Ten Hag sack surely closer than ever after late Maguire rescue act against Porto

Dave Tickner
Erik Ten Hag watches on as Manchester United take on Porto in the Europa League
Erik Ten Hag looks more doomed than ever after Porto draw

It might be one of his very final acts as Manchester United manager, so let’s all take a moment to salute Erik Ten Hag’s visionary brilliance in throwing on Harry Maguire to grab a wildly unlikely equaliser in a batsh*t game of Europaball against Porto.

With two subs left to use and his job possibly on the line, Ten Hag’s decision to throw on Maguire and Jonny Evans for the last 15 minutes at Estadio do Dragao had looked like a cry for help. It might look quite entertaining, but it’s actually something managers only do when they are very distressed.

Yet there big Harry was to brilliantly plant his lovely big head on an injury-time Christian Eriksen corner to rescue a 3-3 draw for a United side that doesn’t really appear to know what it’s even trying to achieve anymore.

This was a wild game from opening minute to last, one from a United perspective that featured far too many of the familiar lowlights from Sunday’s absurd performance against Spurs. The same sense of defensive confusion was there again, with Porto – like Spurs – guilty of passing up a truly alarming number of clear chances despite helping themselves to three goals.

There was even another red card for Bruno Fernandes as United mystifyingly sought to keep Sunday’s vibes going.

The difference this time, at least and at the very last, was that Porto were made to pay for their profligacy. What does it all mean? Probably f*ck all, to be honest. A big header from Harry Maguire shouldn’t save Ten Hag any more than the FA Cup final should’ve.

It was still impossible to watch this United side play this absurdly self-defeating and clueless football and conclude that Ten Hag is anything but completely f***ed. He cannot possibly survive anything close to a repeat of this effort against Villa. Jhon Duran might score 10 in injury time alone.

We felt beforehand that this game was always a bit of a red herring in the great Ten Hag Narrative. It never felt like there was anything that could happen in this game that would override what happens against Villa.

Such is the nature of the Europa League now that this second successive draw for United doesn’t even significantly impact their qualification hopes. Indeed, in what is on paper their toughest game of the whole league phase – the pot-one away day – a draw could be said to be a perfectly acceptable result.

Except what we’re learning two weeks into these new-look European competitions is that results don’t really matter, not yet anyway. There’s just so much time to put things right, and so big a safety net with 24 teams making it into the knockouts.

What you’re left with, therefore is all narrative and vibes. Arsenal’s win over PSG doesn’t in itself really alter either team’s overall chances in the tournament that much, but it still feels like… something. A sign. It feeds into the idea that, yes, this Mikel Arteta Arsenal side absolutely are one of the best in Europe and absolutely should be among the favourites to win the thing. Villa beating Bayern doesn’t really affect the tournament at all, but it certainly means something to Villa. It was a night to remember.

And that’s why this is still a night that cooks Ten Hag, pushes him ever closer to the brink even if Maguire’s late impact delays the inevitable.

READ: Premier League sack race: Man Utd boss Ten Hag on borrowed time after Spurs, Porto shambles

Because the way United went about securing this point doesn’t pass a vibe check. They raced into a two-goal lead thanks to a roughly equal mix of Marcus Rashford running at pace and Porto’s defending being United-level generous. Rashford’s withdrawal at half-time was another baffling Ten Hag decision given his contribution to everything good about United’s first-half effort.

The two quick breaks that produced United’s early goals were nicely done, but it shouldn’t have been as easy as Porto made it to slice them open. And even then the first should’ve been saved by the ‘keeper and Rasmus Hojlund’s might on another night have been cleared off the line. It never felt like a rock-solid 2-0 lead, and so it rapidly proved.

Porto’s comeback was even easier than United’s early charge. The two goals United conceded in seven minutes here were just the latest in a long line of goals conceded in clusters and both were results of defensive clusterf*cks. Most notably the second, which all stemmed from an initial shanked clearance and became more mortifying from there.

Porto themselves did more to stop that goal than United, with home players taking the ball off each other’s feet, so eager were they to get in on the act against a defence that was barely there. It would end up with Samu Omorodion bullying Matthijs De Ligt to head home, a mismatch that would be repeated for Porto’s third goal early in the second half.

The speed and ease with which United’s two-goal lead was swept away, on the back of the defensive calamity that was the Spurs performance, means this doesn’t end up helping Ten Hag at all, really. This wasn’t a manager or team answering questions or making a statement in the way, say, a solid 0-0 draw against seasoned European opposition might have done. It was another sh*tshow, just with an ending that may have been slightly better but still feels largely irrelevant to the bigger picture.

Harry Maguire being able to head home corners is no more a revelation than the news that United can’t defend. And just as was the case on Sunday, United were fortunate to have conceded only three.

Time and again – before and after the red card – Porto eased through, around and over an almost non-existent and entirely uncoordinated defence. Time and again they suffered an attack of the Timo Werners at the final moment.

They will wonder just how they failed to win this game. It’s certainly hard to remember a better time to be playing United than right now, with the idea that a solution for this defensive shambles can be located between now and Sunday a surely forlorn one. All eyes on Villa and a game that feels more likely than ever to be Ten Hag’s last.