Paul Scholes fears Manchester United are ‘regressing’ under Erik ten Hag and the club’s hierarchy with a faulty recruitment strategy and poor coaching.
The United legend believes fans are losing hope after their joint-worst start to a Premier League season which leaves them wilting in 13th.
With clashes against Porto on Thursday night and Aston Villa on Sunday, which some think could be make-or-break, Ten Hag has cut a cool figure and insisted he is not sweating over his future – but Scholes is worried.
‘You don’t see where the next good performance or win is coming from,’ Scholes tells Mail Sport. ‘I don’t think the players even understand what the manager wants from them. They look like a poorly coached team. It’s difficult to watch.
‘It’s two-and-a-bit years now and I feel like there’s no progression when teams like Liverpool, Manchester City, and Arsenal, are progressing all the time.
Paul Scholes thinks Man United are yet to take off under Erik ten Hag and are even ‘regressing’
Man United chiefs have given Ten Hag the vote of confidence but results must improve
Salford City, the club Scholes co-owns, teamed up with sponsors Fireball to fly fans out for their game at Newport – the sort of fun United fans have not been having recently
‘With United, it feels like the opposite – it feels like we’re regressing. We’re going the wrong way as results would suggest. All fans want is a bit of direction but there’s a lack of hope. The team look so far off being anywhere near competitive.’
A dystopian view, you might say, and precisely the opposite of what he’s trying to foster at Salford City, the League Two side he co-owns with other stars of United’s ‘Class of ’92’.
On Tuesday, Salford teamed up with their sponsor Fireball Cinnamon Whiskey to fly four lucky fans to their match at Newport County for the ‘Hottest AwayDay’, which got them out of a 360-mile round trip down the M6. Scholes praised Fireball for their ‘fan-focused ideas’ and helping the club to support fans who can get ‘pushed aside’: ‘This is something we haven’t seen before. Fans are the lifeblood of a football club. We’re so pleased Fireball decided to do this.’
Thankfully the helicopter passengers made it there and back without incident – not the case, Scholes claims, if former team-mate Nicky Butt had been piloting. ‘I’m sure he started trying to get his helicopter or pilot’s licence. I think he started it but never went ahead. I couldn’t trust him. He’d be flipping it upside down and everything. No chance.’
You wouldn’t blame United fans for feeling the same sense of turbulence. Every event and incident is scrutinised to within an inch of its life and made a flashpoint.
One of those, for example, was Ten Hag’s decision to drop Marcus Rashford against Crystal Palace in September after he had scored three goals in two games. He questioned the forward’s lifestyle and in subsequent fixtures against Twente and Tottenham, Rashford has not looked the same.
‘I thought he had turned a corner. I thought it was a really strange decision to leave him out of the Palace game,’ says Scholes.
‘When a lad has been struggling for confidence for such a long time and then he actually scores, two in one game and one in another, and then is just left out, when you think he’s got his spark back, then you have to question whether Marcus has been behaving properly or whether the manager has got a big decision wrong.
United have had their joint-worst-ever start to a Premier League season, sitting 13th
Scholes has questioned Ten Hag’s ‘really strange’ decision to recently drop Marcus Rashford
The club’s recruitment has been ‘difficult’ because the squad has no regular playing style
These Salford fans had a great time visiting Newport County – but will United supporters get the same joy out of trips to Porto and Aston Villa?
‘Just when you think he’s back and firing again, his confidence looks low again and you’re back to square one.’
The forward areas and midfield have been particular problem areas. United have only scored five goals in six league games, while the manner their midfield was bypassed against Twente, and particularly in the 3-0 defeat by Tottenham, has fuelled much criticism.
Scholes cannot help but feel that poor recruitment (did anyone mention they have spent £600million under Ten Hag?) has damaged them.
‘The manager makes recruitment difficult because we don’t know how they want to play. Recruiting players for a style of play you know nothing about becomes virtually impossible.
‘They had (Rasmus) Hojlund – a very young centre forward who has been injured. It could take another 12 months to get the best out of him. There was good potential last year. (Joshua) Zirkzee came from nowhere – not many people had seen him or heard of him when other strikers were available.
‘The numbers that were quoted to most teams for Ivan Toney were ridiculous which is probably why he didn’t go to Chelsea or Arsenal and ended up in Saudi Arabia.
‘The big ones are a couple of years ago when you could have signed Harry Kane or Declan Rice. They might have cost £100million each but you know their qualities and character, their belief in the dressing room and on the football pitch, would have been better than going and spending £200million on four or five players that you’re not quite sure about.
United should have splashed the cash on Harry Kane and Declan Rice rather than unproven talents, Scholes believes
Ex-team-mate Nicky Butt apparently once tried to get a piloting licence but never went through with it
‘Zirkzee came from nowhere – not many people had seen him or heard of him when other strikers were available’
‘I’m not sure what market United are in anymore. They’re still the biggest club in the world and people will want to sign for them, but not as much as they would have wanted to in a time gone by. ‘
If the momentum of Ten Hag’s impressive first season at Old Trafford, in which United finished third and won the Carabao Cup, has evaporated, then what of Salford?
In 2014, Scholes, Butt, David Beckham, Ryan Giggs, Gary Neville, and Phil Neville took over the Ammies alongside Peter Lim with the club in the Northern Premier League Division One North, the eighth tier of English football.
At first, they seemed unstoppable. Four promotions in five seasons. That gripping documentary series.
League Two has proven a barrier to that upward trajectory. They’re now in their sixth season in the fourth tier, having made the play-offs once, and so far this season are in another relegation scrap despite having the likes of Ben Woodburn and Luke Garbutt.
‘We’ve stagnated a little bit in League Two, there’s no doubt about that,’ says Scholes.
Erik ten Hag insists he does not fear for his position at United despite the growing pressure
Salford have ‘stagnated’ in League Two despite their initial momentum in lower divisions
‘We did so well in a short space of time to get to League Two. At first that was the big ambition. We had one season in the National League and looking back we were lucky to get out of there straight away – Graham Alexander did a brilliant job to do that for us.
‘But there’s bigger competition and more money. In those first four or five seasons we always had the most money in the league and we could get the best players and now it’s slightly different. There are a lot of clubs with big budgets and getting 14, 15,000 every week and at this point it’s something we’d struggle to keep up with.
‘We had the season where we did finish in the play-offs, got very close to beating Stockport and you see they’re doing well at the top end of League One. We don’t think we’re far away. We know it’s competitive and we’ve got a real experienced manager now so hopefully we can push on to where we want to.’