Why do we have an awful away record under Erik Ten hag?

[Dominos]

We have a terrible away record under Erik Ten hag. Our away record against last season’s top 9 teams read as 8 losses and 1 draw. Some of these loses include a humiliating 7-0 loss to Liverpool, a 6-3 spanking to City and 4-0 defeat at Brentford.

After our first away 2-0 loss against Spurs this season, new questions have to asked about Ten hag’s ability to set-up teams away from home.

Our away record against top 9 teams last season
Brentford 4-0
City 6-3
Villa 3-1
Arsenal 3-2
Liverpool 7-0
Newcastle 2-0
Spurs 2-2
Brighton 1-0

That is a goal difference of -20. This is not acceptable but I am wondering how Ten hag can fix this.

I posted this last season and it still applies.

I find it a bit odd the way people talk about this issue, "we need to fix our away form".

The reason City and Arsenal win more away games than us is because they can actually pass a fecking ball like an elite football team is meant to pass a football.

The way to "fix" your away form is to become a better football team. It's very unlikely to be something specific that we're currently doing wrong in our approach away from home that we can just stop doing by flicking a switch.

Away games are more difficult than home games. Combine that fact that we're not very good, you're going to have a lot of difficult trips on the road.

By elite teams standards we're below par at playing out from the back, the ball retention all over the pitch is often horrendous, we don't have any competent striker, and don't create enough chances. All these factors result in us finding ourselves under too much pressure and turning the ball over and gifting the opposition transitions which causes our defence problems.

If we were smashing teams at home 4-0 every week, then it would be a different story. But we're still mostly scraping close wins at home and then hanging on for dear life in the final minutes as we defend our penalty box from an aerial and set piece onslaught because our team is too incompetent to retain possession of a football. Which signals if you put this team in the more difficult equivalent fixture away from home, those narrow wins very easily become draws and losses.

 

[Chairman Steve]

We should focus more on why we couldn’t beat the likes of Villa, Brentford and Brighton away rather than City, Arsenal and Liverpool away. I don’t think this is the type of game to hammer ETH on the bad away record for. It’s kinda a given that when the very top sides play eachother, the home team usually wins anyway and a draw for the away team is typically a decent result.

 

[Ali Dia]

Could be worse this season if we have to see out many 8-12 mins of extra time each match.

We just don't have the fitness, mental strength, it's game 4 and we have Maguire and Evans back there.

that’s the owners not being serious about winning coming back to bite us again and again. From poor scouting and recruitment to stockpiling players who don’t work out and not chasing better players on the way up

 

[Martial'sEmergingSmile]

• Lightweight midfield with very little defensive instincts (outside Casemiro). Luckily we solved both issues by signing Mount.
  
• Forwards who don't compete physically and play hero football
• Generalised lunaticball style where we treat the ball like a Splash Out toy and our first thought is always pumping balls over the top, almost always ceding possession with the pump, then hitting a simultaneously half hearted but suicidal press to try to win it back and leaving ourselves wide open.

 

[Camy89]

I posted this last season and it still applies.

I find it a bit odd the way people talk about this issue, "we need to fix our away form".

The reason City and Arsenal win more away games than us is because they can actually pass a fecking ball like an elite football team is meant to pass a football.

The way to "fix" your away form is to become a better football team. It's very unlikely to be something specific that we're currently doing wrong in our approach away from home that we can just stop doing by flicking a switch.

Away games are more difficult than home games. Combine that fact that we're not very good, you're going to have a lot of difficult trips on the road.

By elite teams standards we're below par at playing out from the back, the ball retention all over the pitch is often horrendous, we don't have any competent striker, and don't create enough chances. All these factors result in us finding ourselves under too much pressure and turning the ball over and gifting the opposition transitions which causes our defence problems.

If we were smashing teams at home 4-0 every week, then it would be a different story. But we're still mostly scraping close wins at home and then hanging on for dear life in the final minutes as we defend our penalty box from an aerial and set piece onslaught because our team is too incompetent to retain possession of a football. Which signals if you put this team in the more difficult equivalent fixture away from home, those narrow wins very easily become draws and losses.

Absolutely this.

 

[flappyjay]

I posted this last season and it still applies.

I find it a bit odd the way people talk about this issue, "we need to fix our away form".

The reason City and Arsenal win more away games than us is because they can actually pass a fecking ball like an elite football team is meant to pass a football.

