Roy Keane: The three Man Utd stars getting Ten Hag the sack

Carlo Garganese

• 3 Mar 2024 19:00 GMT
• 3 min read

Roy Keane has singled out the three Manchester United players who are making it impossible for Erik ten Hag to execute his preferred game plan.

When Ten Hag was hired as Man Utd manager in the summer of 2022, it was expected he would display a high-intensity, high-line style of football focused around pressing and dominating ball and territory.

However, this has not proved to be the case, with United more of a counter-attacking team who play with a deep defensive line and hit teams on the break.

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Coupled with disappointing results on the pitch, Ten Hag’s position is very much under threat.

United are sixth in the Premier League and face a very difficult task to even qualify for the Champions League next season.

Former Man Utd legend Keane believes that United don’t have the players for Ten Hag to be able to play the way he wants to, and he singles out three stars in particular.

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What did Keane say?

“They aren’t pressing up,” Keane said on The Overlap’s Stick to Football show.

“I don’t want to be just pinning it on [Harry] Maguire, but there’s always that worry with Maguire coming up and squeezing the pitch, like all the other top teams are doing.

“There’s that worry with him all the time – that’s where there is gaps. They are frightened to death to come all the way up because they’re thinking, ‘anything over the top, he’d be in trouble’.

“Manchester United haven’t got the players to [press].

“Fernandes is not going to do it. Rashford won’t do it.

“They might do it for five or 10 minutes, so if you’ve got a team that’s not going to press – we’re talking about leopards and spots.

“Man Utd are never really going to be good at that pressing side of it.”

Rashford did impress in the Manchester Derby on Sunday with a stunning goal.