Dog looks uncomfortable, like he's there against his will. There was a dog that went missing 2 weeks ago, you wouldn't know anything about that would you?Nah mate, my dog has more important things on his mind.
Erik ten Hag - Manchester United manager | Staying
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In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik (@Rood) was joined by comedian Ali Woods to look back at the best and worst moments of a rollercoaster season with the annual United Hour Awards.
Has Ten Hag been sacked yet? We're not sure and we hope not, but it's looking more likely as the days pass.
Who should replace him and why is it taking so long to make a decision?
Every fanbase thinks they've been screwed over by the refs, I'm not sure that's actually been the case (Newcastle should have had a penalty yesterday for instance), but in fairness I think he's talking about our results compared to performances (actual points to expected points) rather than us getting favourable calls from officials.
We don't know - for all we know they would have won the league last season if they'd sacked him - I mean we're just saying random stuff, right?
What we do know is that a sacking was justifiable then, as it is now for Ten Hag. There's no evidence that the same turn of fortune will happen for United, in fact, most metrics suggest otherwise - including the fact that Arteta is an outlier - which you know, is not the norm.
Arteta finished 8th, 8th, 5th before he got second and outspent everyone in that time bar darth Pep his old master. The real difference is he was basically given complete carte blanche with that squad and the biggest issue had was probably Auba who was probably about 1% of the Ronaldo drama alone. When he was clearing it out and playing some ok youth players (remember Smith-Rowe etc.) a lot of the football was all over the place but he came in around the same time as Edu and they've clearly worked ok together. They pay big fees but they haven't seemed to hit any huge duds yet.
I don't know what you're saying here. A simple statement was made that underperforming in the manner Ten Hag has, would most likely get him booted at most clubs of similar stature. The rebuttal for said statement was "b-but Tuchel" (Bayern has already released a statement saying was leaving at the end of the season, btw - despite rumors/reports of a u-turn). I simply said Tuchel finishing second, 5 points off of an unbeaten team, and knocked out of CL semis - is not the same as finishing 8th, negative GD, and last in a CL group with Copenhagen and Gala.
I don't think even most United fans were expecting a title challenge this year, which is further corroboration for how badly Ten Hag has failed.
What? Kinda scary that you think that actually makes sense. United is renowned for holding on to managers far longer than they should, and has underperformed considerably when compared to clubs of similar stature that change managers relatively frequently. For reference:
I once bought a house and then paid a builder to knock it down and build a better one. Now I live in a nice house but what if instead I had sacked him for knocking it down. Would changing builders have achieved anything except delay and a slightly different house?
How do you know Arteta is an outlier? Because he succeeded? That's circular logic.
ETH won't survive the summer, that's not the issue. The issue is that we as a fanbase are going to turn on the next guy and the next guy while this slow process of actually building a house grinds through. Managers see that, so how can you expect anybody good to come?
TBH I'd question your judgement, why not just buy a a better house in the first place
Except the builder isn't being sacked for knocking it down.
How many Arteta like turn-arounds are you able to point to?
Yes, people turn on underperforming managers, they are sacked and another manager comes in.
I'm saying we're not a similar stature currently and haven't been for over a decade, if we're judging manager's by the same standards as there are at Bayern then no one who could potentially be our manager will come out of that looking good because at best our squad is a contender for 4th while they have one of the best teams in Europe. The failure is that we've been a mess and the manager hasn't even tried to fix it for a full season, not that we're not challenging for a title or even making top 4.
United is of similar stature, and should be of similar ambition. I'm not arguing we have a squad of similar quality, hence "most United fans weren't expecting a title challenge this year, which is further corroboration for how badly Ten Hag has failed."
Had United fought for 4th, played decent football and the GD weren't in overdraft. The poll and conversation in this thread would be dramatically different. United is currently 11 points off of Aston Villa.
Trying to use Tuchel as rebuttal to the statement that Ten Hag would have been sacked at most clubs of similar stature, makes no sense.
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For the first time, I'm willing to give him the chance. It's 100% the club culture that's rotten.
