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In an alternate timeline, Erik ten Hag could be the present supervisor at Tottenham Hotspur and Ange Postecoglou would nonetheless be a distant thought in Glasgow.
The Dutchman was interviewed for the vacant place at Spurs following Jose Mourinho’s dramatic dismissal within the lead as much as the 2021 League Cup closing. On this timeline, nevertheless, the Spurs hierarchy wouldn’t have rejected Ten Hag because of considerations over his communication abilities, as they did in ours.
The Athletic contends the chief department on the creatively-named Tottenham Hotspur Stadium determined to rent Nuno Espirito Santo on account of doubts over Ten Hag’s “command of English and [his] means to speak concepts.” Regardless of being impressed with the Dutch supervisor’s methodical strategy and proactive philosophy, they didn’t belief his means to translate these concepts on the pitch.
When Manchester United later interviewed Ten Hag for their very own managerial emptiness, they didn’t arrive on the identical conclusion.
Demanding Self-discipline within the Dressing Room
Over a collection of interviews in 2022, the membership’s executives – soccer director John Murtough and technical director Darren Fletcher – had been mentioned to have “no points with the Dutchman’s communication abilities.”
As a substitute, they had been receptive to his plans to “develop” the United squad, believing he might make the gamers “able to competing for trophies on a number of fronts.” A “meticulous strategy” – which targeted on each facet of squad’s lives – was significantly “spectacular” to United’s administrators.
There was a way amongst the choice makers at Previous Trafford their dressing room had developed deep-rooted points with self-discipline and professionalism. The hands-off strategy of the pleasant Ole Gunnar Solsjkaer had adopted the cold-shoulder mentality of the Jose Mourinho, with the gamers seeming to prey on the great nature of the Norwegian after struggling beneath the unhealthy nature of the Portuguese.
Ralf Rangnick, appointed as interim supervisor within the wake of Solsjkaer’s departure, was believed to be shocked by the state of the United squad – bodily and mentally – when he took cost. The Austrian rapidly misplaced a dressing room which barely gave him an opportunity to instil his concepts.
By this stage, United’s gamers would seemingly relatively have run to the press to leak beneficial tales about themselves than really run to press the opposition. The connection between the staff and the followers was damaged.
The membership’s executives believed an authoritarian rule-setter like Ten Hag would supply an antidote to this situation; a return to the times of excessive requirements and excessive expectations beneath Sir Alex Ferguson. His philosophy at Ajax, predicated upon attacking soccer with an appreciation for blooding in academy gamers, was additionally valued.
And so the Dutchman handed these interviews with flying colors, with the membership saying him as their new supervisor in April 2022, forward of the 2022/23 season.
The Flying Dutchman
A return to the Champions League, courtesy of a cushty third place end, and a primary trophy in six years adopted (in addition to reaching the FA Cup closing), with Ten Hag’s debut yr within the Premier League incomes the Dutchman plaudits throughout English soccer.
United’s squad responded positively to his strategies, for essentially the most half. Olá Cristiano!
Within the construct as much as the two-nil victory over Newcastle within the Carabao Cup closing, Luke Shaw praised Ten Hag’s easy strategy: “The management he takes, the foundations he units out and everybody has to comply with them — or, as you’ve seen just lately, in the event you’re not following his guidelines and doing what he needs, then you definately received’t play.”
The month prior, Marcus Rashford was dropped for an important away match towards Wolves after arriving one minute late to a staff assembly. Deployed from the bench within the second half, the ahead would come on to attain the one aim of the sport as United ran out 1-0 winners.
Rashford was believed to be extra-motivated to carry out after feeling his exclusion had let his teammates down. As a substitute of being indignant at a strict rule, the 26-year-old was as an alternative indignant at himself for falling foul of it.
The dressing room was seemingly having zero points understanding the directions and messages Ten Hag was searching for to impart. The barrier between Dutch and English didn’t section him both – he was as blissful to conduct interviews and press-conferences in his second language as he was classes at Carrington.
Group conferences – which might final so long as an hour, such was the element the supervisor delved into – had been largely producing the specified outcomes, regardless of gamers’ frustrations with the size of them. Senior squad members had been equally perturbed by Ten Hag’s fixed repeating of sure rules and guidelines; however that didn’t cease them from executing them.
A way of self-discipline and professionalism had been restored at Previous Trafford final season. And it appeared to largely stem from the supervisor’s means to speak precisely what he wished and anticipated from his gamers.
