Ten Hag defenders citing Klopp and Arteta are clutching at slippery straws

Comparing the records of Mikel Arteta and Jurgen Klopp with Erik ten Hag is a madness when the trajectory is so different.

Send your thoughts on everything – but maybe England, for a change – to theeditor@football365.com

Arteta and Klopp are the outliers, not reason for Ten Hag patience
I always find it amusing how many fans use Arteta and Arsenal’s patience with him as the reason why their failing manager will come good if everyone just sticks by them. I’ve seen managers themselves cite Arteta as the reason why they shouldn’t lose their job. As if it was all that easy.

The exponential growth of Arsenal under Arteta and Liverpool under Klopp are the outliers, the anomaly, not the precedent to cite for why your own failing manager will also surely get better.

Manager goes on a terrible run of results for a prolonged period of time and people think the most likely thing to happen in the future is he turns this round because Arteta did rather than they stay on a similar trajectory. To use such a binary and illogical reasoning ignores so much of what Arteta (and Klopp) were doing even in the periods of poorer results.

Firstly recruitment was always good and neither Arteta or Klopp had anywhere near the money Ten Hag has had. Ten Hag has had three summer windows and two winter windows, are there genuinely any signings you can hang your hat on and say they’ve looked really good and will form the bedrock of a Man U team which will challenge soon, even one?

Meanwhile in a similar timeframe of transfer windows Arteta had signed Gabriel, Partey, Odegaard, White, Ramsdale, Tomiyasu, Jesus, Zinchenko and was ready to follow this up with Jorginho, Trossard, Rice, Havertz, Timber, Raya….sure there are some duds not mentioned but nearly all of those were low risk and low cost and certainly not out-weighing the very good set of purchases above.

Klopp had signed Mane, Winjaldum, Matip, Van Dijk, Salah, Robertson, Ox. Man U fans may argue Ten Hag has had to completely revamp the squad, well by my count Ten Hag has made 15 senior permanent signings in his three seasons.

Arteta’s 15th signing in an attempt to completely revamp the Arsenal squad was in the winter window of 2023 a season Arsenal led the league for most of the season. And Arteta and Klopp turned their squads round with far, far less money than Ten Hag. Ten Hag signed half his old Ajax squad and managed to miss the two best ones in Timber and Kudus! It’s chalk and cheese.

We can also talk about a clear set of standards and style of play that were established early with both Arteta and Klopp. What is Ten Hag’s style? What are his tactics? This is where the whole ‘trust the process’ comes from, there has to be a tangible process to be able to trust.

Man U fans who defend Ten Hag may try to point to this process on an upward curve but I just don’t see it, at best it’s flatlining, at worst it’s nose diving! My take on Man U is the only reason they aren’t actually much, much lower in the league is because the players they have are capable of producing an individual moment of brilliance once in every 7-8 games or so and that nicks the odd win to keep the wolf from the door. Most teams in the prem are better set up tactically but miss that individual quality.

I think when all your rivals are desperate for your team’s manager to stay in a job because he’s so bad and is showing not one sign of improving the team on or off the pitch them you have to stop deluding yourself.

Having written all that I’m not actually sure why I’m bothering to convince any ‘Ten Hag In’ crowd to join the ‘Ten Hag out’ crowd because the more Man U fans who stick behind him is the better for the rest of us enjoying this car crash. If he’s sacked, like the last 7 Man U managers there is a small chance they might improve, whilst he’s here they’re going backwards.
Rich, AFC. (My 6 year old once scored 6 goals in a game like Messi did at the same age – happily preparing for his world footballing dominance and my early retirement)

MORE ON MAN UTD FROM F365:
👉 Ranking Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s mistakes at Man Utd from the email to Ten Hag
👉 Ten Hag avoids bottom spot in latest Premier League manager rankings with a newcomer on top
👉 The Media don’t want Ten Hag sack; why would we want the circus to end?

…I’ve not read all the back and forth between Garey and Oliver, but for what it’s worth, even in the midst of poor results and prolonged poor form you could see what Klopp and Arteta were trying to do. I couldn’t tell you what style of football Man Utd play?

That’s the difference, Klopp and Arteta were working towards something.

United often look like they’re playing together for the first time.
Chris, NUFC

…The problem with statistics is that they are just numbers without context. Anyone can find some numbers that fit their narratives and run with it. Garey’s usage of points and win rates might be accurate in terms of the numbers alone, but it doesn’t quite show the full picture. Moving from 3rd – 8th – 14th isn’t the same as moving from 8th – 4th – 4th for Klopp or 8th – 8th – 5th for Arteta. The trend seems to suggest we are actually getting more inconsistent in winning games.

Here’s another way we can frame arguments with statistics. We can say United have kept 4 of 7 Clean sheets (Hooray!) or we can say United have failed to score in 4 of 7 games (Boooo). Both are true numbers, it’s just how we want to spin it.

