Where the feck is this stuff on Southgate coming from? Surely the club cannot be that irresponsible.
Erik ten Hag - Manchester United manager
- Thread starter sewey89
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I am gonna give this a stab.
I think this happens alot , particularly with the rise of social media. Basically a bullsh*t story, made up for attention, gets legs, gets retweeted and rebroadcast cause it’s juicy and by virtue of the amount of coverage it gets (not the credibility of the source) it can seem more legitimate.
It’s kind of like bitcoin. Nobody knows how credible it is, but the more it seems to be getting some traction , the more legitimate it seems to be without anybody really knowing for sure
Yeah I feel exactly the same way,anyone else but him or Potter and I could stay on the Erik out train
I’m still on the fence if I want to keep Hag or not.
On one hand; he did great last season with some great football (at least until Feb 2023), played some of the best football we have seen at Ajax, handled some bad situations (Ronaldo, Sancho) very well, bad luck with injuries, no great replacements (Southgate!!!).
On the other hand; can’t stop losing, struggling to score, has been battered several times, bad CL campaign this season, pretty crap football for the past 12 months.
If there was a replacement who was fantastic (say if we had a chance getting Alonso) then fair enough, let’s get him in. But there doesn’t seem to be one at the moment. Southgate, Potter, Di Zerbi, hardly inspiring.
On one hand; he did great last season with some great football (at least until Feb 2023), played some of the best football we have seen at Ajax, handled some bad situations (Ronaldo, Sancho) very well, bad luck with injuries, no great replacements (Southgate!!!).
On the other hand; can’t stop losing, struggling to score, has been battered several times, bad CL campaign this season, pretty crap football for the past 12 months.
If there was a replacement who was fantastic (say if we had a chance getting Alonso) then fair enough, let’s get him in. But there doesn’t seem to be one at the moment. Southgate, Potter, Di Zerbi, hardly inspiring.
I would be interested to see how De Zerbi would do for a big club. He has not only been doing a good job for Brighton but also for the clubs before that. I think he deserves a chance to work at a big club and play in the CL for example. Potter and Southgate arent very inspiring to me but De Zerbi is.
The thought of rivals getting Alonso and De Zerbi (or Amorim or even Nagelsmann) in the next year while we keep ETH is sickening.
The thought of sacking ETH to then replace him with Southgate for the next 2+ seasons while all the above still happens makes you just want to uninstall football from existence, bulldoze Old Trafford and replace it with a giant crazy golf course.
The thought of sacking ETH to then replace him with Southgate for the next 2+ seasons while all the above still happens makes you just want to uninstall football from existence, bulldoze Old Trafford and replace it with a giant crazy golf course.
Think he deserves a chance with the new structure,however agree it would be gutting to see any of those join rivals. I do understand when people are concerned about De Zerbi's record though.
I don't understand the Southgate talk, Ineos want the best of the bunch and surely they can see he is bang avg.
What's there to understand not even a single credible source has mentioned him as candidate , atleast wait until that happens to question Ineos competence I don't believe he is even in the picture for United's job .
We’ve had a strong start to 2024 results wise. If he keeps it going until the end of the season I think we’ll likely keep him. If we win the FA Cup and have a strong league finish he should stay anyway.
I really don't understand some fans. One one hand they talk about the standards at United and we should be winning titles... then they mention Di Zerbi who has on numerous occasions said titles is not what he wants.
Also, anyone see Brighton keep losing 4/5 on a regular basis? Almorin? Is he the new talk in town?
How is keeping a manager sickening, its always this cycle, a manager has a below par season and its time to get the next talk of the town.
It's about playing well too - not just winning. I'm fine with him getting us the points but I want to see more than that. I want to see some good football where we do not look disjointed and lazy. The win against Liverpool gave some hope that he can do that (although it was still suicidal football at times) but we need to see it consistently in the league.
Ofcourse it is. However; he is winning games whilst having all these injuries. Alot of ETH outers have said.. why does Ange still manage without his players. Well go have a look at his win % without Romero and Van der Ven starting. Go have a look at Liverpool's win % without VVD, Arsenal without Saliba.
We have been playing most season without Licha, who is for us, what those CB are for the clubs. Add to that we have no LB and CDM.
Its this poor narrative that all managers can manage without injuries apart from Ten Hag. Its nonsense. Not many other managers can win with a style when they are changing the back 4 every game.
Now, on top of that, we want to play a high line but we dont have the profile of CB's to do so, Varane, Maguire, Lindelof, Evans are all CB who want to defend the box, not be aggressive. We wanted Kim at the start of the season, an aggressive CB.
We need CB's who are happy to play the high line, play on the half way line and not drop, which is why we keep seeing this massive gap between our press and CB's.
If you look at him purely from a results perspective he's England's best manager since 1966.
This is where not knowing much about football can be a problem. From a results/stats point he looks like a great manager, but you aren't taking in to account that International football is very weak now and England have much stronger squads than virtually any International team bar France.
But this is the entire point against.... we don't have the players to play the way ETH wants so we will do it anyway, the mind boggles
I fancy driving in the le Mans 24, but I only have a knackered old escort.... oh well I will do it anyway!
I fancy being a cardio-thoracic surgeon but have no medical training.... oh well what could go wrong!
