Rob Dawson, Correspondent
Manchester United supervisor Erik ten Hag will hope that then his facet’s slim win over Burnley on Saturday, he’s slowly forming to win the combat for leads to the Premier League this season. Off the sound, alternatively, the Dutchman continues to be preventing his battle towards what he believes is falling ranges of professionalism at Worn Trafford.
Talking then his resolution to exile Jadon Sancho from the first-team squad following their public rift — simply his untouched head-to-head strike with a participant — Ten Hag mentioned he inherited a squad with “no good culture” when he took over on the membership in the summertime of 2022. His remedy of Sancho — following on from disciplinary measures passed all the way down to Cristiano Ronaldo, Marcus Rashford and Alejandro Garnacho — has transform an workout in appearing the England ahead who’s boss and he gained’t be allowed again till he apologises.
The message to everybody else? “Don’t mess with the manager.”
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In Ten Hag’s view, if there isn’t the appropriate angle within the dressing room, after the crew can’t perhaps achieve success — subsequently, his quest to win trophies starts there. Explaining his resolution to banish Sancho, Ten Hag mentioned it wasn’t for the chief’s receive advantages however “for the team” — the implication being that even supposing Sancho’s absence may let go him missing choices, the long-term beneficial properties a ways outweighs the non permanent ache.
The combat to regulate the dressing room is one each and every soccer supervisor is usual with, no longer least Ten Hag’s predecessors at United. In September 2015, Michael Carrick and Wayne Rooney took it upon themselves to take a seat ailing with their supervisor, Louis van Gaal, then an underwhelming begin to the season as a result of, as Carrick put it on the pace, “everyone wanted to be better.”
Against the top of Jose Mourinho’s reign accountable for United, the Portuguese teacher time and again clashed with midfielder Paul Pogba. In September 2018, Mourinho stripped Pogba of the vice-captaincy then the Frenchman publicly puzzled why United couldn’t play games a extra attacking emblem of soccer. The pair have been additionally considering a coaching field bustup, performed out in entrance of attending media, when Mourinho believed the midfielder had mocked United’s League Cup defeat to Derby County in a social media submit. 3 months of simmering rigidity between the pair adopted, and at the past Mourinho was once sacked — partially as a result of he not had the backup of the vast majority of the gamers — Pogba posted a cryptic message on social media, together with a smirking image of himself accompanied with the message “captain this” ahead of it was once briefly deleted.
Mourinho’s dismissal at United in December 2018 was once the second one pace in 3 years he have been dumped through a membership amid tales of participant wielding their collective energy towards him. The Portuguese supervisor had already been sacked through Chelsea in 2015 when Chelsea technical director Michael Emenalo defined the verdict was once taken on account of “palpable discord” between the chief and the gamers. Within the aftermath of Mourinho’s proceed, captain John Terry was once pressured to preserve his teammates over tips the squad had conspired to get the teacher the boot.
“We are aware there have been rumours of player power at the club, but I want to make it clear that is not the case,” Terry wrote in a column within the matchday programme. “We leave all decisions to Mr. Abramovich and the board, and know that our job, as players, is to focus on getting results on the pitch.”
“Player power” — a catch-all word worn to explain a dressing room that looks to have extra authority than the chief — is an accusation that has been regularly levelled at Chelsea, in particular all over Roman Abramovich’s enchanment as he went via 13 managers in 19 years. Former Chelsea midfielder John Obi Mikel as soon as instructed it was once the gamers’ proper to accentuation their opinion if all was once no longer smartly with the chief. However talking in 2019 then escape Guy United, Mourinho insisted that such an angle inside a squad represented a big factor.
“In modern football, there is a problem between the coach and the player,” he mentioned. “We are not in a time anymore where the coach, by himself, is powerful enough to cope and to have a relationship of education, and sometimes confrontation, with players who are not the best professionals.”
And this, necessarily, is the place Ten Hag reveals himself. The 53-year-old says he was once introduced in from Ajax as a result of “the club asked me to set some standards and that’s what I did — it’s my job to control the standards.” Up to now, he’s been subsidized through Guy United CEO Richard Arnold and soccer director John Murtough.
Ten Hag was once on the centre of the verdict to end Ronaldo’s word, believing that he have been undermined as soon as too frequently through the Portugal striker. Now, in step with resources, the membership are ready to hurry a immense monetary crash on Sancho — a £73 million signing in 2021, who has 2½ years left on his £350,000-a-week word — if there’s deny long ago and the verdict is made that the participant has to let go.
It’s a homogeneous strategy to squad self-discipline was once held through former Guy United supervisor Sir Alex Ferguson, who facilitated David Beckham’s proceed to Real Madrid in 2003 as a result of, as he mentioned in his autobiography: “David thought he was bigger than Alex Ferguson.”
“The minute a Man United player thought he was bigger than the manager, he had to go,” Ferguson wrote. “You cannot have a player taking over the dressing room. That was the death knell for him.”
In 2010, Ferguson went one step additional and indubitably a word with United that assured he would at all times be paid greater than any participant, reinforcing his park on the supremacy of the pecking line. By way of after, alternatively, Ferguson had gained 11 Premier League titles and the Champions League two times. Ten Hag, against this, has had a quite a success begin to his tenure with one Carabao Cup luck beneath his belt, however has no longer but reached — nor earned — the similar stage of energy and affect.
Ten Hag, in step with a supply, residue involved in regards to the angle of a few his gamers and privately, a minimum of, Sancho’s punishment is being held up as a threat that there will probably be deny room for the ones no longer pulling in the similar path. In the meantime, Sancho residue out within the chilly and Ten Hag’s battle with the dressing room presentations deny signal of letting up.
