- 17/03/2024
A predictable derby defeat against City saw Manchester United concede an astonishing 27 attempts on goal. But rather than just being a statistical inevitability of playing one of the best teams in the world, this has actually become an astonishing pattern for Ten Hag's side, and puts them in the same bracket as the Premier League's relegation scrappers in terms of their defensive frugality.
Adam Clery looks at both the numbers, and the goals, to explain why this is an inevitable by-product of the Dutchman's football.
Adam Clery looks at both the numbers, and the goals, to explain why this is an inevitable by-product of the Dutchman's football.
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00:00 [DING]
00:02 So, top of the bat, which I'm reasonably sure that's an expression.
00:06 The thing that's prompted me to do this is I was listening to the Football Weekly podcast on The Athletic,
00:10 which I really like and you should check out if you hadn't,
00:13 and they came out with the absolutely astonishing stat that this year, Manchester United,
00:18 which I know they've had injuries, Hoyland's not been there and there's been others,
00:21 but like in 2024, Man United have largely looked like this, right?
00:25 This team, which is good, this year has conceded a shot on its goal every five minutes.
00:34 And that is f***ing nuts.
00:37 But we will get to all the numbers and stuff in a little bit, right?
00:40 Straight to the point, the problem they've got is this midfield three here,
00:45 although I will say I don't actually think it's the fault of anybody in this midfield three here.
00:49 Time and time again this season, we have seen some just slightly different version of this still image,
00:55 where Man United's defenders are frantically backing off against an advancing attack from the opposition
01:00 with their own midfield lagging some way behind them.
01:03 And legitimately, you could do like an hour-long slideshow of this exact scenario,
01:08 like all the way through the season, you see this exact same pattern emerging of this enormous,
01:14 yawning more between their defence and their midfield.
01:18 Now, you may have seen on Monday Night Football, Jamie Carragher did a little segment looking at this exact thing,
01:23 like the distance between Man United's defence and their attack,
01:26 and the fact the midfield seemed to be running around in between it all, not really sure what to do.
01:30 And Eric Ten Hag said, "Ahh, don't listen to him. He's not objective."
01:35 Basically, on the one hand, Carragher insinuated that Ten Hag had instilled no identity or plan into this team,
01:41 and Ten Hag was just like, "Of course he's gonna say that, man. He's a Liverpool fan. What does he know?"
01:47 And then, of course, they went into the Manchester derby, where they conceded 27 shots,
01:52 which is obviously absolutely loads. It's fractionally better than one every three minutes, but come on, right?
01:58 That's Man City.
01:59 So, on the one hand, you've got Jamie Carragher, who's not objective,
02:02 and on the other hand, you've got Man City, who are just always gonna have loads of chances.
02:06 If you discount both those things and just look at all the other games and how they're performing,
02:10 it'll paint a very different picture, right? Right?
02:14 Here is a little graph. I am already dreading the amount of time it's going to take to make,
02:18 but this is Manchester United surrounded by the three teams above them in the league
02:21 and the three teams below them in the league, i.e. the teams they are trying to catch
02:25 and the teams that are trying to catch them.
02:27 So, exactly where they are currently competing in the league.
02:30 And for some additional context, because I do spoil you a lot,
02:33 let's throw Arsenal into the very top of this and Sheffield United into the very bottom.
02:37 Now, let us just now agree on this concept that if you are in control of a game of football,
02:43 you can measure that by the amount of chances the opposition are creating.
02:46 Like, maybe possession is a good indicator, or maybe the chances you create is a good indicator,
02:51 but if you are not allowing your opponent the ball, or you're only allowing them it in certain areas,
02:55 then they will not get very many chances and you will be in control.
02:59 Anyway, yes, let's now fill this graph in with their last however many games I decide to do
03:04 and show you how many chances their opponents had in those games.
03:08 We'll just pop a little average at the end there to make it easy to understand.
03:12 And now, let's see how Man United are doing.
03:15 That is not good.
03:17 And what's really concerning if you're a Man United fan is this is not even a particularly difficult run.
03:22 Like, there are none of the quote-unquote "really big teams" in there.
03:25 Like, yes, Aston Villa away, that's always going to be a tricky tie,
03:28 but this is West Ham United at home.
03:30 This is Fulham at home.
03:32 This is Luton Town.
03:33 This is Newport County.
03:36 In fact, if we just get rid of this graph, despite how long it's going to have taken me to make,
03:39 and we just show you a ranking in the Premier League this season for the amount of shots faced per game,
03:46 if you're a Man United fan, where do you want to be in this table right now?