The way to "fix" your away form is to become a better football team. It's very unlikely to be something specific that we're currently doing wrong in our approach away from home that we can just stop doing by flicking a switch.

Away games are more difficult than home games. Combine that fact that we're not very good, you're going to have a lot of difficult trips on the road.

By elite teams standards we're below par at playing out from the back, the ball retention all over the pitch is often horrendous, we don't have any competent striker, and don't create enough chances. All these factors result in us finding ourselves under too much pressure and turning the ball over and gifting the opposition transitions which causes our defence problems.

If we were smashing teams at home 4-0 every week, then it would be a different story. But we're still mostly scraping close wins at home and then hanging on for dear life in the final minutes as we defend our penalty box from an aerial and set piece onslaught because our team is too incompetent to retain possession of a football. Which signals if you put this team in the more difficult equivalent fixture away from home, those narrow wins very easily become draws and losses.

We have no interest in controlling the game. We play to the other teams beat, then we seat back and hope to hit them on the counter.

 

[InfiniteBoredom]

I posted this last season and it still applies.

I find it a bit odd the way people talk about this issue, "we need to fix our away form".

The reason City and Arsenal win more away games than us is because they can actually pass a fecking ball like an elite football team is meant to pass a football.

The way to "fix" your away form is to become a better football team. It's very unlikely to be something specific that we're currently doing wrong in our approach away from home that we can just stop doing by flicking a switch.

Away games are more difficult than home games. Combine that fact that we're not very good, you're going to have a lot of difficult trips on the road.

By elite teams standards we're below par at playing out from the back, the ball retention all over the pitch is often horrendous, we don't have any competent striker, and don't create enough chances. All these factors result in us finding ourselves under too much pressure and turning the ball over and gifting the opposition transitions which causes our defence problems.

If we were smashing teams at home 4-0 every week, then it would be a different story. But we're still mostly scraping close wins at home and then hanging on for dear life in the final minutes as we defend our penalty box from an aerial and set piece onslaught because our team is too incompetent to retain possession of a football. Which signals if you put this team in the more difficult equivalent fixture away from home, those narrow wins very easily become draws and losses.

I fully agree with this and that’s why I was massively disappointed with the Mount signing. It seems EtH has opted for the most expedient path and chose to all in on augmenting the strength of his best performers from last season I.e Bruno and Rashford and make us a team that depends on quick transitions as our only weapon. The brutal reality of modern football is teams have copped on and are different kind of beast from the ones of yesteryears, especially the smaller teams, they are fitter, stronger, more disciplined, more technically sound on the ball. If you are unable to play through a compact defense, a press, or keep possession in a prolonged sequence, chances are you will not apply enough consistent pressure to win football matches consistently, and we’ve run away from taking the growing pains to transform ourselves into a modern side, instead taking the ‘easy’ way and excusing it with torturous reasonings like traditions, the Utd way etc

 

[Ceteris]

Erik is just refusing to learn. I've said this before even Fergie was pragmatic away from home.

This man goes with same selection, same formation, I've never seen a tactical change that made me think wow that's brilliant from our manager.

That midfield away from home is suicidal especially when Case and Eriksen can't play 90 minutes of football. Casemiro now runs like he has lead in his boots

Bruno has too much freedom in this team, he needs to operate in areas where its easier to find him to make things happen.

People complain that city are boring to watch because of all the passing, guess what if you pass the ball the opposition cannot get the ball

You need control away from home, the silly flicks or Rashford with his head down running into traffic doesn't give control

We still have players that don't need to be here.

I don't envy Ten Hag been the man to sort it all out

 

[Baxquux]

Are away from is fine for the level of club we are. I think too many United fans are living in the past. We are so far from being a top team. It's why I say time and time again I would prefer us to focus on winning trophies we have a chance in, Europa League for example. And I loved our Carabao run.

We are fighting for 4-7th positions as that is our level. Learn to accept that and you will enjoy the football more and be less stressed.

Not good enough with the level of expenditure though: think people are over-reacting re. today's performance considering how the game could have gone with half a yard on the Garnacho decision, RH debut etc, but in larger terms the side should be challenging for 2-4th rather than 4-7th considering the spending, ETH's reputation and how other managers have had their new teams click more quickly.

There are issues with recruitment and set-up/possibly aspects of coaching more to blame than something inevitable about the club. The Glazers are terrible but i don't think anyone has claimed they're micromanaging who gets signed (slow on signing off on purchases, maybe, and refusing to invest anything of their own money). Nothing to have stopped us buying one of several other midfielders for the same price or lower than Mount, or accepting Maguire/McT offers at the initial rate, and using part of the Henderson deal to compromise with Maguire for the pay-off etc, then signing Amrabat earlier so we had him to fill in for this game when Eriksen tiring, and so forth...

