Despite not taking to the Old Trafford dugout for a Premier League fixture yet, new Manchester United boss Erik Ten Hag already has a rife list of problems to solve if he is to become the first Red Devils boss to succeed since Sir Alex Ferguson's retirement in 2013.
The obvious and most disruptive saga that has taken the shine off the Dutchman's first few weeks in the Old Trafford hot seat has been the speculation surrounding the future of Cristiano Ronaldo. The 37-year-old former Real Madrid man missed a large portion of the club's pre-season schedule after he didn't begin the early days of the Ten Hag era with the rest of his teammates, as he was absent for their tour of Thailand and Australia, citing family problems as his reason.
And while the six-time Ballon D'or winner seems unlikely to be granted a move to a Champions League club this transfer window, which he so desperately craves, with Atletico Madrid, Chelsea and Bayern Munich distancing themselves from a move for the forward, his apparent unwillingness to put his personal motivations to one side in order to help United get off to a promising start in the Premier League this weekend sums up exactly why Ten Hag may have bitten off more than he can chew with this current group of players.
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Of course, Ronaldo isn't the only Manchester United employee to have attempted to force a move away from Manchester this summer, with goalkeeper Dean Henderson recently revealing his irritation at being made to stay at Old Trafford last season after the club's hierarchy broke a string of promises relating to the 25-year-old's game time.
Having joined newly-promoted Nottingham Forest last month, Henderson gave an explosive interview to talkSport on Tuesday afternoon which seemed to lift the lid on the dressing room issues Ten Hag faces the almighty task of trying to turn around this season.
"To be quite honest with you, it's probably been the toughest 12 months of my career," Henderson told talkSport. "It's been tough, it's been hard and I'm so happy I've come out the other end of it now.
"The conversation I had, coming out of the Euros squad (with England), was that you're coming back here (to United) to be the No 1 goalkeeper. I got Covid, then unfortunately no one followed through with anything they told me.
"It's frustrating as well because I turned so many good loans down last summer for that reason and they wouldn't let me go. To sit there and waste 12 months is criminal, really, at my age. I was fuming.
The Manchester United loanee was then asked if he had aspirations of trying to impress Ten Hag upon his return to the United squad this summer, to which he bluntly replied: "No. I didn't want him to see me in training. Because I knew that he probably wanted to keep me. So I told the hierarchy that I need to play football, I don't want to be here and play second fiddle."
Such comments make it little surprise that five managers have walked through the door of Old Trafford, since Ferguson announced his retirement nine years ago, and enjoyed little success. Even Jose Mourinho, despite his controversial ways of working, failed in his attempt to transform the mentality of those within his ranks at United.
According to the Portuguese boss, leading the 2017/18 United squad to a second-place finish - some 19 points behind champions and close-city rivals Manchester City - is among the greatest achievements of his career.
Speaking in 2019, Mourinho said: 'If I tell you, for example, that I consider one of the best jobs of my career was to finish second with Man United in the Premier League, you will say, 'this guy is crazy'.
"He won 25 titles and he is saying that a second position was one of his best achievements?
"I keep saying this because people don't know what is going on behind the scenes."
It seems that the former Ajax manager is desperately trying to install some form of discipline into his new squad, with Ronaldo quick to receive the wrath of his manager for leaving Sunday's friendly against Rayo Vallecano early while the rest of his team-mates played out the latter stages of the second half.
“I don’t condone this.," the United boss said in a recent interview with Dutch television. "This is unacceptable, for everyone. We are a team and you have to stay until the end."
Though Ten Hagg could take inspiration from Jurgen Klopp's dealing with controversial figures during his seven-year time at Anfield, which has, regardless of an individual's quality, put the harmony of the team at the centre of everything.
In 2016, Mamadou Sakho felt the fury of the Liverpool manager when he was expelled from the Reds' pre-season tour of the United States as a result of ill-discipline. Having suffered an Achilles injury that would rule him out of the start of the 2016/17 Premier League season, which would be Klopp's first full campaign on Merseyside, Sakho embarked on the tour with the rest of the Liverpool squad but was later sent home for disrespecting the club's ethos.
“I have to build a group here, we have to start new here. So I thought maybe it made sense for him to fly home to Liverpool and after eight or 10 days when we come back we can talk about it. It's not that serious." said Klopp when speaking about the incident in 2016.
“He nearly missed the departure of the plane, he missed a session and was late for a meal.
“So I thought maybe it made sense for him to fly home to Liverpool and after eight or 10 days when we come back we can talk about it. It's not that serious.
“He nearly missed the departure of the plane, he missed a session and was late for a meal. It is private how he reacted. But we had no argument, it wasn't 'aghh, you, no...'.
And while the luxury of hindsight reveals that Liverpool would cope just fine without the services of the Frenchman, as Klopp brought Champions League football back to Anfield, Sakho had been one of the players the Liverpool manager would have viewed as a key individual as he drew up his plans for success during the off-season.
At the time, the Reds only had Ragnar Klavan, Dejan Lovern and Joel Matip - as well as Sakho - as senior centre-backs heading into the 2016/17 season, which made Klopp's decision to stick to his principles and not reintroduce the defender to first-team training upon the club's return to Melwood all the more respectable.
Sakho would never kick a ball for the Liverpool first-team again as he was banished to the Reds' academy training ground to join up with the U21 side, before joining Crystal Palace on loan the following January.
More recently, rumours linking Liverpool with a move for former midfielder Philippe Coutinho appeared to carry little substance, and even less interest from Klopp, who was not willing to send the wrong message to his squad after the former Anfield star had used deceitful tactics in a bid to leave Anfield.
Klopp told the talented Brazilan, who had his eyes set on a move to Barcelona from the summer of 2017 onwards: "Stay here and they will end up building a statue in your honour. Go somewhere else, to Barcelona, to Bayern Munich, to Real Madrid, and you will be just another player. Here you can be something more.”
It's been that type of collective mentality that has seen Liverpool build year-on-year during Klopp's time at the helm and ultimately resulted in his side winning every major trophy on offer during that time, as they completed the set with Saturday's Community Shield triumph over Manchester City.
While Ten Hag embarks on the toughest test of his managerial career to date by aiming to get the Old Trafford house in order, he could do more destructive things than take guidance from Klopp's harmonious approach which has resulted in the Reds building one of Europe's finest sides.
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