Ten Hag sack, Man Utd nightmares for Ugarte and De Ligt, Kulusevski dazzles for Tottenham and more
Tottenham were good but not as good as Manchester United were bad in another new low for Erik ten Hag, whose summer signings have changed nothing at Old Trafford.
1) Distinctly mediocre starts to the season for both these sides meant a high likelihood of a crisis klaxon accompanying the final whistle. Ange Postecoglouās lack of a Plan B and the wait for Erik ten Hagās Plan A to materialise had put both managers in the sack race running.
Neither team had inspired confidence in their ability to achieve what we assume is their primary aim this season. With the excellence of Manchester City and Arsenal, Arne Slotās start at Liverpool, Aston Villaās steady progression under Unai Emery ā even with that disappointing draw at Ipswich ā and the getting together of the sh*t by Enzo Maresca at Chelsea, it would have taken particularly blinkered Tottenham or Manchester United fans to suggest their teams had anything more than the faintest hope of Champions League qualification via the Premier League based on the opening five games of the campaign.
This was theĀ perfect opportunity for a statement win, given it would be over Big Six side, but one playing below the level that led to them being labelled as such.
The result was always going to look better on paper than it would be in reality and while Spurs will rightly be buoyed by a win at Old Trafford after a less than convincing start to the season, itās a result that requires the context of it coming overĀ thisĀ Manchester United, just as such a comprehensive defeat for Ten Hagās side requires the context of it being doled out by a Spurs side whose flaws have been laid bare over the last six months, during which time theyāve won just six of 16 Premier League games.
That run of form is worth considering when deciding whether this was more about Spurs being good or United being bad.
2) Gary Neville played the hits, describing Manchester Unitedās first-half performance as ādisgracefulā, ādisgustingā and ā most damning of all ā āone of the worst performances under Erik ten Hagā.
Tottenham were allowed to do whatever they wanted. While we saw energy, cohesion and structure from them, United were chaotic, disconnected and lacklustre. Weāve bored ourselves saying it, but itās no less true the 427th time than the first: the Manchester United players donāt know what theyāre doing.
When you combine that with the second example in the space of a week of the opposition team āwanting it moreā, weāre left once again questioning what Ten Hagās value is. A manager that canāt organise or motivate their team should not be the manager.
3) There was one particular penetrative move of many by Spurs which saw them go from back to front, ending with Brennan Johnson hitting the post, that exemplified the lethargy of the United players.
In a misguided attempt to press Tottenham, first Noussair Mazraoui and then Matthijs de Ligt attempted to win possession, but were both too slow and by diving in half a second too late left their teammates horribly exposed to what was admittedly some slick passing from Spurs.
It happened time and again. If Spurs got their passing right they cut right through United. Thatās not normal. Thatās a training exercise.Ā Attacking players can be brilliant ā and at times, Spursā were ā but defenders can be brilliant too, and save for one excellent clearance from Mazraoui, Unitedās werenāt. But we almost āĀ almostĀ ā feel sorry for them.
4) They were always under pressure. If Tottenham got the ball, they would at some stage in a move ā normally after three or four passes ā get it in or around the United penalty area.
Again, thatās not normal. We donāt think weāre being disingenuous by suggesting that every other Premier League team would have defended better. The press is probably nowĀ theĀ most important aspect of defending, and Manchester United ā after over two seasons under Ten Hag ā have no idea how to either beat the press or press themselves. Itās unbelievable.
Whether itās a lack of understanding as to what the triggers are, poor fitness levels or a more simple case of them failing to follow instructions, it all reflects terribly on Ten Hag, who has consistently failed to implement the tactical aspect of modern football that at one stage separated the best from the rest but is now ā like it or loathe it ā a staple of all half-decent professional football teams.
READ MORE: Wasteful Tottenham still left laughing at Manchester Unitedās humiliation in Old Trafford rout
5) Ten Hag can no longer blame injuries or squad depth as he did last season.
Luke Shaw would be the first-choice left-back if fit and there will be a debate over which of Rasmus Hojlund or Joshua Zirkzee should lead the line until either one of them starts scoring on a regular basis, but those two positions aside, the starting lineup here is about as good as itās going to get for United.
Key to this close-to-first-choice-XI was the full Premier League debut of Manuel Ugarte, who will go to bed tonight picturing the No.10 of James Maddison over one of his shoulders.
The Uruguayan was caught flat-footed by Maddison with simple one-twos three times in the opening half an hour of the game and, more an indication of Spursā dominance than his own limitations, failed to complete a pass in the Spurs half in the Ā first 45 minutes.
It was a brutal introduction to Premier League football for a midfielder who did a perfectly serviceable impression of the guy he was signed to replace, chasing shadows as Casemiro has done for the last year. He looked alarmingly uncombative and cumbersome for a midfield battler famed for his ability to get around the pitch.