 

[Dominos]

We have no interest in controlling the game. We play to the other teams beat, then we seat back and hope to hit them on the counter.

If that's the case we need to become far better on the counter because we don't create or score enough.

I do think we want to control games though, it's just when your players lose the ball every 10 seconds then it's impossible to do so.

 

[eire-red]

If you win 30 games, you're in with a really good chance of winning the league. I couldn't care less if we lost away to Liverpool, City, Arsenal and Spurs if it means we win the rest and win the league.

I don't think there's a secret formula to consistently beating top teams away from home, but we should be doing much better against the rest.

As for the why, the reasons I would point to is that we don't keep the ball well enough and we're not clinical in the right moments.

Mentality is also a problem - we go under when things go bad.

Overall, the balance of the team looks wrong. We have attacking players that are built for absorbing pressure and then hitting on the break, but I think our defence isn't set up to do that. Defensively, we look better when we dominate the ball and play a measured game through the lines, but our attack doesn't function as well when we play like that.

The midfield isn't built to be a passing machine, isn't mobile enough to press hard and isn't defensive enough to fully protect the defence.

 

[FriedClams]

If you win 30 games, you're in with a really good chance of winning the league. I couldn't care less if we lost away to Liverpool, City, Arsenal and Spurs if it means we win the rest and win the league.

I don't think there's a secret formula to consistently beating top teams away from home, but we should be doing much better against the rest.

As for the why, the reasons I would point to is that we don't keep the ball well enough and we're not clinical in the right moments.

Mentality is also a problem - we go under when things go bad.

Overall, the balance of the team looks wrong. We have attacking players that are built for absorbing pressure and then hitting on the break, but I think our defence isn't set up to do that. Defensively, we look better when we dominate the ball and play a measured game through the lines, but our attack doesn't function as well when we play like that.

The midfield isn't built to be a passing machine, isn't mobile enough to press hard and isn't defensive enough to fully protect the defence.

do You think this team can win 30 games?

 

[Leftback99]

Physicality and technical ability. Getting physically bullied by Arsenal is a new low.

 

[eire-red]

do You think this team can win 30 games?

I think we should be capable of winning anywhere from 16-19 games at home, and theoretically we should have the ability to beat most of the bottom 12 teams in the league away from home.

Note I say theoretically, but in reality I think the best we can hope for is winning mid to high 20's this season.

Our away form only gets highlighted when we we lose away to the big teams, but the real focus should be how do we set up in such a way to consistently dispatch lower half teams.

That's what will really cost you across a full season.

 

[JoeyJoJoJrShabadoo]

Our players are cowards away from home.

 

[Pearl's a minger]

We played like you’d expect a newly promoted team to play away from home. Ramsdale won’t have many easier games. Just about sums us up.

 

[fezzerUTD]

Because he’s a pretty s*it manager. I mean a year on he’s still not learnt to tighten up and pack the middle. Instead he treats it like a home game and plays whichever attacking formation he likes.

 

[Pronewbie]

I reckon we'll have a better away record if we start Casemiro and Amrabat (if he's Eriksen's level but defensively) in those games.

 

[tjb]

do You think this team can win 30 games?

No team wins thirty games, but I see his point.

I actually think we can win a lot of games. I actually think we did a good job of being in position to win some away games last season, but our inability to close it out cost us.

Today I actually saw a lot of positive signs that would change. Ceding control due to not being able to keep possession from the back when pressured was one of the reasons for this. Today showed that as a unit, our defence can now do this.
The second had to do with a lack of a focal point. We had no firepower up front. In away games, where your midfielders find it hard to connect with attackers easily, its the job of the attackers to make it easier by moving, individual brilliance or bringing others into play. Watch Madrid and any other top side and you'll notice that their attackers are far more active in duels than ours have been. I think Hojlund will help with this.

In terms of general play, we played really well against Spurs and Chelsea last season away. We were also fantastic against Barcelona. So we have it in us

 

[Wumminator]

Are away from is fine for the level of club we are. I think too many United fans are living in the past. We are so far from being a top team. It's why I say time and time again I would prefer us to focus on winning trophies we have a chance in, Europa League for example. And I loved our Carabao run.