In the end, I believe more in the eye test which tells me 1) Offensively, we suck at creating chances and converting them and still have no identifiable style of play 2) Defensively, we keep getting sliced open through the midfield and see shots rain down on Onana and 3) after spending millions on players, ETH’s best buy has somehow been Jonny Evans. Maybe that’s why ETH’s win rate has been dropping eh?
Jason (Hope the trend doesn’t keep moving toward the 20th spot)

In Klopp we trusted
OK Garey, I’ll bite (again). Only for the hilarity of the continued defences of Ten Hag and claim to any sort of parallel to Klopp at Liverpool. So let’s unpick a few things:

Firstly, I actually spat my tea out when Garey quoted the Daily Express. I mean if that’s where you are getting your facts from, no wonder your view of reality is a bit distorted. Liverpool fans were absolutely united behind Klopp. You always get a couple of nutters but there was no discontent in the stands or amongst the wider fan base.

Secondly, “It doesn’t matter if you got beat 4-3 or 3-0 by Bournemouth”. Well Garey, I would suggest it does matter. I would venture that losing 4-3 away at Bournemouth is not as bad as losing 3-0 at home to Bournemouth.

But as you’re quoting that game, lets unpick a little. That was a match in which, and I quote BBC sport: ‘The Reds were looking for a victory which would make it 12 league games unbeaten and equal their best start to a Premier League season.’ While a bad result (in which they threw about a lead) it was not a hammering, and was coming off the back of some very impressive performances. Can you say the same for Man United?

That was also just over a year into Klopp’s reign. Liverpool’s back 5 that day were: Loris Karius, Nathaniel Clyne, Dejan Lovren, Lucas Leiva & James Milner. He was working miracles.

Ten Hag is now in year 3. And they have been battered by Liverpool & battered by Spurs. They are 14th in the league! We are 7 games in and they have scored 5 goals. As I have said previously, 2 years into Klopp’s time at Liverpool he had a team that would reach the Champions League final that season. In his 3rd full season they won it, and got 97 points in the Premier League. This is Ten Hag’s 3rd season. He is not going to do the same, however much you want it.
Mike, LFC, Dubai

Some still believe in Ten Hag
Reading the 16 Conclusions seems more like a transcript from someone’s trip to see their psychiatrist. Someone who clearly has a dark obsession with Ten Hag & Manchester United. To say “Shrewd observers may have noticed we’re now five conclusions in without really talking about this match at all.” is odd considering it also took five conclusions to actually mention the football in Liverpools 3-0 victory.

So whether there’s goals to talk about or not, the clear and obvious start point is always the same: Convince readers Ten Hag must go, and make United fans unhappy. I can only assume writers like this associate whatever issues of their time in the 2000’s with Manchester United. I get the clickbait, like Sky reporting on the clubs meeting this week, but these takes are full on sociopathic.

Arguing it’s been a good start to the season would be false. In fact, it’s been their worst start ever to a PL campaign. Goals have not been as forthcoming as we would like and the results against Spurs & Liverpool weren’t great, nor were draws against Twente & Porto.

That all said, it’s not been the car crash from the apparently drunk and inept Ten Hag as the media portrays. United have had poor results against teams in 9th, 6th & 1st, while drew 0-0 with Palace and Villa. 4/5 were bogey teams for United last year, and all whose qualities perfectly match United’s weaknesses.

We suffered a last minute defeat vs Brighton which was unfortunate but they are clearly able, as Spurs found out. Spurs got a good result but had Bruno not been sent off wrongfully, we could have certainly got something from that game, as Brighton proved Spurs are poor performers over 90 minutes. Draws away at Villa and Palace are decent results, especially given Villas form, and United’s horrible recent record in London (no wins in 15 I believe – yikes).

Liverpool also got a good result, but with both teams having an XG of 1.5, it was clearly a tale of one side who could finish and another who could not, which has been United’s biggest issue this season. Twente ran their hearts out and celebrated like it too, whereas the collapse vs Porto was concerning, recovering with ten men to make it 3-3 made it a semi-decent result away from home.

Prior to the Spurs game I was looking at metrics to see how United were performing, and across almost all of them, United have improved drastically from last year. The eye test also seemed to confirm this. Spurs/ Porto aside, they play with more control, and less defensive vulnerability, while also creating a lot of chances. I call this progress, those on psychiatrist’s couch call it delusional it seems.

As F365 showed last year with their recent signings from Serie A article, not many players succeed coming in this direction, and those that do need time. I think that’s a fair thing to call for with our two young but able strikers, and adds credence to our goal scoring issue. I am concerned most about Bruno’s form as he’s been wretched and I stand by my summer assessment that perhaps we should have cashed in. A fit left back would be nice but beyond those, I’m relatively happy with the new signings and concur with Ten Hag that Ugarte needs time to adapt.