I fancy being a porn star but I only have a really small.... well never mind
I think the injuries thing has many facets (I have posted about this before) but regardless you have to play with what you got not what you want
Suspend reality now but say we had Sheringham, Scholes and Cantona as our three attackers and setting up to play on the counter attack, then blamed them for not being fast enough
The Liverpool game albeit madness has gained ETH some time, lets see what he does now.... I sincerely hope he uses this to change things up and do things better, I like ETH he has done so much right, but I have zero confidence right now given the showing over the last 12 months that he is the manager to take us forward.
And yes if he has a really good transfer summer and is able to play the way he wants high press, high defence, maybe he gets some success, if not we then have a groups of players specialised in playing his way, there is too much doubt of ETH long term for me to see this as a good option, I would rather INEOS restart the project with a new manager capable of managing multiple styles of play
Ineos are clever creating fear that Southgate might come in. Everyone will be happy then to just continue with ten Hag.
Getting Southgate is like building a Ferrari and then adding a Prius engine in it
We are about to find out whether our new minority owner in charge of football matters is bonkers. Southgate is the driver that doesn‘t want a scratch on his new Ferrari and won‘t win any races.
He has the best squad in the world and is making them look ordinary.
He has the best squad in the world and is making them look ordinary.
that did cross my mind
I'd give Ten Hag a lifetime contract before appointing Southgate. Fortunately, the only source is still Ogden.
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They’re not getting Southgate after getting people like Berrada and Ashworth in.
If ETH is to stay and continues as he has been doing for the rest of the season, then the pressure will be on him from minute one of next season, which isn’t the greatest idea.
The performances need to be improved drastically until the end of the season. Every game for the rest of the season has to be played as if it’s a cup final. I’m cynical with this type of thing so I wouldn’t be at all surprised if we looked like some scrubby Sunday League team against Brentford in two weeks and lost that game, after the glimpses of a great performance against Liverpool the weekend just gone.
Get rid of the chaff in the playing squad and replace them with younger, hungrier players. No more ready made marquee signings who see us as an easy pension. Crucially ETH would not get the licence to vet his player picks.
If ETH is to stay and continues as he has been doing for the rest of the season, then the pressure will be on him from minute one of next season, which isn’t the greatest idea.
The performances need to be improved drastically until the end of the season. Every game for the rest of the season has to be played as if it’s a cup final. I’m cynical with this type of thing so I wouldn’t be at all surprised if we looked like some scrubby Sunday League team against Brentford in two weeks and lost that game, after the glimpses of a great performance against Liverpool the weekend just gone.
Get rid of the chaff in the playing squad and replace them with younger, hungrier players. No more ready made marquee signings who see us as an easy pension. Crucially ETH would not get the licence to vet his player picks.
"Would you like us to get you Olise?"
"Heh no thanks. Brobbey please"
"How about Nunes?"
"BROBBEY. HEH"
Perhaps if we didn't spend 90M on Antony or 60M on Mount or 45M on Onana we'd have money for anything other than dumpster dive loans. These players are part of his plan.
Until he has 15 players he’s bought for at least 40 million, and at least 13 of them are injury-free, it’s not ETH’s squad and you can’t reasonably expect anything from him.
The Anthony signing should never have happened; that was a pure panic signing from the club who could not deliver Ten Hag his targets.
We need to see thoughtful pragmatic transfer business from now on. Last summer was a bit better, although it remains to be seen if the money spent on Mount was a good idea.
Note that Amrabat was signed on loan at the last minute; we were after other targets.
Perhaps if Murtough can negotiate properly and not like a clown we wouldn't have to dumpster dive for loans.
Antony fee ratification was made above Ten Hag (Antony was a unanimously agreed upon target, by the way, despite ten hag having initial hesitation. This is in Athletic).
If there were other targets than Antony who the club failed to deliver to ETH, and other targets than Amrabat... Who were they?
Also - still too early to call the Mount transfer as utterly shite?
£60m over a 5 year contract = £12m. Wages for this season = £13m. So far we've paid out £25m for 600 minutes of terrible performances. Making Martial look good value.
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A hesitation that, according to the same report, was solely about him worrying about the optics of him only signing his former players. Do you genuinely not see how you’re constantly painting things in a way designed to absolve Ten Hag of blame?
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Bollocks. Ten Hag wanted Antony, but it wasn‘t going to happen because Ajax did not want to sell more players.
I‘m not blaming him for what we paid: that‘s on the club.
Even if Southgate only ever reaches the stage of "featuring prominently in discussions" it's still a damning indictment on the new circus in charge.
What is bollocks?
And do you think Antony would have been a good signing at 50 million?
It's always good time to tell Southgate to feck offI love the positioning of this post in the thread. I was reading some interesting debates with lenghy-ish replies touching on academy players, midfielders, structure etc.. and then boom "Southgate can feck off"
Hesitation to buy Antony because he played for Ten Hag. There was none of that.
In hindsight doesn‘t count. I would have supported buying Antony at 50 mill.
I’m literally just quoting the Athletic article VP89 referred to in his post. What a weird response.
I‘m not buying it. I was following the transfer as it unfolded. The hesitation had to do with the price, which was high because Ajax did not want to sell.
Alfred Schreuder was pissed because he was promised Antony would not be sold. You can look it up and verify if you feel like it.
What were Ten Hag's targets?
Feel free to share the articles that contextualise that.
Im not absolving by the way. I'm surprised at how some people constantly paint things as though he's the lead person to blame. It's not just him making a mistake.