Erik ten Hag's lack of charisma, bravery and diminishing ability to effectively change his tactics cost him his job

Well, shall we digest it?

It’s over.

After 2 seasons and 14 games, new Manchester United owners INEOS and Erik ten Hag have parted ways in what has been an ultimately bizarre relationship that never looked like a convincing partnership.

The defeat on Sunday to West Ham in incredulous, controversial circumstances was seen as one embarrassment too many as United look to secure Sporting Lisbon manager Ruben Amorim.

On the back of a horrendous 23/24 season it felt like a matter of when, not if Ten Hag would be sacked.

To be fair to INEOS, they had given the Dutchman more than enough time and investment to show them something. An exciting brand of football perhaps, or collecting the amount of points akin to his first season.

It’s astonishing that for a club as big as United it has taken THIS long for INEOS to dismiss the FA Cup winning coach. It can’t be forgotten the levels United had sunk to last season.

The public flirtations with Thomas Tuchel and Roberto De Zerbi in the summer indicated that he wasn’t the chosen one, rather the one in the seat that had just beaten Pep Guardiola.

A glorious day at Wembley aside there was enough evidence that tactically, the wheels were coming off. INEOS’s stuttering may have come from them being occupied with fixing the structures and processes left in place by the previous unpopular Glazer regime.

In doing so they may have forgotten they’re not the ones to manage the football team or sit in the dugout, which leaves you scratching your head as to why these first nine games were allowed to occur.

You can’t be the new sheriffs in town, with talks of turning around England’s most illustrious club without breaking some eggs but the petrochemical conglomerate allowed the FA Cup final and a failure to make an agreement with other managers to force their hand.

In football when the stakes are desperately high and United is consumed, followed and debated about to a world-wide exhausting level, if you don’t ruthlessly stick to your convictions, it tends to blow up in your face. Or rather you have to pay an extra £16 million, (the cost of renewing Ten Hag’s contract for an extra year).

At the time it was seen as a declaration of faith, that courting other managers was merely conjecture and the two parties were to work together to do what everyone before them hadn’t done but promised they could.

That classic, glorious dream. Take Manchester United back to the top. Instead the ‘keep him and see if he turns it around’ plan has quickly been thrown in the bin leaving INEOS to mark down the first big L into their early ownership.

It was quickly becoming apparent that Ten Hag hadn’t learnt from last season, it wasn’t just the catalogue of injuries that had led to him consistently and hopelessly changing the tactics. In his first season, his area of expertise was creating a United side that shape-shifted according to the opponent.

Bottom half opposition? No worries, exploit the gaps wide and inside with a full-back.

Big team fixture at home? Narrow the gaps centrally and hit them on the counter.

Can’t find a way to win a game? I’ve ignited Rashford’s form, he’ll cover us.

The burden of being United manager, the constant, suffocating pressure of always needing not hoping for a result meant we saw games like the one a couple of weeks ago vs Aston Villa.

A carbon copy of most of the away games United played last season, the priority being to stay compact, scrapping any attacking principles that could get you a result, scraping by.

Regularly needing a last minute Scott Mctominay or Bruno Fernandes goal to win.

Survival football, backed into a corner, bereft of the type of bold defiance United fans long for.

Largely the Dutchman reverted to this type of football in response to being decimated by injuries last season or when he felt as though he was in a position where he simply couldn’t afford to lose.

Ultimately, cracks began to show when Ten Hag would change his game plan TOO much, according to the opponent, surroundings and type of match. This was his strength in his first season that had turned into a weakness.

The desperation of winning meant he was always chasing what he thought was going to win a football match, not what would make Manchester United a brilliant football team for years to come.

Additionally whenever the tactics were constantly tinkered with last season, United suffered from one or more of the problems below:

1. Scraping wins relying heavily on late goals or moments from players with no real attacking principles or patterns to fall back on. Even if United won these games it was never convincing.

   

2. Huge holes in midfield, teams easily manipulating United’s press forcing them either wide or out of position to find gaps in midfield. This worked in 22-23, but it felt as though teams had figured it out and yet if you take a look at the images at the bottom this was STILL in issue that hadn’t been looked at this season. There was always a spare man in midfield for opponents to find with the midfield outnumbered.

3. To exasperate 2. at some point a forward press was added in by Ten Hag. This is a sign of the bravery that alluded him, the issue was this tactic also functioned with issues.

   It’s why we constantly saw teams with oceans of space running into United’s midfield and take 66 shots per game vs the Red Devils. Of course, I’m over exaggerating but the games felt exhausting, it was a miracle United came out from some of those games not being on the end of worst scorelines.

   Think about Brentford away and Newcastle away last season, it led to me screaming at the screen, things were that uncomfortable and awkward for their defence.

The fact that we saw all three of the above still as issues United were dealing with when we haven’t even reached November yet in the season is astonishing.

The man who specialised in ‘tinkering’ to alter a game had lost his touch. United were a team attempting to do three things at once and were unspectacular at each one.

The United job is a poisoned chalice, it’s the hottest topic ever day for every week round and everyone knows how they’d fix the conundrum until the get into the hot seat. The job has a way of chewing managers up and spitting them out and as the house of cards collapses it’s extremely difficult to get a hold of once the cracks appear.

It’s a club so besotted by it’s successful history and obsessed with the fact it’s gone, the scrutiny is unlike any other footballing institution. Henceforth you have to at least try be unshakably charismatic, to have a 34 inch chest and be the figurehead that is happy to take on the burden because that’s exactly why United were so successful before. One man’s ruthless, tenacious quest.

Perhaps the monster is too big for any modern day manager but it hardly helped Ten Hag never used the media to fire his side up, or spark a war of words. Guardiola’s conferences are always fascinating, whether he’s using them to overtly praise teams before crushing them or dramatically reminding the world that City are the best and he doesn’t care about the way they got there.

The Dutchman’s media was predictably the same responses or blunt remarks. Not that this is what defies how successful a United manager is but once the wins dry up (and they did) you were looking for some sort of retort or rallying cry to hang your hat on. It never came.

The United job is reminiscent of the England job before Gareth Southgate took over. A stifling amount of pressure with any slight problem magnified and covered in detail. A look at history with rose-tinted glasses. A high pressure environment where even when you win, your questioned on whether it’s good enough.

The only footballing institution that welcomes and thrives under such pressure has a lion share of it’s league’s revenue money and can buy the best talent in the world regardless of where they are in their careers. Real Madrid have gotten so accustomed to success a slight slip off the top of the mountain and an overhaul is swiftly overseen.

United have been scrambling to get up the mountain for years only to be sent back down to the bottom again, whilst the mountain has formed new peaks with other climbers looking to get ahead.

Going into this season, the issues of last were painfully clear. Ten Hag, however, only adjusted when his job was on the line by which point everyone had grown weary.

If you don’t win at United, you need to be bold and brave in your approach or rely on principles that serve you well and by season three those should be ironed out.

Chopping and changing in hopes of getting a result over the line meant after 30 months of being in charge, United altered their game plan far too often in desperation.

Manchester United is an extremely difficult job, but it becomes impossible when the fear of defeat encompasses and dictates your plan.