It must also be pointed out that in slightly over 2 seasons, United have signed 29 players(6 loans) and got rid of 30. Rangnick called for “open heart surgery” and we have gotten it. It’s not perfect yet, but with that much change in a short period, time to settle, adaptation and familiarization should be given.

I also agree with the assessments of Mr Vance over the week, and have pointed out similar things in the past. Side by side, you can absolutely make a case that Ten Hag is on par, slightly ahead, or slightly behind both Klopp/Arteta at this point in their reigns. (As Vance says: that doesn’t mean he’ll out do them, keep your heads on, but he has won more trophies with a half baked United than a fully cooked LFC/Arsenal since arriving 😉 )

Side note for the Gooners who say “delusional”: Arteta had Arsenal dead last at the end of August in his third season, with a goal difference of -9. Also, to put “managing during covid” as a challenge is quite ridiculous as 1. It’s during this period he won his only trophy, and 2. He did it without any fans there. There’s absolutely no evidence he can win a trophy with a crowd present (unless you count penalties in the Community Shield).

This will be the season to judge Ten Hag football. Results need to improve but I still think he can do so. I would like to see him set up as he did vs City in the FA cup final when we play away from home, but it’s nice to finally win trophies again, and beat the likes of City & Liverpool doing so.

United fans should get behind our team as that’s why we are supporters, and we need to be louder than the media when it comes to what our team hears. United we stand, divided we repeat the cycle some sociopaths seek for us.
Calvino (Did ya miss me Oliver?)

MORE ON MAN UTD FROM F365:
👉 Ranking Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s mistakes at Man Utd from the email to Ten Hag
👉 Ten Hag avoids bottom spot in latest Premier League manager rankings with a newcomer on top
👉 The Media don’t want Ten Hag sack; why would we want the circus to end?

The elephant in the APT room
I’ve been following the 115 City stuff a lot, being a Liverpool supporter, I can’t say I’m impartial, but at the same time I don’t mind Liverpool losing to a better team when deserved.

Seeing the different takes in the media about the APT ruling, both pro City and pro the EPL I thought I would actually read the 175 page ruling. I managed about half of it, starting with the conclusions and then moving on to the more detailed witness accounts and the actual rulings.

Regardless of whether the legal ruling is a win or loss for either party, no one seems to be reporting the fact that Nielsen, the independent Regulatory Team decided multiple transactions were “evidently” above fair market value. See page 23, section 77 and section 133. Another transaction was eventually found to be FMV after having initially been found to be above FMV (section 103).

So essentially MCFC were found to have 2 sponsorship transactions that after extensive analysis and factoring in a maximum bandwidth to potential FMV were still “evidently” too much.

The losses for the EPL are the shareholder 0% interest loans, which is more of a loss for the other clubs that will have to use FMV interest rates…or whatever the clubs/EPL come up with. The FMV rulings for FAB and EAG were found to be unlawful because the EPL/Nielsen didn’t give access to a database to determine how they came to the “evidently above” FMV conclusion. So essentially a procedural win for MCFC to share data by the EPL and a financial loss for the clubs with high 0% shareholder loans.

At no point is there a conclusion that the actual issue, MCFC inflating their sponsorships through APT was incorrect by the EPL/Nielsen. I just don’t see how this ruling, in the grand scheme of things to keep the sporting integrity of the league intact, despite MCFC’s best efforts, is a win for City.

Going back to the 115 breaches, I always try to ask a simple question; In whose interest is this? In what world is it in the interest of a commercial entity (the EPL) to attack one of their most successful and prominent clubs, thereby harming the leagues integrity and sporting drama from the past decade? It just isn’t.

On the other hand, how likely is it that local Abu Dhabi businesses would be willing to pay sponsorship values at Real Madrid, Man Utd levels for a club with barely a quarter of the fanbase (if that) and which most media and rival fans just don’t really care about. See the completely lack of attention to a treble. Ten Hag and Utd continue to be sh*te and it’s everywhere. In other words, they just don’t generate the clicks and exposure to sell the Abu Dhabi products to make the inflated sponsorships realistic. It’s not logical and seems likely that City have bent the rules as much as possible and have allegedly broken 115 of them.

Or maybe Paul, Manchester has tales of Abu Dhabi kids growing up in the nineties watching Shaun Goater and the gang enjoy their YoYo club status who are now high-level executives that want nothing more then to pay inflated sponsorships for their boyhood club.

Or maybe they are guilty. Will be interesting to see what the 115 rulings will be…
Dean, LFC

Man City critics are not bullies
There is a certain irony in the emotional breakdown Paul, Manchester seems to be experiencing by calling anyone raising questions regarding City’s ‘alleged’ attempts at circumventing rules as bullies.

