Ten Hag out? The media is making the Man Utd job an ‘impossible’ one by pushing a false narrative

The Mailbox questions if there is any point taking on the impossible task of managing Manchester United with the media constantly exaggerating negatives and ignoring positives…

Send your thoughts to theeditor@football365.com…

 

Is it possible to manage Manchester United?
I realise the irony in writing into your esteemed site with a bit of a lament of the media, but here goes: is it possible for a manager to succeed at Manchester United today? I do not think it is an exaggeration to say that – presumably down to the success almost a full generation of players ago – United are held to a different standard than pretty much every team in the Premier League. What do I mean?

A decision goes in United’s favour: it demonstrably gets more airtime than those for any other club. Look at the Bruno goal last year. The Onana non-penalty this year. Rooney remains the only player in Premier League history banned for both swearing (ha) and getting a card in a friendly. United’s treatment is asymmetric: positives are downplayed, negatives are exaggerated.

Ten Hag had (might still?) the best record of a new manager in his first 40 odd matches in recent times. Better than Pep. Better than Klopp. Absolutely miles better than Arteta. Yet, already media sites are asking if he’s going to survive, he doesn’t know what he’s doing, he’s lost the players. And that permeates into the worst of United fandom too.

The team looking disjointed is simply unacceptable, already. Despite missing Mount, Varane, Shaw and anything resembling a striker, United came off second best away at a fully fit Arsenal. Any idiot can see United a midfielder who can offer Casemiro some support and an actual striker. Why can’t EtH?

Finally, United are spending so much! Why can’t they beat City (whisper it, City spent more this summer, you’d never know though). Anything less than a title challenge is a failure. Regardless of when players come in, injuries and so forth. Regardless of having the worst owners in the league, who have still spent 0 of their own dollars after decades.

Point being: why would you bother? Go manage Chelsea – you’ll get more money, no expectations and a pay off after 12 months. Or Arsenal, where you can putter about for 4 seasons before anyone expects anything. Or Newcastle.
Ryan, Bermuda (should we start a gofundme to buy Sancho an emotional support puppy?)

 

Ten Hag
I have to take issue with you lot on your criticism of Ten Hag because he is spot on regarding the offside as well as the foul on Evans, Havertz wasn’t touched until he threw himself on the floor and kicked Casemiro with his flailing leg, if Casemiro made the challenge Saka did on Bruno he’s getting a red card two footed studs up into the ankle but it’s little Saka so he didn’t mean it, lastly United should of had a penalty but since the media hand wringing and four days of constant wall to wall bullshit regarding the Wolves game we have gotten the sum total of f*ck all off officials, no PGMOL apology for United just suck it up because you know Fergie and all that.

The narrative that United get all the decisions is frankly bullsh*t, last season we were 2nd bottom in penalties awarded even though we had numerous (and I mean numerous) stone wall penalties denied, one contentious decision in the City match which the officials explained the rules regarding letting the goal stand then 4 days of media fuckwittery on United and we get absolutely nothing for the rest of the season.

I’m sick to the back teeth of the lie perpetuated regarding United getting favourable decisions, the Howard Webb in a United shirt bollocks, Norwich City had a better record under Webb than United FFS.

So enough of the conspiracy that United are favoured by officials we are patently not.
Paul Murphy, Manchester

 

Knee jerkism
Football punditry is a knee jerk sport. I feel this is partly due to the algorithm needing controversy to fuel engagement to keep the bucks rolling in. But mainly it is because we all want some sort of instant impact, instant return on investment to justify purchases. Kai Havertz is a case in point, the boy has played 4 competitive games for us, it took Henry 8 before he scored for us (I’m not saying Kai is Henry 2, but just a bit of patience should be possible). Give him a chance.

Take Fabio Vieira, a stiletto dagger, skinny and penetrating as a player, who was too small, and not confident when we first signed him. Slowly but surely he has worked hard, and now he has the 3rd most assists for us this year. I know we want to see instant impact (see Rice), but we need to be patient. If Arteta has taught Arsenal fans anything, it is we should trust the process. Arteta and Edu know more about football than I ever will. I think Havertz will come good, it will just take a bit of time. Confidence is slow to build, and destroyed in a heartbeat.

