It was once about as near as an FA Cup-winning supervisor has come to a mic shed.
In a room of reporters who had spent the last few days reporting on his bosses’ plan to exchange him, a bruised, embattled however belligerent Erik ten Hag defended his report as supervisor of Manchester United.
“Two trophies in two years is not bad,” he stated. “Three finals in two years is not bad. If they don’t want me, then I go somewhere else to win trophies because that is what I do.”
It was once a excellent form, virtue repeating, which he did. Then Ten Hag’s word was once prolonged and his week settled, he sat unwell with MUTV in July and reiterated his “two trophies” level.
Later he stated it once more a couple of days next in Trondheim then United’s first pre-season pleasant, including: “Apart from (Manchester) City, that’s more than any other club in English football.”
He repeated it once more then the pleasant towards Rangers in Edinburgh.
Later once more at the excursion of the USA.
That was once simply pre-season. Because the get started of the marketing campaign correct, Ten Hag has referenced his two home cup wins in six exchanges with reporters all the way through pre- and post-match press meetings, to mention not anything of interviews with broadcasters.
The unedited example, then Sunday’s 3-0 defeat to Liverpool, got here amid a stressful trade with one journalist who Ten Hag invited to call the “mistakes” his group have been accused of creating. Then the journalist rattled off a protracted listing of repeated mistakes, Ten Hag retreated to his used trustworthy.
“I have a different vision. I think we won, after City, the most trophies in English football,” he stated. “I am sorry for you.”
He’s proper, in fact. It’s as true now because it was once at Wembley. However 3 video games right into a unused season, an issue with which he well skewered his critics in Might is rapid turning into a crutch to fall again on.
On Friday, having simply repeated his favorite level, Ten Hag added: “There’s only one thing in football and that’s at the end of the season if you win prizes, trophies, or not.” However as others have famous, that view is in stark distinction to that of his predecessor Ole Gunnar Solskjaer.
“Any cup competition can give you a trophy but sometimes it’s more of an ego thing from other managers and clubs to finally win something,” Solskjaer stated in March 2021.
“It’s not like a trophy will say, ‘We’re back’. It’s the gradual progression of being in and around the top of the league and the consistency and the odd trophies. Sometimes a cup competition can hide the fact you’re still struggling a little bit.”
Solskjaer’s phrases are the ones of a supervisor who had the other weakness to Ten Hag. Underneath the Norwegian, United’s league finishes often stepped forward — from 6th to 3rd to moment — however the trophy cupboard was once naked.
Solskjaer was once protecting his report through claiming that the league is a real barometer of travel, simply as Ten Hag is protecting his report through pointing to silverware. As to which view is proper, critiques will range.
Ten Hag along with his alternative trophy, the Carabao Cup (Julian Finney/Getty Photographs)
As essential because it was once for Solskjaer’s United to qualify for the Champions League at the last weekend of the 2019-20 marketing campaign, do you bear in mind who they beat that week? Do you bear in mind the ranking? Possibly you do, however that 2-0 win at the back of closed doorways at Leicester Town is rarely a end result that can echo throughout the ages.
In a similar way, reminiscences aren’t made through being runners-up within the league. Solskjaer’s aspect completed 12 issues adrift of champions Manchester Town the age they completed moment, in 2021, having no longer crowned the desk from past due January.
The one trophy United got here near to successful that age was once the Europa League. Talking earlier than the general in Gdansk, Solskjaer maintained that silverware once in a while “hides other facts”. However then United misplaced to Villarreal in a penalty shootout, he admitted he may no longer imagine the season a good fortune having failed in order silverware.
Ask some who’ve recognized the interior workings of Impaired Trafford through the years and they’d say you can’t live to tell the tale as United supervisor with out successful trophies. Solskjaer’s witchery in fee is arguably proof of that, month Ten Hag’s proves the inverse: ship a trophy plus the best week of United’s post-Sir Alex Ferguson time and you’ll live to tell the tale anything else, even the worst-ever Premier League end.
There was once additionally the 4-3 quarter-final win over Liverpool, in fact — certainly one of Impaired Trafford’s excellent video games and atmospheres this century. Upload the Carabao Cup victory on lead, and the year two years have given supporters indelible reminiscences, highs to stability out the lows.
However Solskjaer’s view is far nearer to how efficiency is coldly assessed on the elite stage in fashionable soccer. A league marketing campaign over 38 video games house and away is undeniably a more true gauge of a facet’s attribute, in addition to in most cases the gateway to profitable Champions League qualification, which impacts budgets in some way the FA Cup can not.
United is also the second-most a hit aspect in English soccer over the year two years, as Ten Hag issues out, however no person would sincerely argue that they have got been the second-best group.
Nor would any one recommend United are nearer to difficult Town for primary honours than Arsenal, regardless of Mikel Arteta simplest including a Society Preserve to his honours listing since Ten Hag’s appointment.
That’s the truth. In a quieter life, out of doors the hostile nature and pitched battles of a press convention, even Ten Hag would agree that trophies aren’t enough quantity. You wish to have each pots and issues.
United’s decade-plus of underachievement will simplest have ended when the membership are frequently competing for Premier League titles and achieving the closing phases of the Champions League once more.
There have been mitigating components closing season — accidents, off-field turmoil, takeover unsureness, the a lack of a longtime left-back — however United have been underneath same old within the competitions that subject maximum.
That, regardless of home cup good fortune, is why their supervisor is below force to turn out travel has and will nonetheless be made, and why he’ll simplest have the ability to level to his two trophies for see you later. When no longer staring unwell a room of reporters and tv cameras, even Ten Hag would settle for that.
GO DEEPER
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(Manage photograph: Erik ten Hag with the FA Cup; through Alex Pantling by the use of Getty Photographs )