Would Dave, LFC’s missive constitute further bullying, as he laid out some reasonable points?

I say ironic as watching City home games seem so ‘unemotional’, as if the City fans can’t be arsed to get excited about winning yet another game – as it’s all already ordained. Sort of like the way the Roman’s indulged in orgies of food, wine and sex in the dying days of the empire – as if this was just an another, boring day of excess.

No, Paul, football fans who don’t support City aren’t bullying by expressing their concern that City have ‘cheated’ their way to success. City hire many expensive lawyers in an attempt at finding a loophole or attempting to wiggle out of situations – such as the time limitations in the UEFA case. Teams do get away with one from time to time, like Leicester and the recent decision that went their way. Was it that they didn’t exceed PSR or that they found a date loophole? It doesn’t mean the offence didn’t happen.

I’m watching City fans continue to boo the UEFA anthem in a stadium with empty seats, with the occasional murmur, on a European night, makes one wonder why they even support the club. All because EUFA had the temerity to call the team out.

And if you think what City fans read is ‘bullying’, imagine what Utd fans must be feeling right now, with almost every sports lead, in print, online or TV hammering on about how dreadful the team is and how bad ETH is. There is just no comparison. Yet the ground is full and their fans still make a noise when the team plays.

With all strife in the world today – all the ways people are truly being bullied – having other fans question the morality of City’s management and ownership just doesn’t even compare.
Paul McDevitt

Spurs are actually smashing it
It’s safe to say it’s been a strange start to the season for Spurs. Having spent most of the season playing scintillating football that fans of other clubs can only dream about we somehow find ourselves in 9th place. I like to think of myself as somebody who knows his onions when it comes to the beautiful game and even I’ve been left scratching my head over our current points tally.

That was until I came across the Opta Expected Points table, and things started to make a little more sense. The OEPT uses an intricate and quite fascinating system to calculate where a team actually deserves to be placed in the table. The expected points model simulates the number of goals scored by each side in each match based on the expected goals (xG) value of every shot taken. It then uses the simulated number of goals to determine the match outcome (win/draw/loss). Each match is then simulated 10,000 times. The expected points for each team in each match can then be calculated based on the proportion of simulations they win/draw/lose.

This method actually places us fourth in the table, a full five places above our actual position, and tucked right in behind Chelsea, Man City and Liverpool. It’s difficult not to conclude from this data that we have been incredibly unlucky, and that this Spurs side is very much going in the right direction under Ange. Bad luck doesn’t last forever, and if we keep up this level of performance we will eventually be rewarded for it.

You may have noticed that Arsenal are not in the top four in the OEPT. That are in fact placed in 8th, behind Bournemouth and Fulham. Make of that what you will.
Barry Fox

Maths chat
Some points re Radu’s Chelsea rant. I don’t disagree with the general point they’re making but there are some inaccuracies.

Firstly, if you’ve played 7 teams at an average 10th position then that’s actually slightly higher than the average of teams you’ll play across the season which is 10.8 taking Chelsea’s current ranking of fourth out of the equation.

Unfortunately the average of the teams you’ve given is not 10. The mean is 11.6 (your sums were wrong and City are actually second) so you’re doing worse than you thought.

However, to finish in the top four you only really need to “best” 16 other teams on a consistent basis. It doesn’t matter if you beat the top 3 as long as you are better than every other team. So the mean position of teams you need to beat is 12.5. So whether you use your own average or my more pessimistic (and accurate) one you’re absolutely fine.

The likes of Liverpool and Arsenal are likely to have some fun though.
Ash (definitely concerned my numbers are wrong now) Metcalfe

Shall we talk about some football joy?
So, here’s my attempt at bringing the Mailbox back to chatting about the joys of football rather than Ten Hag this, Man City money, Ten Hag that, Tottenham are Tottenham, etc.

Who’s your favourite player ever, favourite Premier league player ever, and what’s your favourite goal ever? I’ll go first.

Ronaldinho – Because he’s Ronaldinho. Always had a smile on his face. And he made Seaman look stupid at the World Cup in 2002. The never ending debate about who is the GOAT or an actual goat seems pointless. It will always be subjective. For me, the greatest of all time is who I enjoyed watching the most. And that’s Ronaldinho. Glorious.

Jay Jay Okoacha – Because he’s Jay Jay Okoacha. Always had a smile on his face, was Ronaldinho’s mentor at PSG. And he tried to rainbow flick two Arsenal defenders from a short corner once. Glorious.

Kaka’s goal for AC Milan against Man Utd in 2007. The technique that left Fletcher for dust, and then the bravery and skill that caused Heinze and Evra to wipe each other out, before finishing with aplomb. Glorious.

Over to you Mailbox.
Danny, Brighton