MANCHESTER, England — Manchester United, the club with a record 20 English championships, is currently looking for its sixth permanent manager since the tenure of Alex Ferguson ended in 2013 after Erik ten Hag was dismissed from his position.
Statistics reveal the significant decline of United under Ten Hag, highlighting areas that his replacement must address in order to restore the club’s competitiveness.
To gauge the performance of each team in the Premier League, the current international break provided an opportunity for reflection, and the results were alarming for United. After their first seven matches, United managed to garner only eight points, marking the least amount in the Premier League era, which began in 1992, and representing a dismal moment, reminiscent of their seven points from the 1989-90 season. As a result, United found itself positioned 14th in the league, trailing by 12 points behind leaders Manchester City, despite having played one game since then, which kept them still in 14th.
Last season illustrated their struggles more broadly, as Ten Hag led the club to its lowest position in Premier League history, finishing in eighth place, a record that harked back to Ferguson’s time when United ended the season in 13th place during the 1989-90 campaign.
United’s lackluster performance extended to European competitions under Ten Hag. In last season’s Champions League, they finished last in a group that included teams such as FC Copenhagen and Galatasaray, conceding a total of 15 goals—an all-time high for the club in a single group stage, and a record for any English club. This season has not fared much better in the revamped Europa League, where United has only managed draws in all three of their games against FC Twente, Porto, and Fenerbahce, placing them 21st overall in the 36-team competition.
A significant area of concern for fans has been the lack of goals, particularly with the chant “Attack, attack, attack” commonly echoing through Old Trafford. Under Ten Hag’s management, the team has scored a mere eight goals in its first nine matches of the season, ranking them as the third-lowest scoring team in the league, ahead only of Crystal Palace and Southampton. In the previous season, the club had finished as the ninth highest scorer with 57 goals; however, entering the current season, United has a goal difference of minus 4, having scored only 65 while allowing 69 goals.
Defensively, United’s vulnerabilities were glaring. The team conceded 58 goals last season, the highest in their Premier League history, and recorded a worrying statistic of conceding three goals within a match on 24 occasions under Ten Hag, the highest number credited to any manager post-Ferguson. Opta stated that United faced 1,739 shots during Ten Hag’s 128 matches, significantly more than Manchester City, who, despite playing six additional games, faced 717 fewer shots.
The late-game failures were also troublesome, with seven of Ten Hag’s 27 losses resulting from goals scored in the 90th minute or later, concluding with his final match being defined by a penalty conceded in stoppage time that offered a 2-1 win to West Ham.
Ten Hag’s early days were marked by significant setbacks, including back-to-back defeats against Brighton and Brentford at the beginning of the 2022-23 season. The 4-0 defeat at Brentford stood as a low point until the team confronted Liverpool at Anfield, suffering a staggering 7-0 loss—United’s heaviest defeat to their arch-rivals and their worst in competitive play in over nine decades.