At this level, United’s executives would possible have been casting a smug eye in direction of Spurs’ misfortunes beneath Antonio Conte, who was finally sacked in March 2023 after being unable to speak correctly along with his squad or his bosses.
New 12 months Similar Issues
But, primarily based on United’s abysmal performances this season, one could be forgiven for questioning whether or not the Tottenham government’s impression of the Dutchman was a prescient one.
United have misplaced fourteen video games this yr. They misplaced twelve within the entirety of final season.
They languish seventh within the league with a damaging aim distinction. Solely Crystal Palace, Sheffield United and Burnley have scored fewer objectives than United. A prime 4 end seems to be more and more unlikely, whereas they’ve already crashed out of the Champions League and Carabao Cup in embarrassing style. The FA Cup represents the one sensible technique of salvaging some type of success this season.
Put extra succinctly, it’s been unhealthy. Actually unhealthy.
A persistent and pervasive damage disaster has undoubtedly contributed to those struggles. Ten Hag’s defence has been hit significantly laborious, with all 4 of his senior centre-backs unavailable at varied factors. His first-choice midfield pairing of Casemiro and Mason Mount has additionally been dominated out for almost three months.
Accidents to vital squad members, resembling Aaron Wan-Bissaka, Tyrell Malacia and Christian Eriksen, has additional exacerbated the unavailability of those first-choice choices.
To make issues tougher, Ten Hag has been searching for to implement a brand new system at Previous Trafford – one primarily based largely on dominating transitions by means of a high-press. To take action, he’s enacted a formation tweak from final season, whereas instructing his gamers to play increased up the pitch.
This is able to have been a painful course of along with his first-choice eleven. With a depleted squad, it’s been a catastrophe.
There has maybe been a naivety to persevering with to pursue a radically totally different model with so lots of your key gamers dominated out. However Ten Hag is uncompromising as soon as his thoughts is settled. And this could concurrently be a supervisor’s greatest power and their most deadly flaw, relying on outcomes.
Whereas United rank extremely throughout urgent metrics, main the league in classes resembling pressured turnovers, this development has come at the price of virtually every part else. They’re extra prone to concede and fewer prone to rating; they’re extra vulnerable from set-pieces with out providing a menace of their very own; they battle in possession, and are way more open to opposition’s counter-attacks ought to their preliminary press be overwhelmed.
They’re merely much less prone to win video games of soccer; or extra prone to lose them, relying in your emotional disposition. Regardless, Previous Trafford has resembled extra of an empty glass this yr.
If Ten Hag’s gamers had been heeding his directions throughout his debut season, they seem to have stopped listening within the sophomore one. Murmurings have even resurfaced within the press of a dressing room in discontent, although this has been extensively refuted by the membership.
The Lack of Id
Accidents alone usually are not a adequate trigger for these performances, or lack thereof.
There’s a scarce lack of demonstrable progress on the pitch this yr, regardless of it being Ten Hag’s second in cost. He has been entrusted with over £400 million price of funding on gamers particularly requested by him. But it isn’t apparent precisely what the Dutchman is attempting to get his squad to do.
The obsession with the press is but to impress. The dearth of enchancment in United’s means in possession has been totally underwhelming. The absence of cohesion within the entrance line and the absence of organisation within the backline are as stark as they’re symmetrical.
United started the season towards Wolves with (just about) a full power staff. All of those identical points had been current on this recreation – one which the opposition had been desperately unfortunate to lose – however had been dismissed as opening day kinks, points which might be ironed out because the season bought underway.
As a substitute, they had been early warning indicators of a staff struggling to execute their supervisor’s directions. And this was earlier than accidents may very well be used to rationalise the issue.
Satirically, it’s Postecoglou and Spurs who’ve demonstrated the fragility of such an excuse.
Regardless of going through the same damage disaster to Ten Hag, Spurs’ risk-heavy attacking model has by no means wavered beneath the Australian supervisor. They play the precise identical means, whomever is within the beginning eleven. Large Ange has began a centre-back partnership of Emerson Royal and Ben Davies away on the Etihad and nonetheless sought to play out from the again.
United welcomed Spurs to Previous Trafford themselves just a few weeks in the past. Postecoglou was with out three of his first-choice midfielders and two of his first-choice attackers. But Spurs dominated with the ball, confidently spraying it round Previous Trafford prefer it was their dwelling stadium. Although the sport would end a draw, there was just one winner within the dugouts.
