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What could have been a clean break in the summer instead became a messy, drawn-out divorce
The record books will show that there were 116 days between Manchester United triggering a 12-month extension in Erik ten Hag’s contract and finally sacking the manager, but the surprise is the Dutchman lasted that long.
Indeed, there must have been an uncomfortable sense of deja-vu within the corridors of power at Old Trafford of late – and for Ten Hag himself.
It was like the final weeks of last season were repeating themselves all over again: a lame duck manager limping on as the club agonised over his future while surveying potential replacements.
In the days leading up to and following the FA Cup final victory over Manchester City on May 25, the crowning glory of Ten Hag’s strange two-and-a-half year tenure in charge, United held conversations with at least half a dozen managers.
Thomas Tuchel, Roberto De Zerbi, Thomas Frank, Kieran McKenna, Mauricio Pochettino and Marco Silva were all spoken to at one point or another.
In recent weeks, with United plumbing new depths under Ten Hag, the names of a fresh batch of managers from Xavi to Edin Terzic to Ruben Amorim began to be debated and a few old ones resurface as fans wondered how long it would be before Ruud van Nistelrooy, parachuted on to the coaching staff in the summer, might take interim charge.
There were even similar staging posts when United could have pulled the trigger but ultimately opted against it, compelled for one reason or another to give Ten Hag that bit more time, hoping – perhaps forlornly, naively – that he could right a sinking ship, despite all evidence to the contrary.
For May 14, when United executives met in Monaco where the club’s co-owner Sir Jim Ratcliffe resides and resolved that Ten Hag was to be relieved of his duties only to eventually row back after that unexpected FA Cup triumph and a wave of fan sentiment, read October 8.
On the same day Tuchel was signing his contract to become England manager and the man who had come closest to replacing Ten Hag back in June went off the market, United’s power brokers convened at Ineos’ Knightsbridge headquarters for an executive committee meeting that may have been long in the diary but which now had taken on a very different colouring in the wake of a calamitous start to the season.
In the hours before United were trounced 3-0 at home to Liverpool on September 1, chief executive Omar Berrada and sporting director Dan Ashworth had given their full public backing to Ten Hag. There was no doubt he would survive the September international break.
But by the next hiatus in the domestic calendar that faith was being pushed to breaking point and, if one or two had got their way, Ten Hag may not have been in the dugout for the Brentford game nine days ago.
Ratcliffe himself had refused to give Ten Hag his public backing before a goalless draw at Aston Villa in United’s last game before the October international break, deferring instead to the people he had enlisted to make such decisions.
The America’s Cup – in which Ratcliffe’s Ineos Britannia sailing team were beaten by New Zealand – had served as something of a distraction for the Oldham-born billionaire. But there has also been no hiding how alarmed Ratcliffe has been by United’s start to the season, and he has not been afraid to voice that opinion to those closest to him.
In addition to Tuchel accepting the England post, his predecessor Gareth Southgate had effectively ruled himself out of the United job by revealing he would not manage again for at least the next year. But then United knew this and had already resolved that the former England manager had been out of club football too long to be the right fit for them, although that is not to say Southgate has not had his advocates at Old Trafford.
He has a long-standing relationship with Jimmy Worrall, who founded the networking group Leaders in Sport with Ineos’ director of sport and United board member Sir Dave Brailsford and was the person the club used to help facilitate many of those meetings with other managers at the end of last season.
Even with Ten Hag surviving that six-hour inquest at Ineos HQ, though, it was also clear his reign would not withstand another body blow. Defeat at West Ham on Sunday was undeserved and highly contentious but it was never going to be viewed in isolation.
By the time Ten Hag was called to what was described as a calm and dignified meeting with Ashworth and Berrada at United’s Carrington training base on Monday morning to be told he had finally used up all his lives, it was made clear that “neither the results nor the performances have been good enough across last season and into this one” and that there were “no excuses for the current performance level”. The clocks have only just gone back and already United fear another season without Champions League football. As one source put it: “We have put everything we can in place to develop and we are not seeing an improvement.”
