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According to The United Stand, Erik ten Hag has been given 3 games to save his job. The fixtures in question are Everton home, Liverpool at home and Brentford away.
This is off the back of an astonishing 11th loss in the Premier League alone this season, and with only 27 games played, this is an absolutely unacceptable statistic for a club of our stature and grandeur. To put that into context, former manager Ole Gunnar Solskjær only lost 12 Premier League games in his 2 full seasons in charge.
To be fair to ten Hag, he has had a nightmare with injuries. In fact, Diogo Dalot, Alejandro Garnacho and captain Bruno have been the only outfield players to avoid injury this season. As it is, we currently have 10 first-team players on the injured list.
Players like Tyrell Malacia and Mount have been injured for just about the whole season. Malacia who’s an excellent deputy for Shaw has not played even a single minute, resulting in Amrabat and Lindelof having to play when Shaw is injured.
The first of these 3 fixtures is a date with Everton at the Theatre on Saturday afternoon. Of the 3 fixtures, this may be the easiest, and it is a must win, just like the other two. The toffees are on a 10 game winless run in the Premier League, with their last win coming against Burnley on the 16th of December.
They recently received a boost after their points deduction was reduced to 6 points from 10, propelling them to 16th in the table, 5 points clear of the relegation zone. The first leg was an easy 3-0 win, punctuated by that Garnacho worldie of a bicycle kick.
The next game against Liverpool will be the most important – make or break, as they say. It is this fixture that gave us perhaps the worst result of our lifetimes, that hellish Anfield 7-0 decapitation.
Erik ten Hag has a horrendous record against top teams, and if he ever needed a result against the big boys, now is the time.
Klopp’s boys are top of the table and on a six game winning streak in all competitions. They always find a way to win this season, and they seem determined to decorate Klopp’s last season with all the gold.
We however are the only side to keep Liverpool from scoring in the Premier League this season, and I hope that will be the case too come 17th of March.
The last of these 3 fixtures will be a trip to the Brentford community stadium. A fixture against Brentford is never an easy one, and they always find a way to make themselves a nuisance, especially against ‘the big boys’.
We almost lost the first leg against the Bees but for an incredible McTominay brace in stoppage time to put us 2-1 up.
These 3 matches will probably define ten Hag’s future at the club, and it will be interesting and nerving to see how it unfolds.
