His name circulated in all the spans, now it’s done. Erik ten Hag will be Manchester United’s next manager, as the club announced on Thursday (21 April). The 52-year-old Dutch technician, in post since 2017 at Ajax Amsterdam, arrives as a firefighter in a burning house. He was chosen by the board of directors to succeed Ralf Rangnick, himself arriving to try to save the house of the Red Devils. But who is this coach, whose rating has continued to climb for several years?
Erik ten Hag, a child from the province of Overijssel in the north-eastern part of the Netherlands, started out as a modest midfielder in the Dutch league, notably with FC Twente, his favorite club where he played played for a long time, and where he went to the other side of the lawn, on the bench. The Batavian then embarked on a career that would take him into a completely different sphere.
The new First-Team Manager of Manchester United: Erik ten Hag.#MUFC || #WelcomeErik
— Manchester United (@ManUtd) April 21, 2022
His career began asassistant to the Twente first team, then to the same position at PSV Eindhoven. He arrived at the head of his first team in Daventer for the Go Ahead Eagles in 2012, which he promoted to the national football elite. He was then spotted by the Bayern Munich reserve team in 2013 where Guardiola prevailed, who“inspired a lot”he admits, and won the regional championship there.
In 2015, Erik ten Hag returned home and settled on the bench of Utrecht, a club where he had also played as a player. But it was in December 2017 that his career took a completely different turn: Erik ten Hag was called up by Ajax Amsterdam to replace Marcel Keizer. The beginning of a beautiful story. He won two championship titles and two national cups with them (in 2019 and 2021).
More than these two titles, it was Ajax’s Champions League epic in 2019 that revealed it. With a supercharged Ajax made up of players like Matthijs De Ligt, Hakim Ziyech, Frenkie De Jong and Donny van de Beek, he climbed to the semi-finals of the Champions League after having dismissed Real Madrid and Cristiano’s Juventus Ronaldo, before stumbling over Tottenham. Erik ten Hag is named the fourth best coach in the world in 2019 at the FIFA The Best trophy.
From his first experiences with the training categories of the Twente club, in U17 and U19, Erik ten Hag kept one of his main characteristics: that of being a training coach. Under his leadership, many players discovered themselves, launched or relaunched their careers. Dusan Tadic experienced a real renaissance under the ten Hag era after his time at Southampton. This season, the Ivorian Sébastien Haller, also in difficulty in England, stood out for his newfound efficiency, especially in the Champions League where he scored eleven goals.
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But young people remain at the heart of the game of “little general”, as we liked to call him during his time with the Go Ahead Eagles. Of the 28 players present in the professional group this season at Ajax, the average age is 25.3 years. The technician is behind the explosion of the nugget of Dutch football, Ryan Gravenberch (19), midfielder trained at the club and coveted by all of Europe. But ten Hag has a new “darling” since the De Ligt/de Jong generation: Antony, whom he would see himself bringing to Manchester.
With this very attacking 4-2-4, strongly inspired by those put in place by Pep Guardiola throughout his career, Erik ten Hag wants dynamism. The comparison with the Spanish coach is such that some call him “Little Pep” (Little Pep). The Dutchman is an ultra of “total football”, worthy heir to a certain Johan Cruyff, idol of the people of Amsterdam.
“Pep Guardiola’s philosophy is sensational, which he has done at Barcelona, at Bayern and now with Manchester City. This attacking and attractive style wins him a lot. It is this structure that I have tried to implement with Ajax.”
Erik ten Hagat a press conference in 2019
This philosophy of play uses triangles to overload key areas of the pitch both with and without the ball. A system nurtured by the versatility of players in various positions on the pitch, allowing them to move freely. That had seen himself in particular with the midfielder Frenkie de Jong, who had revealed himself to the eyes of the world by his ability to play in all positions, in the center. At Manchester United, ten Hag will arrive with a style of play and all the cards in hand to develop the team as he sees fit.