As for Ten Hag, I disagreed with him on every single point.

1) Offside is offside, Gabriel’s little stop and booty pop to make Garnacho offside was elite defending. I found it funny that he blamed the angle for offside, and then Sky showed another angle which was…offside.
2) It looked like Johnny Evans fouled Gabriel, not the other way round
3) If Hojlund is a penalty, Kai’s is a penalty. If Kai’s penalty area fall happened at Old Trafford, it wouldn’t have been overturned
4) If he is so desperate for cards, Lindelof should have gone for boot high kick of Eddie’s head.

I think it is obvious Old Trafford is not a good place to be right now. They seem to have all the problems Arsenal had in the Ozil / Aubameyang era, players on huge wages, with little appetite to fight for the club.
John Matrix AFC

 

…Pretty sure, no, absolutely certain, that this has been the obvious and stated tone of all my recent mails on United recently.

And I quote from 16 conclusions;

“That is a deeply unserious football club”. Yeah, pretty much.

Thing is, I have a feeling that ANY current top fight side may have gotten that treatment had they been playing Evans and Maguire together yesterday, and not 5 years ago.

Now consider the amount resources available to us, at least when the glazer horde aren’t feasting from the trough, and just think for a minute about it, and tell me this a serious FOOTBALL club. (didn’t say business, because yes, it tries to be very serious about that make no mistake).

Also the reason why I keep harping on about Alessio and Ona.

Yes, the Women’s game in general isn’t nearly as popular at present as the Men’s, but that still isn’t an excuse for such rank incompetence at a supposedly huge club, so indications that a club is being run pathetically need to be called out, end of.

Because it paints a clear picture of the actual scope of this neglectful ownership, which far exceeds just falling short in the Premier League.

Great first look at Rasmus, he looks full of energy, and if we can insulate him a bit from the noise being a 9 at United brings and share the load around, it should increase what looks like already a great chance at him making some impact this season and continuing on a positive-development increment.
Manc from SA (What a game that was, I thought Alejandro had won it for a second, only for all that to happen, great for the neutrals I am sure. Well played to the Gunners)

 

Last King of Egypt
Just wondering what other people’s opinions were surrounding the Mohamed Salah transfer saga and what will surely be another massive bid from the Saudi’s of a fee in the region of £200m.

I had to somewhat agree with comments made by Paul Merson the other night on Sky Sports. He made some very valid points both for and against the sale of the Egyptian, some of the pros and cons to it I tend to agree with. Let’s say for example Liverpool do receive the £200m offer and accept it:

1. The transfer windows already closed so we’d have to wait until at least January to find his replacement so now you’ve got a massive void to try and fill which in this current squad nobody would be able to and to find a like for like replacement for Salah even at his current age of 31 is almost impossible.
2. You have £200m to spend and maybe as Paul said use it as a “four year plan” to rebuild the team.
3. Without the lure of Champions League football right now and no guarantee of it I cannot see any “big” names wanting to make the move.

If you look at it from a statistical POV, there is no one that comes close to the numbers in terms of goals/assists (besides Messi) and the consistent amount of total games played season in season out as what Mo has been able to produce since joining Liverpool.

2017/18 – 44 goals 14 assists (52 app)
2018/19 – 27 goals 10 assists (52 app)
2019/20 – 23 goals 13 assists (48 app)
2020/21 – 31 goals 6 assists (51 app)
2021/22 – 31 goals 15 assists (51 app)
2022/23 – 30 goals 16 assists (51 app)

An incredible model of consistency not to mention winning everything possible since joining the club in 2017. That’s an average of 31 goals per season, 12.6 assists per season and an average of just under 2 (1.64) goals per game. These are the sort of numbers that you’d normally see from a world class striker but mind you Salah has played as a Right Winger for majority of his career and time at Liverpool so the numbers really are quite staggering.

