“If I move, I want to work for an organisation with a clear philosophy, attainable ambitions and honest people. If I don’t have the right impression, I won’t start on it. The last thing I want is to look over my shoulder to make sure they don’t shoot me in the back.”
That was Erik ten Hag speaking two and half years ago, contemplating what it would take for him to be tempted away from his job at Dutch club Ajax, only a few months before he was appointed as the new manager of Manchester United.
“If there is a good working climate, fertile soil for development, people I can trust and with whom I have a good feeling, I would consider it,” he also said.
Trust is important to Ten Hag. And after United’s end-of-season review advanced as far as discussing salaries with two potential successors, only to then conclude there would not be a change of manager after all, that trust needed to be reaffirmed.
Is a one-year extension of his existing terms, to 2026, enough? Arguably, an entirely new contract would have been a greater show of faith. But even Ten Hag must admit that at one point he appeared unlikely to be in the job at the start of the coming season, never mind have his stay extended until the end of the following one.
It is not as if any contract extension is a real guarantee of long-term job security at Old Trafford. Jose Mourinho was dismissed within a year of extending his terms in early 2018. Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s three-year renewal would have expired last week had he seen it out. He only lasted another four months.
The wisdom of tying Ten Hag down to an extended deal after presiding over United’s lowest finish (eighth) of the Premier League era, especially only weeks after giving serious thought to replacing him, will be seriously scrutinised if results and performances do not improve. It would not only call into question the sporting judgement of co-owner INEOS’, but its financial acumen too.
United paid out £24.7million in exceptional costs in 2021-22, the year of Solskjaer’s dismissal and Ralf Rangnick’s interim spell, after shelling out £19.6m to rid themselves of Mourinho three seasons earlier. With INEOS counting every penny in not only the transfer market but also its wider restructuring of the club, being forced into a substantial, unplanned payout would be far from ideal.
Neither Ten Hag nor United can afford 2024-25 to be more of the same. Some things are still likely to change, even if the name on the door of the manager’s office hasn’t.
Mitchell van der Gaag, Ten Hag’s senior assistant, could still depart. If he left, United would lose a diligent, hard-working presence around the Carrington training ground who was no stranger to early starts and late finishes, a lieutenant who was often in the building before Ten Hag’s own 8am arrivals.
The 52-year-old is also a polyglot who crosses the language barriers within the dressing room but his style of communication has led executives to question whether the mood around Carrington could be improved. Van der Gaag may want to pursue a career as a manager or head coach. Benni McCarthy is also leaving the staff after the expiry of his two-year contract and is thought to want to be a manager again, having held the top job at two clubs in his native South Africa in the past decade.
But, in a sign it does still trust the manager’s judgment, although INEOS initiated this reshuffling of the coaching team, the likely additions to it were selected on Ten Hag’s recommendation.
The arrivals of Ruud van Nistelrooy, the former United great and the Netherlands’ PSV Eindhoven head coach in the 2022-23 season, and Rene Hake, manager of Dutch top-flight club Go Ahead Eagles for the past two years, remain subject to final agreements and securing work permits.
Van Nistelrooy is expected to return to Old Trafford, where he excelled as a goalscorer (Julian Finney/Getty Images)
It is not the first time Ten Hag has headhunted Hake, having previously persuaded him to join Twente’s academy after forming a bond while coming up against him when the latter had a similar role at Emmen, another Dutch side. Then, in 2012, Ten Hag narrowly beat Hake to the Go Ahead job, his first in senior management. Hake eventually got the gig a decade later after managing four other clubs in his homeland, and led Go Ahead to their highest league finish in 45 years last season while also winning the European qualification play-offs to secure Conference League football.
Van Nistelrooy, who is 11th on United’s all-time goalscorers list with 150 between 2001 and 2006, has been slowly but surely earning his coaching stripes since the end of his playing career more than a decade ago.
His first and only season as a head coach ended with PSV winning the KNVB Cup (the Dutch equivalent of the FA Cup), finishing as Eredivisie runners-up and Van Nistelrooy leaving under something of a cloud, amid reports of tensions with assistants Fred Rutten and Andre Ooijer. PSV’s statement confirming the departure expressed “regret”, yet explained that, in their head coach’s opinion, “there was too little support within the club to continue longer”.
Rutten, incidentally, was one of the first managers Ten Hag worked under at the start of his own coaching career, and turned down an approach to join the United staff when his former assistant arrived from Ajax two years ago. If there were any differences between Van Nistelrooy and Ten Hag’s old mentor, they do not appear to have put the United manager off the appointment.
That Ten Hag has been able to select his assistants rather than have new hires forced upon him is a sign that INEOS is willing to place its trust in him. He will still be the manager in name too, as opposed to taking head coach as his job title.
Hake (left), who is expected to join as an assistant to Ten Hag, with Arne Slot, now Liverpool’s head coach (Rene Nijhuis/BSR Agency/Getty Images)
One of the other key points of contention entering these contract talks regarded Ten Hag’s influence over transfer policy, particularly the veto written into his original deal. That remains, as does the recruitment department’s one.
Still, there should now be greater balance in United’s transfer activity. While Ten Hag has held greater sway over comings and goings than had been intended in the two years since his appointment, it has largely been out of necessity, filling gaps that would not typically exist in a well-functioning football structure.
If his influence is at all diminished from here on, that should only be because there are now others above him in the organisation who have both the courage and authority to say no to a manager and the ability to present him with viable alternatives to his suggested targets. In the past at United, that was not always the case.
There are a lot of issues to address this summer, some ideally before players return to the training on Monday (July 8), with Mason Greenwood’s future and the Jadon Sancho question unresolved. There have also been no significant ins or outs in the transfer market yet, a month after the window officially opened.
At least with Ten Hag’s future settled, and Dan Ashworth now installed as sporting director, the structure is finally in place.
Giving Ten Hag the opportunity to prove himself within that rebuilt and reformed hierarchy was a key part of INEOS’ reasoning for eventually deciding to stick and not twist.
After compromises on both sides, this extension provides a platform for club and manager to trust each other and build together. But results, above all else, will ultimately dictate how long this new sense of mutual trust lasts, and whether or not Ten Hag feels the need to look over his shoulder.
(Top photo: Justin Tallis/AFP)
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