Explained: What makes manager Erik ten Hag so attractive and what can Manchester United expect from him?

The smoke signals were first seen in Bavarian air. Early in October 2018, Ajax were visiting Bayern Munich for a Champions’ League group match. They hadn’t made it to the knockout stages in twelve years. In a group that also had Benfica and AEK Athens, the best hope for a young side stepping into the Allianz would have been some form of damage limitation. By the end of the match, Bayern had been run ragged. It was a 1-1 draw, and Bayern had the greater share of possession, but Ajax had outrun, outshot, and out-tackled the home side. Ajax did not play like a meek outfit, a legacy club clinging too tight onto obsolete principles. They played with an intensity that caught the seasoned pros of Bayern off-guard. Erik ten Hag, just ten months into his tenure as Ajax manager, spoke about an opportunity missed. A few months later, he would again speak about an opportunity missed, but this time after the second leg of the Champions League semi-final. The making of Erik ten Hag Before that night in 2018, ten Hag might have been an unknown face to a global audience, but Bayern Munich knew him well. He had served as their second team manager for two years, including a brief spell working alongside Pep Guardiola for the senior team. He had caught Bayern’s eye as an assistant manager at PSV Eindhoven and manager at Go Ahead Eagles, whom he led to the Eredivisie in his first season in charge. For a young manager to drag a club, that hadn’t seen top-flight football in nearly two decades, to promotion at such speed raised quite a few eyebrows in European boardrooms. **Read: Manchester United appoint Erik ten Hag as manager from next season** After his stint at Bayern II, ten Hag moved back to the Netherlands, this time to FC Utrecht. Once again, his impact was seismic. In his first season, Utrecht reached the KNVB cup final and finished fifth in the league. They caught everyone’s imagination with their intense, transition-heavy style of football. The season after, they went one better, finishing fourth in the league and reaching the final of the Europa League qualification playoffs. AZ Alkmaar won the first leg of the tie 3-0, leaving Utrecht staring at another failed continental campaign. ten Hag’s side won the second leg 3-0, and the tie on penalty shoot-outs. Ajax had seen enough and came knocking midway into the 2017-18 season. They were struggling to push beyond a low ceiling, having not won the Eredivisie in three seasons and looking unlikely to even challenge that season. The heady success and style of football Utrecht had shown over two seasons convinced the principled Ajax board that ten Hag was the man to take them forward without sacrificing the tenets of aggressive football. Ajax would finish second in the league that season, losing out to PSV Eindhoven by four points. But ten Hag had started the rebuild. The season after, Ajax won the league, the cup, and reached the semi-finals of the Champions League. It took a stoppage-time winner by Tottenham Hotspurs’ Lucas Moura to finally stop Erik ten Hag’s entourage. What can Manchester United expect? First and foremost — intensity. ten Hag’s teams, whether at Eagles or Utrecht or Ajax, have been famously intense. They play a high defensive line, press aggressively, and like to move quickly in transition. When his teams have the ball, they commit players forward and like to find passes between their opponents’ defensive lines. His midfield is often fluid, without a specific role — like a sitting defensive-midfielder — getting tagged to one player. In that 2018-19 season, he got Donny van de Beek, Frenkie De Jong, and Lassa Schone to rotate between dropping deep and moving into attacking spaces. This season, Edson Alvarez has had a more defensive role, but he too often carries the ball through midfield. This motif is visible across the pitch, like a diktat to every player that they must have the technical ability and vision to carve out attacking opportunities. **Read: Erik ten Hag's to-do list to revive Manchester United** Without the ball, he will get Manchester United to press and mark proactively. His teams like getting the ball back in transition, rather than regrouping and waiting for the opposition to make a mistake. His midfielders and wide players are often asked to counter-press hard, and defenders are then given the task to man-mark strikers. A tactic like this is fraught with the risk of getting caught out of shape on the counter, but that’s one his teams like playing with. ten Hag comes with a strong CV of playing the kind of football that United watch their biggest rivals play today.

The most similar team to Ajax in the Big 5 Leagues this season?

Manchester City. pic.twitter.com/zzeiM1Yeqw

— Hudl Statsbomb (@Statsbomb) April 21, 2022

That said, he has also shown signs of adaptability. When his Ajax team had to let go of Donny van de Beek and Frenkie de Jong in consecutive summers, he changed the style up. In 2018-19, Ajax played with a false-9 up top, with Hakim Ziyech, Dusan Tadic, and David Neres frequently rotating and dropping deep to pull teams out of shape. This season, he is playing with a more conventional forward in Sebastian Haller. Manchester United will take some time to build themselves a team that can play the high-intensity style of Liverpool or City, but until then, Erik ten Hag will likely find a cocktail between what they have and what they need going forward. Their recent results may not show it, but United have some pieces of the ten Hag puzzle already in place. In Harry Maguire and Rafael Varane, they have just the kind of defenders their new manager likes. Both Maguire and Varane like to carry the ball forward and have a good eye for a pass. While their defensive game needs a lot of fixing, their ability on the ball should be an encouraging sign for ten Hag. In Marcus Rashford, Anthony Elanga, and Jadon Sancho, United also have the kind of inside-forwards that Ajax have been using extensively over the last four years. Whether they can regain their form is one thing, but like the two defenders mentioned above, they fit ten Hag’s style on paper. If the reports emerging from the last couple of weeks are to be believed, ten Hag was straightforward about the current state of Manchester United and his demands for control over coaching and recruitment staff. The amount of freedom Manchester United give ten Hag and his team will determine the most important question around his signing. Is he the right man? He is the likeliest amongst all of United’s previous hirings since Sir Alex Ferguson. But neither Rome nor a league-winning team gets built in a day. Manchester United, in their current situation, are in no position to challenge for the title. Their recent games against Liverpool and Manchester City have laid bare the abyss that exists between those two title challengers and United. For starters, Manchester United need to allow Ralf Rangnick — should he continue as a consultant from next season — and ten Hag to build a team. Manchester United is a different sized beast to Utrecht and Ajax, but they need something that ten Hag achieved at those clubs. They need to start the rebuild by overachieving, and ten Hag has overachieved at his previous jobs like there is no tomorrow. This Tuesday, as the United hierarchy watched Liverpool slice them open like a ripe mango, they would have hoped for their team to show the kind of grit and fight like ten Hag’s Ajax showed against Bayern Munich and Real Madrid. Before the final round of interviews, United had brought their shortlist down to ten Hag, Mauricio Pochettino, Julen Lopetegui, and Luis Enrique. Inside sources have mentioned how John Murtough, Richard Arnold, and Darren Fletcher, all part of the management and directorial team at United, were unanimously enamoured by ten Hag’s body of work and long-term vision. United couldn’t have signed better, but they need to now give their new chief the keys to the office. Read all the  Latest News **,**  Trending News **,**  Cricket News **,**  IPL Live Score ,  IPL 2022 schedule ,  IPL 2022 Points table  and  Entertainment News . Follow us on  Facebook,  Twitter and  Instagram.