If Liverpool were to sell him I would definitely say top 4 would not be possible to achieve this season. As much as everyone has a “price” in the football world, I just don’t see any proper replacements on offer for what Mo produces. If it were to go belly up, Bukayo Saka is one that does come to mind in that he plays a very similar brand as Salah, cutting inside on his left foot and running rampant on the Right Wing but I just don’t see him wanting to or having any reason to leave Arsenal right now the way they are going and nor should he.

Kylian Mbappè is another obvious super star talent that could come into the conversation if Salah does end up leaving but again that wouldn’t be until next summer when his contract expires in June 2024 and he becomes a free agent but who knows what could happen between now and then. Another thing to remember is that Kylian has caused a lot of issues internally with the club during his time in Paris and I’m not sure that Klopp would be a massive fan of that kind of “me” only behaviour.

Overall I think if the club can they need to try and keep Salah until at least the end of the season because he is still on top of his game and vital to this side regaining success & climbing back up the table into a UCL place. I know that Klopp sees this as well and is desperate to keep him in the side but only time will tell I suppose.
Red man, LFC.

 

Salah to Saudi?
Who reckons Liverpool will (and should) take the money for Mo in January? Gives him time to get his life in order and also avoids all those freezing winter training sessions. Instead he could get a private jet in from his home in Cairo every day.

Unless he is completely opposed to the whole Saudi thing (which he doesnt appear to be) I think he’ll go for it. Thanks for everything Mo. Bring on Ben Doak.
Shunt LFC

 

Some reasons for Man United optimism
That was some finish to the game!!

Man United v Arsenal has always dished up some humdingers (and that’s not even speaking about the 8-2’s of yesteryear), but this seemed on course for quite a tepid, tactical affair until those 2 goals at the end of the first half served to keep us interested.

The first 20-25 minutes were all Arsenal but thereafter United began building from the back and, quite expertly, triangled Arsenal’s high press into submission. Onana is some football player and his presence seems to calm that whole backline down and gave them the courage to play the high possession game ETH wants.

It resulted in Arteta changing tack and allowing United to have the ball deep and start pressing in midfield instead. Arsenal’s passiveness almost back-fired on them as they seemed content to let the game go on without them. Had it not been for Odegaard’s immediate leveller Arsenal would have struggled.

In the end it was quite an equal game decided by big moments. Either team could have walked away with the points on the balance of the game.

There were markedly improved performances from players like Martinez, and particularly Antony, and United just looked like a more fluid unit yesterday than they have in the previous matches.

There is a lot to be optimistic about for United. We seem to have stumbled upon an absolute gem in Hojlund. He is physical, seems to have a deft touch and, if the Casemiro shirt-pulling incident is anything to go by, already has a good rapport with his teammates.

For Arsenal, well done and thank you for the spectacle, however a United team a year and a half into their rebuild already looks like quite a match for an Arsenal team 3 and a half years into theirs.
Buchule Fulanisi, East London, RSA

 

Circumspection
Arsenal are really good. They outplayed us for decent spells but never overran us. We were a hair’s breadth from going 2-1 up in the last minute with a makeshift back 4, our two new midfielders both unavailable and our new striker only able to play 30 mins.

In all honesty, that was probably as well as it could have gone after some ridiculous summer shenanigans and a couple of unfortunate injuries.

As an aside, 7 or 8 points from those first four games was probably par – so losing two more away games isn’t great but at least the team look like they can play football again (which, after 3m47s of the Forest game, looked like a long way off…)

It’ll be ok lads. Except for Sancho, he’s really f*cked it.
Jonny, MUFC

…Can I just say as a Liverpool man, how wonderful it is to see the United tears about their iffy start? Let’s recap; outplayed at home by Wolves – most rational observers tip for the drop. Outplayed away to a Kane-free Spurs, 2-0 down to Forest at home after four minutes, then absolutely schooled by Arsenal. Has there ever been a more insipid United performance? Is the new “United Way?”

Big Harry still on the bench like a looming Frankenstein’s monster, the angry little Argie getting found out game by game, the sulky Brazilian winger doing absolutely nothing (what is he; cousins with Richarlison?) Rat face stropping around as usual, that new goalie, might be ok, but he’s gonna give you some grey hairs isn’t he? Ming the merciless blaming the offside rule, Jaydon Sancho, Flash Gordon and anything else apart from himself….it’s a real joy to behold!

