When he first joined us he said era come to an end meaning liverpool and city’s dominance. Just didn’t think it be so soon.
Erik ten Hag - Manchester United manager
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In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik (@Rood) is joined by CEO Duncan Drasdo and Financial Director Andy Green from the Manchester United Supporters Trust for a special episode on all things behind the scenes at Old Trafford including a brief history of MUST and their aims today, views on INEOS and Sir Jim Ratcliffe so far, and the Old Trafford regeneration.
I bet he didn't support United in the 70sGoddamn glory hunters are coming back to the games!
I don't think there's any manager out there who wouldn't take Casemiro in a heartbeat. Even Pep wouldn't say no to the idea and he's got plenty of options in the midfield. Of course, managers have priorities. ETH was not wrong in his assessment of our midfield. Even with the signing of Eriksen, this team is crying out for a CM who can operate adequately between the lines on both ends of the pitch. His initial "mistake", as he was saying in the pre-season interviews, was that he thought of Fred as the "connector" between the defence and the midfield. The player who would provide the first pass out from the back to either beat the press or progress play. Something that, IMHO, added a flavour of "panic-buying" to Casemiro's transfer. But we did act. We took a suitcase full of money and we started knocking on every door for a solution to our problem. Solskjaer had both the time and the money to address the same issue: The difference is, he didn't.
I will agree that Solskajer wasn't overly happy with McFred. On the other hand, i also believe that he used to perceive the midfield less as a riddle to be solved and more as a nuisance that had to be dealt with. That's probably one of the reasons why he never truly invested in it for almost 3 years. He wasn't dogmatic as many believe, he was more than willing to go back to the drawing board when things weren't going well for him. In this sense, Matic proved quite useful in our build-up after project restart with his ability to drop between the centre-halves and pick out passes. That wasn't the product of tactical acumen, though, but an attempt to patch up the issues Maguire's (and Lindelof/AWB) dithering on the ball were creating. And he also wanted Pogba's vision and his exquisite long-passing range to create chances for a forward line which consisted of players (Martial, Rashford, Greenwood, Cavani) who are all at their best when they can be direct and exploit open spaces. Solskjaer could see all of that. But between a defensive line that feels safe when defending deep and a frontline for which work rate seemed to be an alien concept, the spaces in the midfield became huge. Thus, McTominay and Fred came into the picture. There's a reason why these two are associated with Solskjaer's time at the club, just as Fellaini is associated with Mourinho's tactics despite him being a Moyes signing. They ended up being a necessity for us because the overall plan was deeply flawed.
In the end, Casemiro is an integral player for us, not only because he is a world-class footballer, but because we're maximizing what we can take from a player with his attributes. Notice that ETH rarely mentions how much space Casemiro covers on the pitch. He prefers to talk about his passing abilities, which allow our #8 to position himself closer to the attackers and between the oppositions lines. He also describes him as a "possession-safe" midfielder, one who can be an outlet and provide a numerical advantage in the attacking half. ETH shouldn't be rendered some kind of genius for mentioning these things. Casemiro had the very same qualities in Madrid. But the difference between great and good/average managers isn't in who they buy, but in what they buy. You can spend a fortune on Casemiro to create a midfield like the one ETH is trying to build. Or you can spend it to buy the luxury upgrade of McTominay on the pitch. Both things are possible. And that's why a lot of people on here were screaming that, despite the consecutive top-4 finishes, we were going absolutely nowhere with Solskjaer.
who would we have gotten if fans didn’t do that? And when?
It's not the fans who are deciding on managers.
Donny is more an attacking midfielder im talking about a pure CM/CDM
He played them loads because Pogba and Matic were sicknotes. They were never first choice.
Solskjaer clearly never wanted VdB or fancied him (which has been vindicated), Amad was signed by our youth scouting department, Solskjaer had never seen him play and thought he was supposed to be going to the youth teams. We needed a winger as much as we needed a central midfielder. These are really weird examples. EtH also didn't buy a proper central midfielder until 2 games into the season when it looked like we were floundering.
He spent a lot because he was rebuilding the squad. He never played McFred when Pogba or Matic were available and fit, I think that says far more about how he viewed them than being forced to play them by necessity.
I don't think that resembles anything remotely like what happened to be honest. It was extremely obvious Matic and Pogba were preferred in almost every situation bar the occasional time he decided to sit deep and spoil vs PSG/City. McFred came into the picture because of injuries, not because of a tactical issue. Our best and most coherent football under Solskjaer came with Pogba and Matic in midfield, they were just never around long enough to make it work. He also played Herrera in his first season every opportunity.