03:49 Because I'll tell you before I show you that it's a fairly accurate representation of the league table as a whole.
03:54 Like, the top four teams in the league right now are also the top four teams on this table,
03:59 meaning they concede the fewest number of shots per game.
04:02 So you'd hope Man United are like sixth, seventh, or eighth, right? Somewhere around there?
04:06 They are 18th. They are third to bottom.
04:08 Literally in the relegation zone.
04:11 Only Sheffield United and Luton concede more chances per game this season than Man United.
04:18 I am sorry, Eric, that Jamie Carragher happened to play for Liverpool,
04:21 but if he wants to do a little video saying you are losing games you should be winning
04:25 because you're far too f***ing open, he is correct.
04:30 So that is the what, but now let's get our trousers off and look at the how.
04:33 Eric Ten Haag wants Manchester United to be a team that wins the ball back high up the pitch
04:38 and creates chances that way.
04:39 And they are. They are very good at doing that.
04:42 They might not always feel like it at times,
04:44 but in terms of winning the ball back in the opponent's third and creating a chance,
04:47 they're second only behind Arsenal this season.
04:50 They're a very, very good high-pressing team.
04:53 The problem is that Eric Ten Haag also wants Manchester United to be a team that defends really, really deep.
04:59 Now these two things individually are not a problem.
05:02 You can press high and be really good at it. A lot of teams are.
05:04 You can defend deep and be really good at it. A lot of teams are.
05:07 It's that you can't be both.
05:10 Because if you defend really, really deep and you press really, really high,
05:13 you then leave your midfielders with a cross-country event to do every single half.
05:19 If they move up to support the attackers as they're going to do as the play progresses,
05:23 you end up with this enormous hole.
05:25 You remember our little slideshow that teams can play straight into.
05:29 But likewise, if you're under pressure and then they start sitting deep to track the players,
05:33 then you've got a complete disconnect with the forwards and you can't then get out.
05:37 But I'll tell you what Jamie Carragher was wrong about, right?
05:39 He highlighted Kobe Mainew at the start of the Fulham game,
05:41 where he was getting caught between, "Do I push onto the six or do I drop onto the ten?"
05:46 And said he didn't know what he was supposed to be doing.
05:48 Like he hadn't been given the instructions for who to mark.
05:51 But none of this is an accident. They are playing this way on purpose.
05:55 The reason it looks like Kobe Mainew can't decide whether he should go to the ten or go to the six
05:59 is because he knows he has to do both.
06:02 Like that is his job in this team, run around like a dog and cover all the space while leaving in the middle.
06:08 Now I said at the start of the video, the problem for Man United is these three here,
06:12 but it's not necessarily their fault.
06:14 Neither Casemiro nor Fernandes are well suited to be playing in such an open midfield.
06:19 In Casemiro's case, because his legs just aren't quite there and he can't cover the ground as much as he needs to,
06:25 he's not as mobile as Mainew is.
06:27 And in Fernandes' case, he's got this amazing skill set of passing and chance creation,
06:32 but he's just not suited to being very defensive.
06:35 Like I just show you all the defensive numbers from this season, right?
06:38 Straight away, you'll see that in Fernandes and Mainew's case,
06:41 they're really good at pressing into the attacking third and winning the ball back,
06:45 but it's also incredibly easy for players to just dribble around them.
06:49 And even Casemiro, who is supposed to be the defensive rock in this unit of three,
06:53 has really good numbers for winning the ball back because that's his job.
06:57 But also, gets dribbled around like he isn't even there.
07:01 Just to really keep kicking them when they're down,
07:03 Bruno Fernandes is the most dribbled past player in the Premier League this season.
07:08 Nobody has been dribbled past more.
07:09 He is number one, El Presidente, the king of that.
07:13 And then if you tweak that stat to look at how many times it happens per 90 minutes,
07:16 Casemiro is the third most dribbled around player in the Premier League this season.
07:21 What does that make him? Like, the prince of that particular stat.
07:24 The chancellor of the not getting your foot in exchequer.
07:28 Football is an incredibly nuanced, complicated game,
07:31 but sometimes it can also just be really simple.
07:34 Like, if your defenders are deep and your attackers are high
07:36 and you get the ball back anywhere in the midfield and you're facing three players
07:41 you can just run past very easily, they might as well not be there.