We are fighting for 4-7th positions as that is our level. Learn to accept that and you will enjoy the football more and be less stressed.

we were third last year.

 

[Quagmire Maguire]

we were third last year.

Yeah and I think Liverpool and Brighton are just 2 teams that join City and Arsenal as being better than us now. Things can change fast in football but I just no longer feel we compete anywhere near the top and I don't expect it. Just watch what happens to us in the champions league, on current form I fully expect us to go out in the group stage.

 

[Quagmire Maguire]

Not good enough with the level of expenditure though: think people are over-reacting re. today's performance considering how the game could have gone with half a yard on the Garnacho decision, RH debut etc, but in larger terms the side should be challenging for 2-4th rather than 4-7th considering the spending, ETH's reputation and how other managers have had their new teams click more quickly.

There are issues with recruitment and set-up/possibly aspects of coaching more to blame than something inevitable about the club. The Glazers are terrible but i don't think anyone has claimed they're micromanaging who gets signed (slow on signing off on purchases, maybe, and refusing to invest anything of their own money). Nothing to have stopped us buying one of several other midfielders for the same price or lower than Mount, or accepting Maguire/McT offers at the initial rate, and using part of the Henderson deal to compromise with Maguire for the pay-off etc, then signing Amrabat earlier so we had him to fill in for this game when Eriksen tiring, and so forth...

I agree fully, expenditure and ETH reputation we should be competing at the very top. But the teams I see as elite, Real, City and Bayern.. they wouldn't have the likes of Maguire, Lindleof, Evans, Wan Bissaka, Rashford, Martial.. etc (I could go on and on basically 95% of our squad) .. anywhere near their clubs.

 

[Josep Dowling]

I agree fully, expenditure and ETH reputation we should be competing at the very top. But the teams I see as elite, Real, City and Bayern.. they wouldn't have the likes of Maguire, Lindleof, Evans, Wan Bissaka, Rashford, Martial.. etc (I could go on and on basically 95% of our squad) .. anywhere near their clubs.

Exactly. We ended up playing Lindelof, Maguire, Dalot, Wan Bissaka, Martial and Evans today. All of these players have had many questions marks over their heads for years but yet they’re still here. Player turnover simply isn’t quick enough and that’s a major reason why we don’t compete every year now.

 

[Baxquux]

I agree fully, expenditure and ETH reputation we should be competing at the very top. But the teams I see as elite, Real, City and Bayern.. they wouldn't have the likes of Maguire, Lindleof, Evans, Wan Bissaka, Rashford, Martial.. etc (I could go on and on basically 95% of our squad) .. anywhere near their clubs.

Madrid, for be fair, just played Joselu up front and were reliant upon a 95 minute goal to squeak a win. Bayern and PSG had a guy (ECM) who basically washed out at Stoke, regularly coming off the bench for them -and even playing a run of games . I agree that someone as mentally weak and injury-prone as Martial wouldn't have been around for as long as he has, coasting off a couple of good, if flawed, seasons out of seven, and Rashford's first 11 place would have been under a lot more pressure. But a lot of it is just 'sub-optimum' decisions in the technical set-up around building squads (who gets the final say-so, what kinds of profiles are they recruiting and is the balance right for a top end PL midfield).

We've had Murtaugh be defended by a number of well -informed posters, but there does seem to be an issue there with exercising authority and/or around judgement, when you're letting a coach function as de facto SD too. That's a club issue and partly structural but its not irreparable or something which demands even a whole new leadership or ownership to get Better, if existing people wise up 5-10% and new signings also click.

The Glazers still need to leave, obviously, and the club is still not 'best in class' orientated enough, but there's no reason why we shouldnt be expected to try and emulate Arsenal last season and, like them, go from hovering around top-4 to pushing towards the top, even if City sadly out of reach.

 

[Revan]

1 point out of 33 when it comes to away matches against top 10. Is this the worst any EPL manager with 10+ matches has ever done? Genuinely curious.

 

[SAFMUTD]

1 point out of 33 when it comes to away matches against top 10. Is this the worst any EPL manager with 10+ matches has ever done? Genuinely curious.

Its not only about the points but performances and circumstances. We went 0-2 against Spurs and managed to feck it up to 2-2 thats our only point. Then last minute loses to Arsenal twice and total humiliations against City and Liverpool.

I'd say we havent played as bladly this season against Spurs and Arsenal but we've made multiple stupid mistakes that have cost us. You have to be really sharp against top opposition and we seem to shit the bed every time.