And where’s that guy who kept repeatedly saying Amrabat wouldn’t join?! Egg on your face there sunshine!

Whisper it, but down the road, the Mighty Reds are looking ominously good. New signings blending in, the team unified, the club pulling in the right direction. Over the city, the blues are looking imperious, seemingly an unstoppable force, not yet dropped a point.

Arsenal clearly weren’t the one season wonders we suspected, and even Spurs are looking like they may have stumbled into a great manager.

All early days, but it’s all very enjoyable.

Hard times lads, hard times
Anon

 

Man Utd’s bench…
There will be lots of comment on the Arsenal v Man Utd match from yesterday. However, I just wanted to add a tiny point and mention the United bench.

Manchester United are the third most valuable football club in the world and we have just closed the latest transfer window. With those two facts in mind, for the Utd bench to contain Bayindir, Maguire, Hojlund, Reguilon(!), Garnacho, Pellistri, Jonny Evans(!), Gore and Mejbri is absolutely unforgivable.

To start a match in 2023 with Martial up front and to finish it with Jonny Evans in defence is criminal.
Micki Attridge (international break already? Oh lord)

 

…Sometime last night somewhere, Stewie had to delete that really long email he had put together telling us all how rubbish Arsenal and Arteta are and what complete idiots Arsenal fans are for showing up at the Emirates to watch that shower.

Lovely stuff.
Graham Simons, Gooner, Norf London

 

VAR pain
I 100% agree with John Nicholson’s article from this morning regards VAR.

As referenced many times, I cannot stand Man U and have a soft spot for Arsenal but Garnacho’s goal should definitely have stood.

If it comes down to freeze frames and multiple reviews from different angles then it is quite literally not an obvious error. Such a cheap way to get out of jail for Arsenal.

Keep a video connected 4th official for terrible errors or off the ball incidents, but getting the ruler out for subjective single frame offsides is so reductive.

The penalty should have been given, the offside should have remained with the on field decision, a decent 2-2. Not some crappy Stockley Park nonsense.

The European SuperLeague nearly did it, the state buy ups of clubs nearly did it, the lack of covid crowds and crazy TV money (remember when they tried to do PPV mid pandemic?!) nearly did it, but I think VAR will finally kill off my love of Premier League football.
Jon, London

 

VAR from perfect
There were a couple of allusions in this morning’s mailbox about the suitability of VAR for offside, choice of frame, angle of shot etc, none of which captured the boring but very important level of detail required to make a judgement that is correct according to the laws of the game. Offside position is to be determined based on lines drawn parallel to the goal line, and given the number of cameras that can be placed along the touchline and some fairly basic geometry that is a piece of piss for modern computers, it amazes me that anyone tries to argue that the offside line was drawn at the wrong angle.

At the moment VARs manually pick out the furthest forward part of attacker’s body and furthest back part of the defender, and it could be argued that they can do this wrong… But said computers are also very good at identifying body shapes and thus can exclude arms from the offside calculation (this is specifically written in the rules as a vertical line from the bottom of the armpit, so any reference to shoulder position when discussing offside is misleading). This is how the new semi-automated offside decisions that UEFA is implementing works.

That leaves the real issue, which is the correct frame to freeze on. VAR cameras use 50 frames per second, so the difference between frames is 0.02 seconds. The fastest players clock well over 30km/h, it is quite possible that attacker and last defender can run past each other at this speed, for a total speed differential of over 60 km/h (16.67 meters / second). That’s a movement of more than 30cm – a whole foot – between frames.

But even more to the point, footballer’s foot speed when kicking the ball has been measured at almost 30m/s. Even assuming that the passing players’ foot is moving at half the speed it would be if they were shooting, you get the same 30cm difference between frames.

The offside law specifically states that the moment to be considered is the first contact of the ball by the passer, but the first VAR frame that shows contact will always be some milliseconds after first contact was actually made. That situation isn’t helped by the fact that the passer’s foot position relative to the ball could be ‘face-on’ to the camera or at an angle, so there is no way to really determine the exact first contact without more cameras at different angles, or further computer wizardry calculating the positions from the known cameras.