6) The United performances before this game had offered scope for the fans to don rose-tinted spectacles. They had the fifth-best xG in the league with 9.5 from five games, in which they had scored five goals, with the reasonable assertion from both the fans and Ten Hag himself that āIĀ would be worried if we werenāt creating chances.ā
Perhaps now is the time to worry then after a game in which Tottenham surpassed Manchester Unitedās xG at Old Trafford: 5.33 for them in one game to Unitedās 4.84 across three, with just 0.98 on Sunday.
āWe have to kill,ā Ten Hag said ahead of kick-off when asked what his side have to do to turn what he professed were good performances into positive results, naming Bruno Fernandes, Marcus Rashford, Alejandro Garnacho and Rasmus Hojlund as his assassins. They had three shots between them; none of them on target.
7) Rashford will bear the brunt of the profligacy criticism. He didnāt manage a shot and has taken just four in 420 minutes of Premier League football this season. An in-form Rashford would be taking pot-shots from anywhere.
That has often been to the frustration of the United fans, who now instead groan at him running towards defenders before turning back and recycling the ball.
He attempted just two dribbles here; if heās not shooting and not dribbling itās fair to question his worth to the team, though he did produce one excellent cross for Alejandro Garnacho, who did well to get a clean enough connection on the ball to hit the post having slipped at the key moment.
That was the one example of decent link-up play between Rashford and Garnacho, who very rarely looked as though theyāre on the same page for Manchester United. Not just in this game, but also definitely in this game, particularly just before Micky van de Van did his madness, with Rashford taking a heavy touch that could have been a pass for Garnacho, but instead allowed the Spurs defender to stride out of defence with astonishing purpose.
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8) His assist against Everton was wonderful, but not so much an indication of his brilliant ball control and dribbling quality as this one. All of Van de Venās eight touches to take him the 70-odd yards to the United byline were perfect, as was his squared pass for Brennan Johnson, who couldnāt keep from smiling even before he side-footed the ball in, such was the plate his teammate had put the ball on and the ease with which he had opened the scoring after three minutes at Old Trafford.
It looks like incredibly ordinary defending from United, with Ugarte bypassed and then Mazraoui and De Ligt split by the extraordinary speed and long strides of the Kaka regen. They should have brought him down, but such was the inertia of United in that moment, there was actually only one point ā whenĀ Mazraoui may not have been sure whether contact would be in or out of the box ā when any of them managed to get close enough to foul him.
Perhaps we would be more willing to write it off purely as Van de Den brilliance if being slow wasnāt typical of everything Manchester United did.
9) We know Tottenham are quick. Van de Ven is rapid and Johnson, Timo Werner, Dejan Kulusevski, Destiny Udogie and Dominic Solanke all have pace to burn. Postecoglouās need for speed was particularly obvious in this game, because ā and this sounds weird ā Ten Hag appears to have built an antithetical team. Whether this is the reality or to do with their torpor as a result of the way things are going, they all seem very, very slow.
De Ligt looked as though heās about to follow Raphael Varane into retirement at the age of 25,Ā Mazraoui was consistently breezed past, first by Werner and then by teenager Mikey Moore, while Joshua Zirkzee requires at least ten strides to get his massive frame moving. Aside from Rashford and Garnacho, thereās a real lack of zip to United.
10) That obviously wasnāt helped by Bruno Fernandesā dismissal at the end of the first period, though United had played as though they were at least a man light before that in any case.
The United captain was definitely unfortunate. He clearly slips before making contact and what would have been a simple trip of James Maddison ā and actually still was ā was instead deemed to be dangerous as a result of Brunoās studs very nearly making contact with the Spurs playmakerās shin.
They didnāt though, it was his heel that caught Maddison, and while we donāt want games re-refereed etc. etc., we would also quite like VAR to look at that and come to the only logical conclusion that itās a very clear yellow card but not a red.
11) We do need to talk about Bruno though. Having been the most creative player in the Premier League across the last two seasons, creating chances at a rate of 3.3 per 90 minutes across those campaigns, heās now down at 1.1 in 2024/2025.
Even if Ten Hag sorts out the pressing, the defence, gets the forwards linking up and comes up with a plan beyond signing decent footballers and throwing them onto a football pitch, United wonāt do anything this season without Bruno Fernandes performing close to his best.
And thatās whatās so strange ā heās always been close to his best. Heās been extraordinarily good throughout his time at Old Trafford. While some of his teammates have enjoyed peaks and all of them have endured troughs, Fernandes has been consistently brilliant.
People have always questioned his leadership skills, grown frustrated with his arm-flapping histrionics and amateur dramatics, but for the first time ever at Manchester United weāve been granted with the alien opportunity to question his form.