 

[The Mitcher]

Because Ten Hag doesn't set the team up right, nor does he coach them well enough.

 

[Litch]

Cause the manager is still working out the league.....he is moving a bit mad at the moment

 

[Borys]

There was an interesting comment on Stretford Paddock today that under Ten Hag we only win games which we would be expected to win anyway. That is mostly home / neutral ground. We lose games in which the opponent actually wants to win.

 

[The Mitcher]

Because he’s a pretty s*it manager. I mean a year on he’s still not learnt to tighten up and pack the middle. Instead he treats it like a home game and plays whichever attacking formation he likes.

We weren't even set up to attack in this match, that makes it worse.

 

[The Mitcher]

Cause the manager is still working out the league.....he is moving a bit mad at the moment

How's he not figured it out after an entire season? Is he that thick?

 

[Eddy_JukeZ]

That was one of our better performances too, but we still seem so mentally weak as a collective.

How do you concede right away after you score? Then you concede a late winner again.

Where is the bottle in the squad?

 

[Rhyme Animal]

He isn’t suited to the PL, it’s that simple.

But he is certainly a good coach.

Was the same with LvG.

 

[Jezpeza]

Because its an emperors new clothes situation in my opinion whereby despite the new manager and players we still aren't very good at moving the ball or retaining possession under pressure. This whole summer was a talk of the ‘transition team’. Essentially a counter attacking team.

When teams really come at us away from home we tend to frantically hack it clear and defend for our lives like a bottom half team or underdog would. To be honest, we did that at home to wolves. On another day wolves would have scored 3 or 4.

We look blown fitness wise from about 70 minutes in because we spend so much of the game chasing opponents. If you watch City and Arsenal they dont win every week but they play the same - always trying to keep possession, spreading play, working side to side, wearing your opponents out.

we have players constantly trying to ping the ball out wide or in behind, hollywood balls, its almost route one football but to the wings. We constantly lose it in an a touch or two this way.

If the opponent dont have the ball they cant hurt you. We dont seem to hold any stock in that.

 

[Big Ben Foster]

Are away from is fine for the level of club we are. I think too many United fans are living in the past. We are so far from being a top team. It's why I say time and time again I would prefer us to focus on winning trophies we have a chance in, Europa League for example. And I loved our Carabao run.

We are fighting for 4-7th positions as that is our level. Learn to accept that and you will enjoy the football more and be less stressed.

Even if we're far from a top team, 1 point in 33 away from home against top half sides is unacceptably bad.

 

[kouroux]

Just not enough goals and creativity.

 

[Sarni]

There was an interesting comment on Stretford Paddock today that under Ten Hag we only win games which we would be expected to win anyway. That is mostly home / neutral ground. We lose games in which the opponent actually wants to win.

The number of points we have got in games where we weren’t firm favorites is definitely very low. In bookmaker’s terms, I doubt we have won many games where we were priced 1.60 or above, quite likely still in single digits and maybe even under 5. And we are constantly being priced above that when away from home to anyone half decent these days.

 

[Yagami]

Then why not prioritise a midfielder who helps solve that issue. We all knew it from last season, instead we went for Mount who runs more than Eriksen but falls short in every other area when compared to Eriksen. Someone like Amrabat or better should have been through the door 1st.

I've been asking that since his first transfer window when everyone else was praising him.

Casemiro, Eriksen and Mount are rubbish. Amrabat could be good.

 

[Oscar Bonavena]

It's simple, if you play like a bottom half team away from home (concede territory and possession, utter inability to retain possession, constantly give the ball away), you're going to get bottom half stats, especially against the good teams. Which is what we're getting.

In many ways, we're worse than a bottom half team because at least they go into these fixtures with 11 players + subs all willing to work their socks off. We have at least 2 or 3 sulkers strolling around half the time.

Does anyone have the stats, was there a team worse than us away from home against the top half last season? Not many I'd imagine, and if they were they probably got relegated.

Absolutely scandalous.

 

[Isotope]

We should focus more on why we couldn’t beat the likes of Villa, Brentford and Brighton away rather than City, Arsenal and Liverpool away. I don’t think this is the type of game to hammer ETH on the bad away record for. It’s kinda a given that when the very top sides play eachother, the home team usually wins anyway and a draw for the away team is typically a decent result.

This. Even in Fergie's era, we rarely dominated away games against "big teams". Trashing those "smaller teams" were our bread and butter of winning the League, or came close to it.