 percent possession, and Liverpool had 70 percent.
We've made a meal out of our games in Europa where you would expect us to have more possession considering the low level opponents we've faced. The EPL games we have had more possession are against Everton, Southampton, and Newcastle who were missing key players and we played at Old Trafford getting out pressed and outhustled in the first half
All those games where we have dominated possession, we have flattered to deceive where most our goals have come from a counter attack breaks, see everton game.
You cannot compare what pep did in Spain and Germany to what ETH did in the Eredevise. It's insulting, considering Pep was an innovator who revolutionised the way football is played while winning multiple major honours in the top leagues in the world. while the dutch league is 6th or 7th from what I remember. Since Pep he's come to the prem he's used many different systems and styles of play to adapt his methods to his squad.
Pep has used and been successful with 4-3-3, -4-4-1-1, 4-2-3-1 and a 4-3-3 false nine formation and there's been other formations he's used throughout his tenure at City which shows he doesn't just have a plan A, but a B, C,D and E in order to adjust to the players he has at his disposal to match his style
So far we only got a plan A of a 4-2-3-1 where players are who not well fitted in the system are being shoehorned into it and often played out of position, where we end up having to rely on a counter or individual brilliance
Regarding the subs, there have been many games, I can't remember them off the top of my head where he has been late to make changes both in europe and the prem which resulted in costing us points.
I don't have any issue with Ten Hag, I'm just providing some critique because some people are behaving as if he's completely transformed our team into something it is not. He's made our players more technically comfortable on the ball, which is good coaching, he's sure'd up our defence and dropped the likes of Maguire and Ronaldo when needed but other than that there is nothing much to shout home about regarding the standard of football. There's been many instances where it's been stale, negative in terms of lacking intensty and grinding.
When Pep and klopp arrived their teams may had slow starts but the football was always intense and immediately showcased the style of play their manager had imposed on the team, and neither did they get all the players they wanted to fit their style. The difference is they moulded their philosophy to suit the players, they didn't need specialised players in every single position to play the football they wished to play.
All summer we targeted players who only knew ETH's system, and if they didn't we didn't want to know about them.
