“No excuses” is the admirable mantra of Erik ten Hag as the manager surveys the wreckage of Manchester United’s early season. In football it is an adage applied unequivocally to injuries and illnesses: never cite the players unavailable as the reason for bad results because you will be cast as weak and lacking the imagination to navigate the alternative route to success with those you do have.
Like all truisms there is a limit. For Ten Hag to have 16 of his first-team squad go down at some point for the 10 games so far is the non-negotiable prevailing factor in United’s dismal form. The number is close to two- thirds of the 25-man Premier League squad clubs name each September for the opening half of the season.
It has included the new signings Rasmus Højlund, who cost £72m, and Mason Mount (£55m), plus Lisandro Martínez (who joined for £57m in summer 2022) – all Ten Hag recruits – and another player, Antony, was unavailable owing to a leave of absence granted for him to deal with allegations of violence against more than one woman, which he denies.
For the record, the rest of those who have been – or remain – injured or ill are: Tyrell Malacia, Luke Shaw and Sergio Reguilón (a trio of left-backs), plus Raphaël Varane, Harry Maguire, Tom Heaton, Aaron Wan-Bissaka, Sofyan Amrabat, Christian Eriksen, Amad Diallo, Kobbie Mainoo, Scott McTominay and Anthony Martial.
Ten Hag refuses to publicly point to a list long enough to fill a hospital ward but it is inescapable that being without a swathe of prime talent means the team will suffer. If Mainoo, Heaton, Malacia, Maguire and Diallo are fringe players, there are still a near-dozen frontline acts, led by Martínez, Højlund and Varane, who have had to sit games out. Also absent, for disciplinary reasons, is Jadon Sancho.
Stellar footballers make stellar sides or why pursue them? At Manchester City we saw a £100m splurge on Jack Grealish (August 2021), at Arsenal £105m is found for Declan Rice (July), and Brighton watched on as Moisés Caicedo was the subject of a bidding war between Liverpool (who offered £111m) and Chelsea (whose £115m won, in August).
What is behind the crisis-inducing number of injuries hobbling Ten Hag is the searing question. Fatigue may be a reason. Alongside City, United had the most matches of any side in Europe last season and most of their players participated in the Qatar World Cup. Training methods may be to blame, too.
Last month United moved to enhance their medical department by head-hunting Gary O’Driscoll, Arsenal’s former chief doctor, and it is understood he is reviewing the slew of injuries.
Tuesday’s 3-2 loss to Galatasaray was a second Champions League defeat from United’s first two group games. As with the 4-3 defeat at Bayern Munich, the defeats can be traced to individual errors, with Amrabat and André Onana the chief culprits. The former could argue – quite rightly – he is not a career left-back. He missed a header for the Turkish club’s opener and was caught out of position along the same flank for their winner. But the Moroccan was only playing there in the absence of Shaw, Reguilón and Malacia.
Onana is a far more concerning case. Look again at the highlights against Galatasaray and Ten Hag’s new first choice is the hapless lead act, a goalkeeper who went down an age early and saw Mauro Icardi’s winner go past him at shoulder height, at best. Earlier he hit a pass that was never on to a colleague; that pass went straight to Dries Mertens, who was chopped down by Casemiro, who was sent off.
This last error is becoming the leitmotif of the Cameroonian’s United career. Onana, in a way, was the Ten Hag statement signing of the summer. The £47m buy from Internazionale who would revolutionise United’s style, moving it from a lumpen hoof-and-hope proposition into a new era of slick-from-the-back football.
So far, so wrong. On his debut in pre-season, Onana’s radar was faulty as a loose header from an advanced outfield area led to Joselu’s decisive strike in a 2-0 loss to Real Madrid in Houston. The mistake that presaged Casemiro’s red card may not be his last. Casemiro, too, is like Onana: a player in search of his mojo – as is another of Ten Hag’s supposed A-listers, Marcus Rashford, whose sharp cross for Højlund’s opening goal against Galatasaray maybe signals he is finally rediscovering it.
On the Wednesday morning after the night before at Old Trafford, Turkey withdrew from the race to host Euro 2028, clearing the way for the home nations and Republic of Ireland to stage it. Yet Old Trafford has not been put forward as a venue by the Football Association. This, the club claims, is because potential upgrades mean it cannot be guaranteed to be ready.
At Euro 96 the ground hosted five games, in a 16-nation competition. With the tournament now expanded to 24, Old Trafford might have been granted numerous matches so the club are now staring at a loss of several million pounds in revenue: one more emblem of how the Glazers, as owners, have allowed United to be left behind by City (whose Etihad Stadium will be a host venue) and other rivals.
One beacon of hope for an on-field upturn is Højlund, who scored both United’s goals against Galatasaray, the second via a burning run along the left from halfway ended by the deftest of dinks over Fernando Muslera.
The hope is that the Dane, 20, is not dragged down by what he has walked into. A clearer picture of what this is will only emerge, though, when Ten Hag does not have so many walking wounded to contend with.
