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<\/p>\nNot at the races: on Saturday, Marcus Rashford, Bruno Fernandes and company were outrun and outworked by a Newcastle team who had every right to feel more fatigued<\/p>\n
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Manchester United, Erik ten Hag claimed, remain just that. The Dutchman rebuffed reports he has lost the dressing room \u2013 or about half its members, anyway \u2013 by insisting he retains his players\u2019 backing, by rationalising that the proof is in the performances.<\/p>\n
\u201cEveryone is giving their best, there is unity as a team,\u201d Ten Hag said. \u201cYou can\u2019t play such great football as we did lately if there is no unity.\u201d And yet the supporting evidence hinted at the cracks in his argument. Ten Hag sought to reassert his authority and looked for solace in his past. That has given him strength and credibility.<\/p>\n
United\u2019s recent travails, both the results and the manner of them, however, can lend themselves to different interpretations. Their manager sought to claim they are headed in the right direction, that his way is the right way.<\/p>\n
\u201cBecause \u2013 see my record,\u201d he said. \u201cEverywhere I was, every season, I got my targets. If we stick together, stick to the plan and the strategy, we will get where we want to be.\u201d After a decade of underachievement, it is certainly not entirely Ten Hag\u2019s fault that those destinations appear far off but there is a gap between a talk of high standards and low-level displays this season. The ambitions are lofty \u2013 \u201cwe want to win the Premier League and we want to win the Champions League,\u201d said Ten Hag \u2013 but the reality very different.<\/p>\n
If United were never likely to achieve those aims this season, they face an early exit from the major European competition. They host Chelsea on Wednesday in precisely the sort of game they have lost this year, at a point when the manager\u2019s relationship with his players is under added scrutiny after their lacklustre efforts in defeat to Newcastle, when his case for the United squad still supporting him rests on wins over lesser lights.<\/p>\n
\u201cI know they would have dropped me against Fulham or Burnley if it was the other situation,\u201d Ten Hag said. \u201cIf the situation was not right, if the environment is not right, and that is not the case.\u201d The manager can project stubbornness and defiance; his side only do sometimes. They were outrun and outworked by a Newcastle team who had every right to feel more fatigued, given the injury list that meant they could not rotate. \u201cWhen you play one bad performance you can\u2019t tell the culture is no good,\u201d said Ten Hag, and if the \u00a373m signing Jadon Sancho is training with the under-18s as part of the manager\u2019s hardline approach to the culture, United are yet to reap any benefit from the stand-off.<\/p>\n
And as for the great football? Ten Hag claimed the overwhelming majority of his players want to play his brand of \u201cproactive, brave, dynamic\u201d football. Yet while United have been prolific in the Champions League, only five teams have scored fewer Premier League goals. Go by expected points and United trail Brentford and Everton by quite some distance. Ten Hag nevertheless looked at displays against Sean Dyche\u2019s team and Galatasaray when, he said, United played well in \u201calmost all aspects\u201d.<\/p>\n
And if Andre Onana\u2019s errors may have reshaped the narrative from the trip to Turkey, United have lost 48 per cent of their matches this season; even in the relegation campaign of 1973-74, they only lost 49 per cent. For now, Ten Hag\u2019s targets seem way off. \u201cI demand of my players to win every game,\u201d he said. \u201cIt doesn\u2019t matter who the opponent is, and I will stick to that. It brought us last year very far.\u201d This season, however, it does matter who the opponent is. United\u2019s 24 points have all come against the sides now in the lower half of the table.<\/p>\n
Perhaps they should not be billed as flat-track bullies, because seven of those victories have come by one-goal margins. But United have played five games against teams currently in the top half and lost all five. They have been beaten by Tottenham, Arsenal, Brighton, Manchester City and Newcastle. An imbalance in the fixture list means four of their next five matches are against the better teams, in Chelsea, Liverpool, West Ham and Aston Villa.<\/p>\n
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Erik ten Hag must find a way to beat the top teams or watch Man United fall further behind <\/p>\n
\u201cWe are developing, progressing as a team, but we have a lot to go, a lot to build on,\u201d Ten Hag said. The danger, though, is that they are regressing after his encouraging debut campaign. Certainly, the bad news comes more frequently now.<\/p>\n
\u201cNegativity is never good. You have to take care it never kills the energy,\u201d Ten Hag argued. United\u2019s new approach \u2013 banning some media outlets \u2013 offered echoes of Sir Alex Ferguson\u2019s reign, but thus far without the results.<\/p>\n
Some of the focus comes with the territory. \u201cI know, and all the players know, we are the biggest club in the world, then you know you get a lot of attention,\u201d he said. And if that attention can include everything from claims raw chicken was sold at Old Trafford to a coach journey to Newcastle becoming public, the more damaging elements relate to the football, to the talk of fractured relationships in what could prove a broken campaign. But it may be a test if, in the style of Ferguson, he can use external comments to forge a siege mentality, to unite themselves against the world.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou know in the moment results are not going your way and you are not performing how you should, there is coming criticism,\u201d Ten Hag said. \u201cYou have to deal with that. There is no way you are alone there. We are together in that boat. We know that. So we will deal with it in togetherness.\u201d United, again. At least according to Ten Hag.<\/p>\n
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