Why Ratcliffe is correct to not sack Ten Hag, explains IAN LADYMAN
Has the FA Cup saved Erik ten Hag just as legend tell us it once saved Sir Alex Ferguson? No, not really.
The truth is that Manchester United looked across the football landscape and couldn’t find an upgrade. So Ten Hag stays. Bruised and a little embarrassed perhaps. Most certainly undermined and now certain of the shaky ground on which he stands. But alive and in work and ready, no doubt, to try to prove everybody – and indeed the Premier League table – wrong.
To be clear, Manchester United and Sir Jim Ratcliffe‘s circle of advisors who now run it were perfectly entitled to do the things they have done.
They were within their rights to look for a new manager and to speak to all the people they felt they needed to speak to. Businesses should always look to improve and to trade up.
Football clubs that stand still tend to get overtaken pretty quickly and United were – and indeed still are – in danger of being swallowed up by the peloton.
Erik ten Hag will lead Manchester United out as their boss next season after INEOS’ decision
After a review, Sir Jim Ratcliffe (centre right) and his INEOS hierarchy decided to back Ten Hag
Ratcliffe and Co were acting in the best interests of United in seeking to replace the Dutchman
So yes United were right to look around. Why would they not? And they were entitled to do so while Ten Hag was still in situ. To sack a manager and then start looking for a replacement makes no sense.
Despite a quite out of character FA Cup final performance that saw them beat Manchester City on the back of 25 per cent possession, last season was a mess. There were mitigating circumstances, largely in the shape of injury problems. But it was still a mess. United looked uncoached and unmanaged for much of the campaign and culpability for that lies at the door of Ten Hag.
Ratcliffe and Co were acting in the best interests of the football club in seeking to replace their Dutch coach. In realising now that there is no outstanding candidate to fill his shoes, they also have made a sensible call. Change for the sake of change rarely works in football.
So United have held their nerve and there is something to be said for that. In trying to rebuild and repurpose United, Ratcliffe’s INEOS are playing the long game. They have no choice. So to give Ten Hag some more time – and pay no heed to a new contract as they mean nothing – will not kill them in the long run.
INEOS have still embarrassed themselves, though. Their motives may have been pure but their conduct has been that of naive amateurs rather than the elite sporting outfit they purport to be.
A decision on Ten Hag should have been made before the Cup final. One trophy – one performance – changes nothing. Their ‘end of season review’ should have been completed by the time United took to the field against City at Wembley. Stick or twist, they should have known and then got on with it quickly.
To delay has cost them credibility in the eyes of their supporters and in all likelihood their manager. Watching Ten Hag dangling on a piece of string for the last two-and-a-half weeks has been as painful as it has been almost unprecedented.
The drip drip of information that has leaked so steadily from all those alternative coaches they have spoken to has hardly helped INEOS either. Another bad look. Is there a manager in Europe who has not had a tap on the shoulder from Ratcliffe and his crew in the last four weeks? It seems not.
What INEOS know now is that confidential conversations in football are not always easy to come by. United’s list of possible replacements has been so public they may as well as stuck an advert in the Manchester Evenings News and invited applications.
INEOS were right to look around but the handling of it all could and should have been better
United’s season was an overriding disappointment that was covered up by their FA Cup win
However, INEOS decision to delay Ten Hag’s fate has lost them credibility with him potentially
If Ten Hag’s football has been clumsy and a little nakedly obvious at times over the last 10 months then so has the conduct of those who now hold the future of England’s biggest football club in their hands.
Tan Hag will have to improve if he wants to stick around longer than the autumn. So too must Ratcliffe and INEOS if they are ever to haul Manchester United back off the seat of its pants.