You can argue Solskjaer should have gotten a central midfielder like Casemiro, but that wasn't even EtH's 4th priority either. The squad has been mismanaged for a long time and has had an awful lot of issues to fix. If Solskjaer had bought Casemiro instead of Varane in 2020 we'd be complaining about him leaving Lindelof/Maguire there for so long. Either way one thing is sure, McFred was a last resort for what he had available and not in any way a tactical preference outside of a few niche cases.
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I don‘t think there is too much difference between the intention/style of Van Gaal possession and Ten Hag‘s style. I think the big difference is the players we now have vs what LvG had. Hag tends to be more pragmatic with tactics, while Van Gaal was less rigid with formations.
It makes a big difference whether you have Smalling and Jones at the back or Varane and Martinez.
We looked best under Van Gaal with Carrick or Blind playing as cb.
Biggest difference is that Hag is happy to switch to playing on the counter when that is the best tactic to go with. Under Van Gaal we were not able to break quickly, it was one of the areas that needed improvement.
I disagree there. ETH's approach is much more intense and energetic. Watching LVG's football was like watching a team 5-0 up by default every game. Feck all urgency and back passing galore rubbish.
If we keep going the same way, you just know we'll rue those dropped points in London
Reading Erik's biography he has always been a man of integrity and always looked towards improving his teams wherever. He knows what he wants and will get it. This shows in what he is doing at OT. At last since Fergie we have a manager who knows what he is doing and doesnt let the players rise above him with inflated egos. He sticks by his players if he feels it is necessary. I love him and I love what he is doing at OT. Long may this continue
I think that was mostly a lack of quality on the ball. We just couldn‘t do it.
Besides, we have people complaining about it now as well. Some don‘t like possession football at all.
This season is an incredible story so far. The transformation in the game against Liverpool was astounding, the wins against Arsenal and City great moments as well. I think we may be on track for a great season, since the other clubs are looking vulnerable and we are on fire.
It still shows poor judgement on Ole's part. Matic's legs were gone and Pogba had a poor injury record and was woefully inconsistent.
Midfield is the heart and soul of the team and Ole did not sign one deep lying midfielder.
Other signings like Maguire and AWB were poor also.
I know that it is always easier to ignore oppo fans opinion but it is very nice to read what they think about our manager now.
During Solskjaer era they were delighted that we have Ole but now, even deluded bunch from rawk, think that ETH is excellent manager.
Give this man top class striker and one more midfielder and we will fight for title next year
During Solskjaer era they were delighted that we have Ole but now, even deluded bunch from rawk, think that ETH is excellent manager.
Give this man top class striker and one more midfielder and we will fight for title next year
What’s really annoying is he is on course to topple both Klopp and Pep yet Pep gets away before Ten Hag puts the foot down
I agree. With the news of Citeh, Liverpool and Chelsea being....them, there might not be a better chance to go and try and win the league.
We haven't travelled there well at all. Arsenal, Chelsea, Brentford and Palace, all dropped points. Thankfully we only have Spurs there left...and Wembley
Ha! We beat Fulham!
We did get rumours about Sean Longstaff for 50 millions, though.
Ole didn't care about midfield.
He used midfield to get the ball to the strikers as soon as possible, and then help protect defenders. Nothing in between.
Unfortunately that was ultimately his downfall.
Maybe, but then the team was also in desperate need of other positions during Solskjaers' time here too. He was never going to be able to fix everything in a few transfer windows, team building takes time.
Everyone and their dog knew we needed a top class striker this year, probably more than a right winger or even a new centerback. Relying on an injured Martial is "poor judgement" because with one we'd likely be very close to top of the league now.
The reality is of course that there wasn't one available who we were convinced by for the money it would have taken. That happens in football. We turned our noses up at a DM because we didn't fancy Rabiot's demands and only swooped because it was Casemiro.
I'm 100% certain if Casemiro was available Solskjaer would have taken him over virtually any of his other signings he made in his time here, he wasn't though so we looked at other options. That's just how football works, it's not neat and tidy.
Could not disagree more. Especially as LVG reign went on. His football had way more passing for the sake of passing, back and sideways passing.
The goals we have scored under ETH with multiple passes, were only seen under LVG in preseason.
One of the best matches under LVG and the team goals was the game against Liverpool at Anfield. ETH teams actually pass with purpose and have movement.
True but still hoping we get a second chance
And those first two losses to Brighton and Brentford, and those two points dropped when Rashford could have scored a late winner vs. Newcastle, and those points away to Chelsea where we were the better side.
It will never just be one result.