Bottom line is that VAR can’t give 100% accurate results. However that isn’t any reason to scrap it. FIFA and the referees bodies should simply be frank about it – it isn’t perfect, but it’s still better
than cross-eyed lines(wo)men, and if errors happen just deal with it instead of making excuses that you lost a game because of VAR…. No, if you lost the game it’s probably got more to do with all the other stuff happening in the game.
James, Switzerland

 

What are Sky up to with Mike Dean?
Soccer Saturday and then next to the commentators for a Live game.

It feels like Sky are trying to play on how poor the referring and VAR have been so far this season. It’s almost like poor decisions are creating clickbait/content for entertainment. As a major stakeholder in the game, they should be calling for a better managed PGMOL. How many more apologies do they need to make before we realise its not fit for purpose?

It doesn’t help that Dean himself has admitted he was bias towards helping his mate on the hair pull incident in 2022.

The best refs are rarely noticed…something Mike Dean seems to struggle with.
Pete

 

Chelsea
How do you spend £1bn and still look this bad? I can picture Graham Potter reclining on a sun lounger somewhere nice, checking the scores with a wry smile on his face.
Alex LFC (Gilberto was The Wall, Fabinho was The Lighthouse, Gabriel Jesus is The Glue. Does that make Richarlison The Joker? “Why so serious Son?”)

 

“Revenge”
Bit late on the Champions League group stage draw but I guarantee beyond any reasonable doubt that when Bayern beat Man Utd home and away, at least one sports site will lead with “Bayern get revenge for 1999” as if they haven’t already beaten or knocked them out multiple times in the twenty-four years since then.
Chris, Barnet

…Cards on the table, my gut is that Garnacho was offside, so I’m not annoyed about that specific instance (the foul on Hojlund in the penalty area, the foul on Evans for the goal are different matters, and I’ll chuck in just a yellow card for a two footed studs up challenge by Saka to round out my hattrick of grievances).

But I do want to call out Rich, AFC’s assessment that VAR is getting offsides right… because it isn’t.

“Yes someone has to stop a frame and judge the body part that’s furthest forward but the technology does give a black and white answer” says Rich, but those factors he mentions are exactly why it isn’t black and white for such marginal calls.

Correct me if I’m wrong, genuinely I might be, but my understanding is that it is a human who is pausing the image and drawing the lines. If so, that’s two opportunities to make an arbitrary decision and new human error.

If they pause just a frame either side of when the ball was kicked, then where the players are could look completely different – and they have no idea if they’re picking the right frame.

On to Ten Hag’s point re. the angle, that’s actually really important, because a 45 degree angle behind the line of play will always make it look like the player nearest the screen is further forward than they really are. Then you have a human drawing two lines by eye on players who are 50 feet away from the camera with a misleading angle.

It is demonstrably not black and white when the calls are that tight. Its arbitrary and will be applied slightly differently every time.

Again, not saying Garnacho was onside. I’m also not saying United haven’t benefitted from these decisions as much as anyone else. I’m just saying that it does not give a definitive answer. The constant refrain on sky was “but offside is offside”. On that we can all agree but to that I ask is the offside that was offside really offside?

Yesterday, the VAR was just giving a best guess, which isn’t good enough.

Particularly because we know that the technology is right there to assess them automatically – they use it in Europe. Rich jokes about fans doing their own MS paint jobs but that is exactly the technological solution PGMOL have opted for. When you compare the PL’s approach to the use of Ultra-edge in cricket which confirms exactly if and when a ball was struck, its positively amateurish.

It’s part of their pathetic attempt to keep a human ref involved in absolutely every decision and they’re tying themselves in knots.

The apex of how ridiculous the situation with VAR had gotten was with the Havertz dive. Mike Dean gets rolled out and says it was the right decision and Gary Neville is asking “has it met the high bar to overturn…” Dean says “well it wasn’t a foul so it’s the right decision… “yeah, but should it have been overturned…” and on it went. First and foremost just use the effing technology to get it right!

It’s all nonsense!
Andy (MUFC)

 

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