12) Tottenham would surely have had five or six had their best finisher been available. They were also without Son Heung-min for the same fixture last season, which confirmed Angeball as a philosophy that ran through the squadĀ after the Premier League return of Timo Werner, who provided a neat assist for Rodrigo Bentancur in that game but also plenty of the stuff that saw him leave Chelsea to little more than a shrug from the fans.
He missed a huge chance in the first half here, and not one single person thought he would score having raced beyond the United defence on halfway to go one-on-one with Andre Onana, who spread himself but neednāt have as Werner scuffed his shot straight at the United goalkeeper with all finishing options available to him.
And it was a similar story in the second half for Werner, whose runs remain brilliant and his build-up play good enough for a starting spot in this team if he could only drum up the odd decent finish, like those he was famed for in his first spell at RB Leipzig, rather than the telegraphed, limp-ankled efforts like his attempt that was again comfortably saved by Onana after the break.
He will not have climbed the winger pecking order as a result of this performance, as Johnson strengthened his claim with a goal and an assist for Kulusevski, who was excellent in his more central position alongside Maddison.
13) Kulusevski created nine chances, the most on record (since 2003-04) by a visiting player in a Premier League game at Old Trafford. Heās having a right olā time buzzing around in midfield and has now created more chances per 90 mins (4.11) than any other Premier League player.
Heās quick and has a very tight turning circle, but that much was obvious while he was playing on the wing. Itās his vision and weight of pass thatās come to the fore this season, and Postecoglou deserves great credit for noticing that his ability to split defences is more useful when playing in an inverted position.
It was a lovely finish too. Johnson raced clear of Lisandro Martinez ā who dived in on the halfway line in a manner in keeping with his typical rushes of blood to the head and his teamās general lack of awareness ā and his cross was deflected into the path of Kulusevski, who neatly cushioned the ball on the volley over and past Onana. It was wonderfully delicate.
We would be wary (not that Ange will be) that against better opposition Spurs may be exposed through the middle with both Kulusevski and Maddison clearly favouring one box over another in their box-to-box roles. And actually, even here, in a ten-minute spell in the second half there were signs that if an opposition team gets the ascendency Spurs may struggle to wrestle it back with Rodrigo Bentancur the lone scrapper, and a cultured one at that.
14) That was a very weird period in the game, and proof ā not that we needed it ā that no matter the dominance of Tottenham, Spursiness always lingers.
Casemiro had come on for Zirkzee to shore things up at half-time and didnāt do that, but did have an impact on the front foot, delivering some excellent passes to force United forward and putting one shot just past the post from a tight angle after a Martinez ball over the Spurs defence.
Garnacho also started to look a bit more like himself, hustling down the wing and cutting inside, to such an extent that very briefly we thought: āIf United get one hereā¦ā
Postecoglou responded to that slightly uneasy spell for his side by bringing on Lucas Bergvall and Pape Matar Sarr, who combined with their first contribution to put the game beyond doubt. Bergvall took the corner and Sarr flicked it on for Dominic Solanke to prod home.
15) Although caveated by it being againstĀ thisĀ Manchester United, it was an excellent performance and result for Tottenham.
They looked far more like the dynamic side that at this point last season had us marvelling at their hell-for-leather football under a new manager, who was perhaps lauded a bit too emphatically at that point and has been written off recently with far too much certainty in some quarters after their recent struggles.
Thereās no doubt after that display that Postecoglou still has the backing of all of his players, and why wouldnāt he? Being part of a team that can play with that much freedom at Old Trafford must be a blast.
But while they were good, they werenāt as good as United were bad.
16) Ten Hag said he āwasnāt thinkingā about his possible sacking after the defeat, insisting āwe are all there on one page, one boat, the ownership, the leadership group, the staff, players too.ā
That may well be true. He canāt know for sure ā Sir Jim Ratcliffe hadnāt been on the blower in the 30 minutes between the final whistle and his post-match interviews ā but either the co-owner or Dan Ashworth may well come out in support of their manager in the coming week, ahead of a possible rabbit-out-of-the-hat display away at Porto to grant Ten Hag breathing space, before more sack chat after defeat to Aston Villa next Sunday. Itās cyclical and interminable.
But the sack is coming. If Manchester United want to win the Premier League in 2028, as CEO Omar Berrada said was the clubās target this week, that will be without Erik ten Hag.
He can neither motivate or organise a team for more than the odd game, let alone with the now extraordinary consistency required to win a Premier League title. Just ask Mikel Arteta whatās required. Ten Hag is nowhere near that level.
We could just about understand them keeping in his post this summer, given the FA Cup triumph and a seeming lack of alternatives, but there comes a point when anyone else would be better, with this team at another lowest ebb of many in his perennially doomed tenure.
