Man Utd boss Erik ten Hag has been “let down badly by the people who scouted his forwards”, according to ESPN journalist Mark Ogden.
The 54-year-old is under the microscope and took his stuttering Red Devils to Aston Villa on Sunday after a difficult start to the season continued with a 3-0 home loss at Tottenham and 3-3 draw in Porto.
Man Utd fought for a 0-0 draw against Unai Emery’s in-form side at Villa Park, where Sir Jim Ratcliffe was among those in attendance just days after sidestepping the opportunity to publicly back Ten Hag.
The co-owner was joined by key members of the leadership team for a stalemate that means they have eight points from their opening seven league matches – their lowest tally at this stage since collecting seven in 1989-90.
Reports indicate that Man Utd’s executive committee is set to meet for a pre-planned monthly meeting on Tuesday and Ten Hag believes everyone at the club is “on the same page”.
“We always talk, every week,” Ten Hag said after the match against Villa. “I would say every day we talk so, yeah, I expect I will speak with them.”
Paul Scholes hit out at their forward line following the goalless draw against Aston Villa and questioned what type of striker Man Utd summer signing Joshua Zirkzee is.
And now ESPN reporter Ogden insists both Zirkzee and Rasmus Hojlund are “nowhere near” the level required to play for Man Utd.
Ogden on X: “Whether Ten Hag stays or goes as Man United manager, he’s been let down badly by the people who scouted his forwards. Hojlund and Zirkzee nowhere near United level.”
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After the match, when pressed on being in the bottom half following their worst start to a Premier League season after seven matches, Ten Hag said: I think you said it very good – it is external noise.
“Internal we are disappointed and we know we need to do better, especially we need to score more because in this moment after this block of games that’s the area we’re really short.
“All the other areas I think we are doing really well. We have four clean sheets so that says a lot about the defending and the organisation.
“Also now the defending of defensive transitions we are doing really well, so we are really improving on that point.
“Our build-up play is good – we are calm, composed. We’re creating the chances apart from today.
“I think today we should have created more, but that area in the box of the opponent we have to be more ruthless, more clinical, more killing and we have to work on this.”