Ten Hag would later be spotted ducking down in the back seat of a black Mercedes, hoping to avoid the cameras, as he was driven out of Carrington for the last time, the fifth permanent manager to be sent on his way since Sir Alex Ferguson’s retirement in 2013 sent the club into a tailspin. There is no hiding place in this job.
In truth, United have gradually been going backwards under Ten Hag since winning the Carabao Cup in the February of his first season in charge, despite the manager’s increasingly desperate and, at times, excruciating attempts to hold up two trophies as evidence of progress.
The league will always offer the most accurate barometer of a team’s development and United’s form in the Premier League in the 20 months since that 2-0 win over Newcastle at Wembley makes for grim, indefensible reading: 61 matches played, 22 of which have ended in defeat, or a loss every 2.7 games. United failed to score in 17 of them and conceded as many (82) as they scored.
All told, Ten Hag’s United conceded at least three times in 24 – almost 20 per cent – of his 128 matches. The nadir of course came with a shattering 7-0 defeat at Liverpool.
As one Old Trafford staffer, in a nod to a description once afforded the England cricket team, quipped this season: “There are only three things wrong with this United side: they can’t defend, can’t attack and can’t score”.
United committed around £615 million in transfer fees under Ten Hag, including £200 million this summer, gave him many of the players he asked for and increasingly threw more and more support around him and yet a game plan and identity became harder and harder to discern and the same mistakes and fault lines would rear their head time and again.
This was a team who frequently imploded at the first whiff of a setback, were unable to read or anticipate danger, left chasms of space for opponents to exploit, did not work hard enough and were wasteful in front of goal. Injuries – and there have been an unconscionable number – do not alone explain United’s shortcomings.
With so many former Ajax players at his disposal, there was bewilderment at United’s struggles to play out from the back with any coherence or conviction and the repercussions of a litany of recruitment failures have been laid bare this season. Ten Hag found himself still reliant upon two 32-year-old midfielders in Casemiro and Christian Eriksen whom he would have expected to have moved on from long ago.
At the same time, the absence of transfer flops Antony (because he is no longer trusted to start) and Mason Mount (because he is never fit) is – along with all those missed chances and scoreless games – a grim, daily reminder of where the money that could have gone on Harry Kane was invested.
In the main, Ten Hag handled himself with a dignity that ensured things never turned toxic like they did in the final six months under Jose Mourinho, but that is not to say he did not have his differences or problems with players. Judging by David de Gea’s reaction on social media on Monday to the news of Ten Hag’s sacking, the United goalkeeper has clearly not forgotten or forgiven the Dutchman for the manner of his exit last year when he felt a new contract was in place and waiting to be signed, only for the manager to pull the plug at the 11th hour.
De Gea simply tweeted an emoji of what is often referred to as a disrespectful Italian hand gesture – two pinched fingers denoting a strong sense of disagreement and frustration. Jadon Sancho, another former United player who had his run-ins with Ten Hag before leaving for Chelsea this summer, may well have shared some of De Gea’s sentiments.
For Ten Hag’s critics, a lack of empathy was one of his biggest drawbacks, certainly when it came to man-management. Even one of his own former staff, Benni McCarthy, admitted as much in a recent interview, questioning Ten Hag’s handling of Cristiano Ronaldo, another player with whom the manager fell out. McCarthy, Ten Hag’s former forwards coach, said Ronaldo needed a “coach who understands him” and that the manager “wasted a great opportunity to use Cristiano in the right way”.
Nor did it help that Ten Hag’s communication skills were not his strong suit and his struggles with English were exposed all the more in recent months by the way in which his compatriot Arne Slot has articulated himself at Liverpool.
United’s hierarchy had felt Ten Hag would benefit from a refresh to his coaching staff which saw Rene Hake and Van Nistelrooy replace Steve McClaren and Mitchell van der Gaag in the summer.
But it has not had the desired effect and, if anything, Van Nistelrooy’s presence became something of a distraction, with plenty viewing the former United striker as a natural caretaker manager should things go south. Suffice to say, it is now Van Nistelrooy in temporary charge.
What could have been a clean, if ruthless, break in the summer between Ten Hag and United has ultimately become a rather messy, drawn-out divorce. Picking up the pieces of it from here will not be easy or straightforward.