Within the post-match interview, Ten Hag indicated his staff had been “preventing for one another” however that they needed to “man up” when defending corners. Given the intricacies concerned in trendy set items, this feels an instruction missing intimately.
Equally, the Dutchman praised his forwards for “arising with routines” with one another. United’s struggles this season up entrance make extra sense when considered by means of the lens of a supervisor encouraging his ahead line to give you options on the pitch themselves.
They’re ominous indicators, nevertheless – ones which level to a supervisor seemingly unable to successfully talk his concepts to his gamers. In distinction, Tottenham’s gamers have completely little doubt over what Postecoglou needs from them.
United’s tactical set-up final season was easy.
It was a fundamental 4-2-3-1 construction with a deep midfield pivot and a defence that hardly ever pushed up excessive. The staff sought to soak up stress after which counter by means of an attacking dyad of Bruno Fernandes and Marcus Rashford.
The system this season has been extra advanced.
A 4-3-3 construction morphs right into a 3-1-6 formation when in possession. A sole midfield pivot sits behind two superior midfielders, instructed to push up the pitch in an effort to provoke a high-press. Quite than absorbing stress, United search as an alternative to inflict it themselves. The staff are anticipated to provoke and participate in counter-attacks, not merely depend on Fernandes and Rashford.
Has the elevated issue in executing this recreation plan confirmed an excessive amount of for Ten Hag’s English to translate? Has the shift from easy to advanced required a degree of communication the supervisor is incapable of? Have the agency guidelines which ruled his first season in England turn out to be repetitive orders in his second? Has he misplaced his dressing room? Is he merely out of his depth?
It’s attainable.
It’s additionally attainable that it takes time to instil a brand new model at a membership, significantly one with the latest historical past of United. It’s attainable a devastating damage record could make this course of slower, and whereas it doesn’t absolutely absolve Ten Hag, there’s a probability we see actual progress on the pitch now his key males – Martinez, Shaw, Casemiro and Mount – are set to return. It’s attainable a lightweight bulb could abruptly activate within the United squad’s heads and the Dutchman’s imaginative and prescient start to make sense.
It’s attainable we may very well be set to witness historical past repeat itself.
A Path Already Trodden
The problems Ten Hag are contending with in Manchester draw an uncanny resemblance to his early struggles in Amsterdam. Regardless of a promising begin after being appointed Ajax supervisor in December 2017, issues rapidly soured as outcomes took a flip.
Although the Dutch giants had been in a poor place when he took the reigns, a powerful defeat away to PSV Eindhoven, which confirmed Ajax’s rivals as Eredivisie champions, was significantly damaging to followers’ notion of Ten Hag. The actual fact his facet largely imploded on the pitch – Luuk de Jong and Nicolas Tagliafico had been each despatched off in direction of the top of the match which Ajax misplaced 3-0 – didn’t assist.
Neither did the very fact Ten Hag was not your typical Ajax supervisor.
Born within the east of the Netherlands (Haaksbergen), he possesses a sort of accent which is commonly mocked within the nation’s north-western capital. He’s additionally thought-about blunt, even by Dutch requirements. Ten Hag had not beforehand labored at Ajax both. He doesn’t subscribe religiously to Cruyffian rules, favouring a extra direct strategy, predicated upon transitions. He’s pragmatic, preferring to adapt his tactical plan to his gamers, relatively than his gamers to his tactical plan.
There have been doubts amongst followers earlier than Ten Hag was appointed; and these continued lengthy after he was confirmed as supervisor. They had been additionally mirrored within the Ajax dressing room early on, with Ten Hag’s new squad disapproving of the Dutchman’s repetitive, rule-based strategy.
Pieter Zwart, a Dutch reporter, confirmed these teething problems: “At first, he obtained a number of criticism for his model of communication. He was not thought-about as a typical Ajax coach, due to his background within the east of the Netherlands and his accent. On prime of that, he all the time spoke about the identical rules. Over and over.”
These rules rapidly grew to become sacrosanct on the Ajax coaching floor and in staff conferences.
In 2021, Dusan Tadic, Ajax’s captain, revealed the squad had been topic to 3 separate conferences, every forty-five minutes in size, in preparation for a recreation towards AZ Alkmaar. “We had been instructed fifty occasions what the power of AZ is and what we must always do in return,” Tadic mentioned. Ajax would cruise to a cushty two-nil win within the recreation en path to the Eredivise title.