I think squad quality isn't the issue at United. Ten Hag, Antony, Casemiro, Varane, Sancho, Martinez, van de Beek were very good signings at the point of their announcements, IMO, and many players with a longer history such as Rashford, Garnacho, Shaw, Bruno or Eriksen proved that they are capable of playing football at a very high standard. Yet with a few exceptions, all of them underwhelm. There has to be a root cause for why so few players and managers fulfill their potential and until you've solved that problem, it won't really matter who you bring in. A player who currently plsys well for Bayern will most likely eventually be a shadow of his former self after joining United.
Lucky in regard to xG/xGA/xPoints, I didn't think about referee decisions here.
Bayern is underperforming all three which can be classified as being unlucky, Leverkusen is (massively) overperforming all three. I don't want to class Leverkusen's title as undeserved, because they deserve it for pushing through and enforcing their luck in every match while Bayern has given up in some when they were unlucky to begin with, but I still think it's fair to mention.
United on the other hand is slightly underperforming its xG, but massively overperforming its xGA/xPts which is something you can call lucky.
I was actually tempted to tag you in my reply originally
Been saying it for years
Honestly though, it's the fickleness that winds me up more than anything else. I've long resigned myself to the fact that a good chunk of the fanbase will be the "manager can do no wrong" types. Those fans don't annoy me as much anymore - the ones who do are the ones who quickly change their minds after one half-decent performance or a short boilerplate speech from the manager. In the blink of an eye, an entire season of shit is just... forgotten.
Every top club in the world turns on managers when they fail and that doesnt stop the next one jumping into the hotseat, does it?
If this is building a house then what Ten Hag has done this season and in 2 summer transfer windows is take a wrecking ball to the framework and add thermite to the foundations.
I'd need to get Arsenal fans opinions on this but i'm pretty sure there was a very vocal segment of their crowd that wanted Arteta out after the two 8th place finishes and that it wasn't immediately obvious what his game plan was at times- with Klopp on the other hand it was obvious from day one ("heavy metal football", manic pressing etc). People seem to be rewriting history a bit with Arteta but maybe I'm in the wrong here.
At any rate I've always maintained that if EtH is sacked he can have few complaints at this stage but I keep seeing this 'he has no plan' stuff when there is a plan, it's just a very very risky, almost suicidal plan of overloading the opposition but leaving a lot of space for counters. He said quite clearly in that interview with Neville that he doesn't want to go back to the pragmatism of last year which seems wrong to me, but it's still a plan for the future- just a very stubborn one which will probably cost him his job.
At any rate I've always maintained that if EtH is sacked he can have few complaints at this stage but I keep seeing this 'he has no plan' stuff when there is a plan, it's just a very very risky, almost suicidal plan of overloading the opposition but leaving a lot of space for counters. He said quite clearly in that interview with Neville that he doesn't want to go back to the pragmatism of last year which seems wrong to me, but it's still a plan for the future- just a very stubborn one which will probably cost him his job.
Lots of people just have terrible memories, and if you have a poor memory you've no choice but to live in the moment. They genuinely do not remember how they felt watching the second half and ET of the FA cup semi final. Or what it was like getting dominated by Brentford a few weeks prior. Or getting 3-0'd by Bournemouth in december. Or just before that the hideous capitulations against Copenhagen and Galatasary. All that matters is we got a win against Newcastle and they saw him pandering to the fans in the stadium.
For me the calculus is simple. If there is a proven substantially better option that ten Hag then we must be ruthless in upgrading to that better option. But no such man appears to exist at this time.
Someone who can do better than an 8th place finish after spending upwards of 400m? There are plenty of options who can do that. All our previous managers did better than that, even the much maligned Moyes. This should be easy.
For every Arteta there are 100 Stevie Gs.
I use a similar logic for players. We all want to clear out certain ones like Antony and AWB, but unless there is a proven substantially better option that we can actually afford, we're probably better off keeping them.
Because managers believe in themselves and that they can make a success given the resources we can throw at them. Every club with high expectations sacks on failure, why it has to be endlessly debated on here is mental.
It's not even that we don't adjust expectations, we haven't sacked a manager since Fergie who hasn't deserved it. This debate might make sense if we were sacking ETH for finishing 4th and not progressing but we're 8th.
The next manager if he finishes 5th next season won't be hounded for the sack, nor would he be if he then made 4th the subsequent season. A manager simply has to convince the players, fans, owners that progress is being made. That's it.
