The toxic environment around Man Utd is the product of the way the club's been run. I struggle to see how we fix it short term.
The culture of the club encourages and rewards mediocrity. Just look at how we pay players for struggling to finish in the Champions League places. De Gea is still sitting around waiting for someone who's willing to pay his wages. Last year he was the best paid keeper in the league. United did that. Look at what's happened to Jesse Lingard in his quest for the same kind of cash United paid him. Is it any wonder that players we want to get rid of don't leave? Nobody will pay them anywhere near as much as we will. Even if we can find clubs that would be open to a transfer fee, they can't match the wages.
So those players are happy to Winston Bogarde it. Happy to sit on the bench and create a toxic atmosphere, hoping the coach will get fired and they'll get a 'second chance' under a new coach. Why would they believe this wouldn't happen? Some players are on their third or fourth second chance. The senior management continually removes coaches and briefs out that everyone will get a chance to impress the new coach. If you've been at this club since Van Gaal, why would you change your behaviour? Why would you believe the club would suddenly stop handing out new contracts for averageness and pursue a serious clear out?
So of course we have a bunch of demotivated players, pretty confident they'll keep getting paid come what may, waiting to outlast another coach who tried to impose discipline on them. Like all of us, they've seen this story. They know that the people who run Man Utd see it as cheaper to sack a coach than remove a dozen players. Even if a coach comes in and wins a trophy, they know he doesn't have enough cache to keep his job if they down tools.
How do you fix that? Unless the club is willing to accept serious losses on a lot of players and make some significant changes to the playing staff, this endless cycle of s-t will simply continue on.
Be it Ten Hag or his successor, the Man Utd coach will continue to be a hostage to the players: Entirely reliant on buttering them up and staying on their good side for his survival. That's not a pathway to success.