Equally, Boudewijn Pahlplatz, a Dutch coach who has beforehand performed and coached alongside Ten Hag, believes “repetition” is the United supervisor’s favoured strategy to teaching. “He does a number of repetition. That was virtually an issue for him at first [at Ajax]. He educated them very laborious and really lengthy to get his philosophy into the gamers. [They] weren’t used to that.”
In November 2018, Frenkie de Jong, a key a part of Ten Hag’s Ajax staff, defined Ten Hag’s course of. It carefully mirrored Tadic’s phrases three years later.
The midfielder said: “in the event you practice one thing loads, it’ll robotically get into your system. [Ten Hag shows us] how we must always stand and that commonly includes photos. What must be improved and that’s additionally mirrored in our recreation. We’re actually engaged on it.”
De Jong’s phrases are significantly related as they got here slightly below a yr into Ten Hag’s tenure in Amsterdam. In addition they got here shortly after the supervisor’s rule-based, repetitive strategy abruptly appeared to click on along with his squad, regardless of the early difficulties.
Within the 2017/18 season, Ajax had not taken half in a European competitors in any respect. They completed second within the league and had been eradicated within the spherical of sixteen of the KNVB Cup.
The 2018/19 season noticed Ajax attain the semi-finals of the Champions League, courtesy of a pulsating run which noticed them vanquish Juventus and Actual Madrid with unbelievable performances. They received the league for the primary time in 4 years, scoring 119 objectives within the course of. They accomplished a home double with a 4-0 win over Willem II within the KNVB Cup closing.
Out of the blue, seemingly out of nowhere, Ten Hag’s strategies clicked.
Sjoerd Overgoor, a former participant of the Dutchman at Go Forward Eagles, contends it’s a theme all through Ten Hag’s profession. “In case you have a board who shouldn’t have endurance it may very well be executed after just a few months,” says Overgoor. “However the board trusted him…at Ajax and also you see what occurs subsequent. It was the identical at Eagles. It was up and down. After that, it was up, up and up.”
Up or down at Previous Trafford?
It seems, subsequently, if we settle for Ten Hag will have the ability to replicate his standard template at Previous Trafford, it’s merely a matter of time earlier than he will get United firing.
Nevertheless it’s a harmful recreation to play given the unconventional variations between a footballing behemoth like Manchester United and a relative minnow like Go Forward Eagles. Even Ajax and United usually are not actually in the identical stratosphere, regardless of the membership’s monumental respective histories.
Ten Hag must depend on his experiences prior to now, however present an up to date model which accounts for the rigours of English soccer and the magnitude of United. And his communication abilities will show important to this.
Ten Hag’s long-term success – or failure – will possible boil down to 2 elements.
Firstly, it’ll rely whether or not his over-arching plan for the staff is a possible one. Whereas it is sensible to instil a press-heavy model at a membership who’ve a deep-rooted historical past of fast-paced soccer, with out the inspiration of defensive stability, and the flexibility to retain possession successfully, it’ll show a flawed try. Given Ten Hag’s success at Ajax was primarily based on a potent pairing of possession and urgent, it’s overwhelmingly possible he already is aware of this.
Secondly, and maybe extra importantly in consequence, it’ll then hinge on whether or not Ten Hag is ready to successfully talk this imaginative and prescient to his gamers. Certainly, it could even partially depend upon his means to convey it to the fan base as an entire.
It wouldn’t be an excessive amount of of a stretch to conclude followers’ sentiment round Ten Hag took a pointy flip in November, when he made an off-hand remark in an interview about this United staff “by no means” with the ability to play like his Ajax one. The Dutchman later clarified this level, nevertheless it was a salient reminder of how a lot simpler a supervisor’s job is when he retains the supporters’ help.
With the complete return of Ten Hag’s expensively assembled squad imminent, United might want to exhibit tangible progress for the rest of the season. He would require his gamers, as De Jong articulated, to point out they’ve his message of their programs. Repeated guidelines on the coaching floor must turn out to be discovered classes on the pitch.
Put merely, United might want to go “up, up and up” this season if the Dutchman is to stay on the helm at Previous Trafford come the summer time. If they don’t, there shall be a really content material board room in North London.
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