Erik ten Hag has agreed to become the new Manchester United manager from the beginning of the 2022-23 season, and the Dutchman will be in no doubt about the size of the task on his hands.
The Ajax boss will step into an evolving drama at Old Trafford, with the club having spiralled somewhat out of control during years of mismanagement and poor recruitment.
Ten Hag can change all that wit his progressive, modern approach, and having been preferred to Mauricio Pochettino for the role he will no doubt already have in mind what he wants to do.
The 52-year-old boss is said to have had ‘a five-year plan’ for the club which he unveiled during his ultimately successful round of interviews with United supremos John Murtough and Darren Fletcher, but what will that plan for a club desperate for success entail?
We’ve taken a look at what he’ll hope to achieve.
That is simply not tolerable for a club trying to achieve things at the very summit of the game.
No-one is expecting Ten Hag to hit the ground running and suddenly start challenging the likes of Manchester City and Liverpool for major honours from the very beginning, but the Dutchman needs to at least look like he has a plan to get there.
Ten Hag will obviously start this process in his first year, and by the beginning of his second season he should have no doubt over who he wants in his side going forward.
As it stands United will see the contracts of Cristiano Ronaldo, Marcus Rashford, Luke Shaw, Fred, David de Gea, Diogo Dalot and Nemanja Matic all expire in 2023, and while some of those will obviously sign new deals by then, and others will be willingly let go, there is no doubt that the bulk of the group Ten Hag wants should be complete by then, with the style of play to the fore.
The Dutchman knows he has a big job on his hands to get United into the shape he wants, and some of these players will face a fight to be included.
Fans love seeing progress and the improvement of players, but what they really crave is success, and every manager who comes to United must know that.
Ten Hag is likely to get the first two seasons as a grace period if his team show signs that progress is being made, but in the end those same supporters will demand that silverware be brought into the club as a clear sign that they are back among the elite.
Jurgen Klopp was often pilloried for failing to bring a trophy to Liverpool in his first few seasons, but after taking over during the 2015-16 campaign it was at the end of his third full season that he brought the Champions League to the club.
The new United boss might not have to win anything quite that substantial, but something will be needed.
It isn’t clear how Manchester City and Liverpool will look by the 2025-26 season, but as it stands neither one of Pep Guardiola or Jurgen Klopp will be in situ.
Again, that could all change, but while the success of those two clubs could well depend on just who has ended up replacing those two managerial titans, if Ten Hag is still at United then Year Four is when he’ll need to get his side looking comfortable as they rub shoulders with those elite sides of recent years.
United are used to that of course, but the inertia which has gripped them over much of the past decade simply can’t be there by summer 2026 if the Dutchman is to be deemed to have done a good job.