07:45 That's why Man United have seen so many times this season,
07:48 like this exact goal or this exact chance.
07:51 Players just running at them and getting all the way into the box.
07:56 And Ten Hag understandably talks about the injuries they've got and seeing the bigger picture,
08:00 but this was the starting 11 they had against Wolves that day.
08:04 And it happened in that game, just as it happened in the Fulham game,
08:07 just as it has happened in pretty much every game.
08:11 But what is absolutely imperative to reinforce here is that Eric Ten Hag wants his team to play this way.
08:17 Like, the wider you are spread across the pitch,
08:19 the easier it is to move the ball from back to front without resorting to sort of low percentage long balls.
08:25 He wants them to be the most direct attacking team in the league.
08:28 And because of this, they are.
08:31 Right, two last graphs for you here, which would pretty much just sum up the entire video.
08:34 Like, Man United, in terms of these direct attacks,
08:36 which is when you start with a ball in your third and you very quickly work it up the pitch
08:41 to get either a shot or a touch in the box, is only Liverpool better at doing it than they are.
08:45 They are really good at working the ball from back to front because of the space they're covering.
08:50 But as a consequence, here is the frankly amazing zones of control diagram that's on the Opta website.
08:56 Now, just to explain what you're looking at here, right, Opta basically collate all the possession a team has had
09:01 in all of their games in the Premier League against every single team they've played
09:05 and sort of averages it out to show you where on the pitch you have more of the ball
09:10 and where on the pitch your opponents have more of the ball.
09:12 Just to give you a bit of contrast here,
09:13 this is the zones of control map for passing, nerds and possession fetishists, Manchester City,
09:19 and this is it for Sheffield United, a team that might as well have a ball gag in their mouth
09:23 for the amount they enjoy being dominated.
09:25 And this is Man United. It's just nothing.
09:28 Like, the grey bits are where there's no real distinction between you having more of the ball than your opponent.
09:33 Like, they're supposed to be one of the best teams in the league.
09:35 There should be so much blue on this, but there isn't because they don't control games at all.
09:40 They don't have long periods of possession.
09:43 They just go up the field really quickly, and then when they lose it, your team goes back the other way.
09:48 Manchester United have no control over games of football,
09:51 and sometimes that's fine because in this chaos, they outscore the opponents.
09:55 Like, that front three of Garnaccio, Rashford and Hoyland can be really dangerous,
09:58 and sometimes it's enough, but when that doesn't work,
10:01 they're going to give away so many chances that you can get beat off full-time.
10:05 So that is what the problem is and also why it is happening,
10:09 and the way you fix it is very simple.
10:11 You just stop playing like that.
10:14 You either push the defence up so you can be a proper high-pressing team,
10:16 or you bring the attack back so you can be a proper deep defensive team,
10:20 and you just stop doing this,
10:22 but the problem that Man United have is that this is the footballing philosophy of their manager.
10:27 This is how he wants them to play.
10:28 This is how they're always going to play,
10:31 and how you fix that is...
10:34 Well, it's a whole other video entirely, isn't it?
10:35 But hey, I tell you what, mind, fair play to Manchester United fans
10:38 because I would be absolutely wet in the bed on social media
10:42 every single time I saw my team concede this exact same goal.
10:46 So if you are a Man United fan,
10:47 I'd love to know what you think about all this in the comments below.
10:51 Like, do you need to get rid of Ten Hag if you want to progress,
10:53 or will it just become much harder to play against
10:56 and far more cohesive when you get players back from injury?
10:58 All comments welcome, as well as any thoughts, feelings or poetry.
11:03 In the meantime, though, if the comment section is like, I don't know, too good for you
11:06 or something, you can yell all of this at me on social media at
11:08 AdamClearyCLERY, the 442 socials are in the corner of the video.
11:12 And the latest issue of the magazine...
11:15 is not that one, actually. Hang on.
11:17 Yeah, look, here you go. It's the new one.
11:19 It's the Trent Alexander Arnold one,
11:21 which is admittedly obviously quite a tough sell
11:23 for a video that's predominantly going to be watched by Man United fans.
11:26 But look, it's a bit about...
11:29 You see, it's the thing on the back of the exhibition.
11:31 So it's not just Liverpool. It's loads of stuff.
11:33 Grab that in the shops, that's what they call them,
11:36 and follow me on the stuff, that's what they call them.
11:39 And until next time, totally lost my brain here.
11:42 Adam Cleary, 442, Man United. See you soon. Bye!
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