That is modern sport for you. It is all about last game and about bantz on twitter ect. People will arque for few hours and then move on some other match. And honest to God I believe that lot people even doesn't watch the games.I was actually tempted to tag you in my reply originally
Honestly though, it's the fickleness that winds me up more than anything else. I've long resigned myself to the fact that a good chunk of the fanbase will be the "manager can do no wrong" types. Those fans don't annoy me as much anymore - the ones who do are the ones who quickly change their minds after one half-decent performance or a short boilerplate speech from the manager. In the blink of an eye, an entire season of shit is just... forgotten.
We are in downhill mode since that Liverpool game, probably worst season by big club* in the last 20 years across top 5 leagues. And people wants him to stay.
*chelsea can feck off same as city.
Or maybe United has more than one problem, and managerial and squad quality are part of said problems? There isn't like a law written somewhere that multiple things can't be addressed at the same time. And of course whoever we bring in will matter - I don't even know why people say that it wouldn't, weird stance.
Thats suicidal not sensible
But how do you as fans know the difference? I would trust Jason Wilcox's opinion over my own.
We don't know, that's why it is sensible to form the opinion based on probability. It is not very probable, with everything we have seen, that giving Ten Hag more time will have an Arteta-like outcome.
Obviously the people behind the scenes will have different information available and they are after all the ones making the decision anyway.
I flicker between being amused and being frustrated by our bizarre fanbase. It wasn't even a particular strong performance either. Newcastle had many decent chances last night and really should be disappointed not to come out with at least a draw.
Hopefully only 2 more games to suffer through.
I think it's telling that he didn't....
Possibly. I'm just saying that some of those players were finished and battle proven products and others among the hottest prospects in Europe. Many of them are barely recognizable anymore. So it doesn't make too much sense to me to compare the quality they show right now with that of a team like Bayern. I wouldn't be surprised if some of the current United players would look extraordinary at Bayern, especially somebody like Casemiro, Bruno or Rashford. I think the quality of your team is fine in principle. But you'd probably still be best off to part ways with many generally good players because you and they need a fresh start.
And they never suggested they had any faith in him. If he stays, it's only because we can't find someone else. What does that tell you about him?
Yeah people acting like last night was some sort of revelation instead of just a good watch with the youngsters carrying us.
Embarrassing really. Have some fecking pride as supporters. People being worried about “turning on the next manager” when THATS WHAT YOURE SUPPOSED TO DO when incompetence is shown. This culture of “support everyone no matter what and trust in the lads” is just a great way to continue being the biggest disappointment in the footballing world. People need to relearn some proper standards.
Yeah, they had 17 points after 15 games and a -4GD. Which equals to 1.13 PPG. Arsenal then took 44 points from the next 23 games. Which equals to 1.91 PPG.
ten Hag was on 27 points from 15 games with a GD of 0 this season. Which equals to 1.8 PPG. United then took 30 points from the next 22 games. Which equals to 1.36 PPG.
Arsenal were in Europe until late that season. They made it to the semi-finals in Europe. So even though they had midweek distractions, they still improved after Christmas.
We went out of Europe before Christmas and got worse as the season went on. We went from a GD of 0 to a GD of -3
That's how bad this season has been. Arsenal's 8th place season was better. The only way this season can shade it is by winning The FA Cup.
They lost less PL games and finished with a +16GD.
I’d of loved to see Arsenals voting when they all wanted Arteta out. That must have been at least 90% of their fans.
We don't know but based on the data that we have we can say it's very unlikely. Wilcox is more qualified than any of us but would you trust him if his decision was Southgate? A lot of ETH in posters say they trust what INEOS decide to do... unless it's a manager they don't want, like Southgate.
Bunch of unserious fans, those bastards!
There are lots of fans who only take the result into consideration and then base their opinion on that.
Newcastle had 55% possession, 21 shots (16 inside the box), 6 big chances, hit the post twice, had one cleared off the line, and were robbed of a penalty. 2.37 xG.
They accumulated 1.91 xG from open play compared to our 0.93 xG. Fairly even from set-pieces.
Most teams will win at OT if they produce a similar performance. We were clinical for a change. We had 2 big chances and converted 1 of them. They missed 5 of their 6.
It reminds me of when we beat West Ham 3-0 and everyone thought we dominated. That game was better than last night. It's a good result. But it wasn't a strong overall performance.
I suppose being able to field a left back, right back and two center backs helps too.