Eh? I'm talking about the Palace win and Arse draw double. We lost 3 points in 5 minutes (and 5 against Arsenal).
Not that difficult to understand. At least for most.
The point is that teams dropping points is inevitable. Some days you'll win it in the last minute, some you'll lose or draw. Over a season it tends to even out based on what level your team is at. You can rue Palace scoring a last minute screamer in a game we should've won, but then we had a few tight wins ourselves that we were lucky to hold on in. We were on a great run, some bad luck was due. Out of the way now. We aren't a team capable of winning 15 games straight yet, not when we struggle scoring so much
I agree.
The big difference is that ten Hag wants his teams to play vertical passes within the positional play principles with high intensity on and off the ball. And that's still in development and will become more pronounced as we add more players to the team going forward.
Van Gaal's positional play ideas were very basic on the ball and there was a absence of a methodical off the ball, proactive approach to defending, which meant the likes of Pochettino took advantage in a league (at the top) that was starting to transition into a high intensity/high pressing league. And as years went by, more and more teams were hiring coaches who were defending in numbers from the front, and that's why the likes of Chris Smalling and currently the keeper was/is under the microscope due to the difference between when Van Gaal took over and the how the league evolved. There was plenty of time to play out from the back against the majority of opponents when LVG took over. But even mid table teams are now looking to defend high up the pitch along with the likes of Klopp, Arteta, Guardiola etc.
Not all dropped point are the same.
We had momentum and really could have put pressure on the Arse who barely need pressure to bottle it. These things matter.
Our loss to Villa, for example, wasn't that big of a deal because there were mitigating factors. You could see how EtH was annoyed by these two games because he could also feel we were on the verge of a major run and we got tripped up.
Yes but a trip up was coming. We had 9 wins in a row. Winning runs are very hard. 3 of those 9 were tight games won by just the 1 goal (last minute vs Fulham, comeback vs City, 1 goal win vs Wolves). We have far too many games in fact that are decided by just 1 goal. It's not avoidable to drop points sometimes when what you have is Weghorst on loan up top with nobody else at striker. That's just where we're at. If not that game at palace, it would've been still vs Arsenal (they battered us, yes we lost by 1 but they also did batter us throughout the game and a draw would've been stealing a point), or in one of the next games. Law of averages and all that. No team is going to be perfect, and there will be results that you feel hard done by and others you are lucky with. Just need to raise our average level to get more points over a season, even if there will be random games where we drop stupid points.
There's a reason why long winning runs are rare while teams bounce back quite often. It's a different mentality to win 2 games a week every week compared to bouncing back after a defeat.
Dutch team at the World Cup did not play boring possession style football.
The players at MU could not play progressive football, it is that simple.
There were some goals with long passing sequences during the seasons, your last statement is not correct. I remember a Mata goal with 40 passes preceding it.
But Van Gaal's Dutch teams in Brazil and Qatar (and in the qualifiers) also looked absolutely nothing like a Ten Hag team.
I think it's pretty clear that Van Gaal's teams for a long while now have mostly been pretty static affairs, with defensive security prominent and attacking guile and intensity not very visible. That doesn't sound much like Ten Hag's approach to me, even if he has used a couple of relatively defensive setups in United games so far.
The Dutch team under LVG in both World Cups he managed in were mostly pretty damn boring to watch.
Yes no yes. At United he tried to incorporate a more controlled possession style. You cannot do that at a national team, if the players aren‘t suited to it.
At a club you can recruit and train players to build a team with a different style. That‘s what he tried to do, but the process broke down halfway through.
He thought he could get the players in to do it, which didn‘t happen. He would have been better off with a pragmatic approach.
Ten Hag doesn't really strive for a more controlled possession style though; he wants his team to be very vertical and direct.
I mean, on a very high-level, yes, Van Gaal and Ten Hag both want their teams to dominate the ball and determine the rhythm of the game, so it's similar there. But within their actual execution of that approach, I'd say they are really quite different - even if you go back to Van Gaal's original style with Ajax in the 90s.
Well, I am very disappointed that we lost 5 pts (draw crystal palace and lost to arsenal). Our opportunity window to challenge the league title was shut down probably.
No I really think the approaches are similar.
To move the ball forward you have to go sideways or backwards as well, this is the same for Guardiola, Van Gaal, Ten Hag, every possession style really.
It is all about the execution. You need players who are confident and able to move the ball forward through the lines. Vertical when possible.
Van Gaal did not have enough of those players. Blind and an aging Carrick.
Ten Hag got Martinez, Casemiro and Eriksen in for this purpose.