Former Man United soccer legend Gary Neville has given his take on the current MUFC manager in a time where some are calling for him to be sacked.
Results have not been good this season and ten Hag has been there two years now, in a time where United have struggled in the Premier League.
Gary Neville speaking to the studio at Sky Sports went into detail:
“Right, let’s get across to Gary Neville, who’s been watching this day unfold in the NBC Studios in America. Gary, give us your verdict on what you’ve seen from Manchester United today. I mean, I think it’s a small step forward. Uh, I think before the game, if you’d offered any Manchester United fan, probably player and coach, a draw, then they would have snapped your hand off.
And I think that’s where, at the end of the game, Erik ten Hag’s interview, I think there was an element of relief because he obviously just keeps the wolves at bay for a couple of weeks. I think it gives him a little bit more time. I don’t think that anybody who thought that there was going to be a sort of major incident after today’s game thought it would happen with a draw.
They always thought it would need to be another difficult day, another difficult defeat, like it was last weekend against Tottenham. So I think it buys a little bit of time, but it’s, I mean, it’s Manchester United’s worst start in Premier League history.
So, I mean, we can’t really over-celebrate. I’m thinking here as obviously someone who’s on Sky as a pundit, but also as a United fan, when we’re thinking that actually it’s a decent point when you draw at Villa, that tells you, far, Villa have come, but it also also tells you how low the bar is for Manchester United at this moment in time. Yeah, and, and I suppose particularly concerning is this staggering lack of goals.
What is it? Five, seven games into the season? Is that the first point that needs to be addressed? Yeah, but when you rely upon moments, which obviously, Dave, we’ve talked about this now for two years, you rely upon moments, what ends up happening with is if, if players go into a little bit of a dip in form or you have injuries, obviously, Hyland’s been injured, Rashford’s had a dip in form, Bruno’s going through a rare sort of difficult patch for him when it comes to goals.
So then you end up in a situation whereby you haven’t got the patterns of play, you haven’t got the sort of, if you like, the combinations to rely upon that can maybe get people goals. And I don’t think Manchester United also, pretty, they’re not very good on set pieces either. So that’s the problem, you know, you play in moments, you end up, if players lose form, you don’t score in moments, and that’s exactly what’s happening at this moment in time.
United somehow got to find a way of playing where patterns develop and people are telepathic and they make the runs without even knowing. And it doesn’t happen. I mean, the front four of United today, Sancho, Rashford, Martial, and Fernandes, is a front four that a lot of, I think, top teams would look at and think that’s not a bad top four, it’s not a bad front line. Yet, it doesn’t look dangerous at all as a combination.
I always think of the front three that played for Liverpool, Salah, Firmino, Mané. They played in combination, they played together, they were close to each other at times. United’s front four, to, I don’t think connect with each other at any point in the game.
The front two for Villa, Rogers and Watkins, they combine with each other, they play with each other on the pitch, they know what each other’s going to do. United just don’t have that. So where does this then leave Gary, the conversation around the manager, Erik ten Hag? This pressure has been building all the way from the summer to this tricky start to the season, playing this game out today in front of all the United hierarchy. What conclusions do you think they go away with?
They definitely won’t want to do anything, Dave, this season. And I think I’ve said that before. No club wants to sack a manager during the season because it’s not only a reflection upon the manager, it’s a reflection upon them, even though obviously, Innos have only come into the club in the last few months from a point of view of actually taking control of the football side.
And Dan Ashworth and Omar Berrada have only been in the club for a couple of months. So you can’t really sort of land the blame at their door. They’re going to need two or three years, four years, to try and sort this out. But obviously, the club did make the decision to keep Erik ten Hag in the summer, and they don’t want to have to basically reverse that decision off after only six or seven games.
So they’ve just got to hope in this next couple of weeks, through maybe a reset, maybe some sort of thinking time, some planning, obviously with Manchester United fans, coaches, players, have talked about this new structure that surrounds Erik ten Hag.
It needs to go to work quite quickly in this next few weeks because I think if the next international break comes around and Manchester United is still in that sort of 13th, 14th position in the league, I think there’s going to be a lot of pressure building. So the next few weeks are critical in making sure that they can somehow get some momentum for the rest of the season so that Erik ten Hag can keep his job because no United fan wants to see Erik ten Hag lose his job either.
That’s just again feels like we’re on a roundabout, just spinning the same way as we have done for the last 10, 12 years. He was bullish, wasn’t he, as as you’ve already referenced, perhaps admirably so after the game. But like you say, it does feel like we are going to go month to month with him.
The bigger picture, Gary, is around Manchester United as a club and their progress. They are 14th right now, regardless of who the coach is. How do you see them making headway? So again, we’re talking about a side challenging for Champions League football again as a starting point. I mean, I thought they would be challenging for Champions League football this season, obviously naively.
It looks like at this moment in time, but to be 14th, I mean, that’s just can’t happen. You know, it can’t continue that they can stay in 14th without repercussions. It’s uh unforgivable with the money spent, the investment in the squad in the summer. Everyone regarded Manchester United’s transfer market as being smooth, and it was a lot smoother than had happened in previous years.
You didn’t see the failing to get targets, and you also saw players coming in without a lot of fuss, which was welcome by everybody. But since the start of the season, you know, Erik ten Hag’s got no excuses now. All the players are fit, the players are all there on the pitch.
They’re his players. I mean, you look at today, he’s had to revert to Victor Lindelöf, obviously maybe we thought was leaving United 18 months ago, and Johnny Evans, who’s obviously getting on in years.
And his first-choice partnership of Varane and Martínez, you know, were on the bench. I know that obviously Varane came on, but they, they were the players that were supposed to get Manchester United up the pitch, play that higher line, be more aggressive, get that style implemented that Erik ten Hag wanted to implement when he first came to United.
You know, we seem to be going one step forward and two steps back. And to be fair at this moment in time, it’s a real struggle, how you even look at Champions League at this moment in time. You can’t, and that’s a problem for any owner.
I think that in terms of the PSR and the sustainability, the financial rules, United are right on the edge. So they’ve got to try and bring extra revenues in at this moment in time, and not being in the Champions League causes them a big problem in more ways than one.”
It will be interesting to see how long ten Hag stays at United, others want him gone.
Ultimately that will be up to the club to decide and the supporters to voice their opinion on the matter more on social media.
