Chadwick questions Ten Hag’s old school approach to punishing underperforming players | OneFootball

Luke Chadwick questions Erik ten Hag’s old school approach to punishing players.

It has been a terrible start to the season for Manchester United. After two defeats from as many games in the Premier League, Erik ten Hag has quickly realised that he has a lot of work to do to implement his style of football.

Speaking to Caught Offside, former academy graduate Luke Chadwick raised his concerns about reports Ten Hag made the United players do extra training on their day off to make up for their lack of running in the 4-0 defeat against Brentford.

According to the Daily Mail, the players were made to run eight-and-a-half miles by Ten Hag, but I doubt that was done as one big run. It was surely done of stops and starts – plus you’d doubt if David de Gea was made carry out the same training.

Chadwick is unsure if this old school approach will help improve performances on the pitch.

“I’m not 100% sure about it – it’s quite an old school way of doing things. The game has changed, the individuals playing it are very different, and of course the world in general has changed a lot over the last 25 years or so,” Chadwick said.

“You’d hope the players aren’t playing badly on purpose and they’ll be disappointed with how things are gone, in which case a punishment like that is maybe not the best way to go about things. But of course the manager makes the decisions, he’ll decide how discipline is done at the club.

“You do hope that the players understand that the performance wasn’t anywhere near acceptable, whether there’s a punishment or not.

“It seems like a real poisonous environment at the club, all the way through, from the top level to the team that’s playing.

“You sort of wonder how they can now put it right. You can’t change the whole squad in just a few weeks left of the transfer window. And the other underlying issues will take a long time to sort out.”

Personally, I think the players deserved extra time. Something needs to change and if they don’t like it, Ten Hag needs to have the bottle to change loyalty.

There’s lots of players in the squad that he owes nothing to – whereas a lot of these players became favourites under Ole Gunnar Solskjaer before throwing him under a bus.