They say never meet your heroes, but a young Erik ten Hag 's encounter with his idol, Johan Cruyff, helped put him on the road to Manchester United.
As a 13-year-old in FC Twente 's academy, the new Red Devils boss starred on Dutch television programme 'Cruyff & co' which gave children the chance to speak to the late, great football icon up close and personal. A babyfaced Ten Hag and his fellow academy starlets had the opportunities to quiz the legendary Cruyff about his career and esteemed footballing philosophy.
When it came to the future United manager's time to ask a question, Ten Hag looked up to his hero - who died aged 68 in 2016 - and pondered: "What is the best way to develop your technique?"
In his wisdom, Cruyff responded by saying: "Developing your technique is really quite simple. You have to do it: train, train, train. That is the only thing that you have to do above anything else."
Ten Hag clearly took note, as after a respectable playing career which included three spells at Twente and 221 games for them, he became a coach obsessed with the details on the training ground and, ultimately, a demanding boss at the highest level. Taking Cruyff's beloved Ajax to the Champions League semi-finals in 2019, the former Barcelona player and manager's influence has stuck with him all the way to the Old Trafford hot seat.
Later in the show - to demonstrate a level of maturity beyond his teenage years and a knack for coaching - Ten Hag offered some insight of his own on the beautiful game and impressed Cruyff, who's regarded as the pioneer of Total Football.
"With youngsters, you have to be careful not to shout too much because that can break a player," Ten Hag began. "[They might think] 'Ah, football means nothing to me. I am quitting'.
"With higher level teams such as Ajax's first team or Twente's first team, it doesn't matter, a trainer may say something because those lads are training more often during the week and if they keep on making the same mistakes over and over again, then I think something may very well be said about that."
Ten Hag was recently shown the footage and opened up on the influence that Cruyff has had on his own philosophy. "He took us for a training session, and everyone was taught a certain skill," the 52-year-old explained. "Johan Cruyff would then go on to train that with us and afterwards we were all to go back to the studio to talk about it.
"I was a big fan of him because of his way of playing. And he was the first player when I was growing up, who was at a big club abroad but above all turning Ajax into a great club. Then you always got to hear about it from my uncles, because I was only really young then."
Of course, Ten Hag isn't the only Premier League gaffer to idolise the Dutch legend, with Pep Guardiola - another ex-Barcelona player and boss - an acolyte. "He was unique, totally unique," Guardiola told the Guardian shortly after Cruyff died. "Without him I wouldn't be here. I know for sure this is why I am, right now, the manager of Manchester City and before that Bayern Munich and Barcelona."
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"Before he came we didn't have a cathedral of football, this beautiful church, at Barcelona. We needed something new. And now it is something that has lasted. It was built by one man, by Johan Cruyff, stone by stone. That's why he was special. I would not be able to do what he did.
"You hear all these people saying: 'Oh Pep, what a good manager he is.' Forget about it. Cruyff was the best, by far. Creating something new is the difficult part. To make it and build it and get everyone to follow? Amazing. That's why, when I was Barcelona manager, I went to see Johan many times."
