Man Utd latest: Erik ten Hag demands ‘showdowns’ as he ‘abstains from sensual pleasures’

There is some right nonsense being written about Erik ten Hag and Manchester United, including his ‘ascetic authoritarianism’ style.

Show-down low-down hoe-down
There are clearly issues at Manchester United and whenever there are issues in any organisation, the sensible path is to talk to employees and gauge any problems with colleagues and management. W**kers call it a 360 approach but we will stick to calling it a sensible path.

So at Manchester United, Erik ten Hag has reportedly decided to talk to his players on a one-to-one basis. The Sun have this has an ‘exclusive’ because the club is leakier than one of those knackered old boats you see at run-down harbours. Leaky McLeakface.

And The Sun are obviously reporting this in a predictably considered manner:

Erik ten Hag hauling Man Utd flops into one-on-one showdown talks to clear the air in desperate bid to fix dressing room

‘Hauling’? They’ve probably received a calendar request. Or a fax because football is f***ing weird. ‘Showdown talks’? It’s a bloody conversation.

As Neil Custis – or news journalist Paul Sims; they have a joint by-line – writes:

Ten Hag wants to know from each player what issues they have with him, his staff, team-mates and training in a series of clear-the-air meetings today and tomorrow.

It’s almost like Manchester United are acting like a normal company in the midst of a crisis. Except unlike normal companies, only one of those employees is likely to be laid off.

And where one leads, others follow. So on MailOnline:

Erik ten Hag ‘hauls Man United stars in for one-on-one showdown talks in a bid to clear the air and fix dressing room morale’, as the pressure builds after a dismal start to the season

That’s pretty much the Sun headline with quote marks. And with the added word ‘dismal’, which is clearly a favourite as it appears in the headline, the opening paragraph, the second paragraph and a photo caption. Which exposes a pretty dismal lack of vocabulary.

Treacherous, treacherous Copenhagen
Mediawatch happens to agree with Samuel Luckhurst that Manchester United should not sack Erik ten Hag (and that view is held elsewhere on this site) but we cannot help but be amused by him painting the next few away games as incredibly ‘treacherous’ for Manchester United.

And now for the possible winter of discontent. Five of United’s next six matches are away from Old Trafford. Not necessarily a negative, given they have lost five of their ten fixtures at Old Trafford this season.

Yet United’s away form under Ten Hag is dire: 12 defeats in the Premier League and European competitions and only ten wins out of a possible 23 in the league.

It is also worth noting the destinations United are due at over a 39-day period from next week: Copenhagen, Everton, Istanbul, Newcastle and Liverpool. It is a treacherous period.

‘From next week’ is excellent as it ignores Saturday’s visit to Fulham. Then comes Copenhagen, who have not won a Champions League group game since 2016 and drew two Champions League qualifying games at home in their ‘atmospheric ground’ to Sparta Prague and Raków Częstochowa earlier this season.

Then come Everton, who lost at home to Luton Town five weeks ago. And then Istanbul (sounds scary, right?), where Galatasaray recently drew 2-2 with Copenhagen.

It’s genuinely like entering the Bermuda Triangle, if the Bermuda Triangle consisted of a series of winnable away games.

The Iceman Cometh
Over in the Daily Telegraph, Oliver Brown has written some of his usual brand of nonsense under the headline of ‘Erik ten Hag’s hard-man act no longer works – and the players know it’.

It quickly becomes apparent that Brown has no knowledge of whether the Manchester United players have any problem with Ten Hag or his ‘hard-man act’, merely that Brown himself thinks that Ten Hag should be more theatrical.

Ten Hag ‘displays a strikingly narrow emotional range…like a careworn Europol detective fast running out of leads’. We think that might be anti-Dutch xenophobia but this is the Telegraph so we’re just relieved he is not black.

You wonder how long this approach will fend off the wolves at the door. For history suggests that the only way to navigate such a crisis is to try some diversionary tactics.

Or win some football matches, perhaps?

It is as immutable a principle in politics as in sport. “Keep the adult attention diverted away from the real issues, and captivated by matters of no real importance,” Noam Chomsky famously wrote.

Mourinho, throughout his 23 years as a manager, has followed this instruction to the letter. When he suffered a 3-0 home loss of his own at United, against Tottenham in 2018, he did not take the Ten Hag approach of sloping away to face the inquisition.

Instead, he headed straight off to the Stretford End, exhorting the die-hards to applaud him, appealing to their goodwill over the doubts of the commentariat.

He was not finished there. At his press conference that night, Mourinho was in no mood to dissect the three goals United had conceded, instead holding up three fingers to denote how many Premier League titles he had won. “Respect, man, respect,” he ranted, flouncing out of the door.

In one sense, it was a ludicrous performance, a desperate Hail Mary by someone seeking to disguise his inadequacies in the present with the glories of his past. But in another, it was a masterstroke, encouraging even his implacable critics to ask whether he deserved to be defined by a few rogue results.

A ‘masterstroke’ that did not prevent Mourinho being sacked four months later. As examples of diversionary tactics go, it’s a poor one.

Does Ten Hag even have this trick in his survival playbook? The evidence would indicate not. He is unlikely to be taken seriously if he tries the same three-fingered salute to signify his three Eredivisie titles with Ajax. But he also appears incapable of the subtle manoeuvring that Mourinho would deploy to save his skin. Ten Hag’s style is one of ascetic authoritarianism, where he never allows his granite exterior to crumble.

Mediawatch does not have a dismal vocabulary, but we had to look up ‘ascetic’. Apparently, ascetism is ‘a lifestyle characterised by abstinence from sensual pleasures, often for the purpose of pursuing spiritual goals’.

Does that sound like Ten Hag? Do we know he is abstaining from sensual pleasures? Surely the poor lad is at least getting his end away because there is precious little other fun to be had right now.

Brown is warming to his theme and describes Ten Hag as having an ‘iron fist’, being ‘more commonly depicted as a tyrant’ and somebody ‘under siege for his autocratic methods’.

Does he have the nimbleness to buy himself some time? On the surface, he is too stern and uncompromising a personality to shift the focus elsewhere. It is a crucial defect. And the more the rot sets in, the more Ten Hag’s disaffected players sense his potentially fatal flaw.

You know what would ‘shift the focus elsewhere’? Winning some football matches. Ten Hag is not under pressure because he is ‘stern’; he is under pressure because his Manchester United side has been shite.