Mark Langdon: Don't overrate Erik ten Hag's results last season

Burnley boss Vincent Kompany couldn't hide his annoyance at his pre-match press conference over the amount of Manchester United-based questions being aimed in his direction, but as a former City captain he must know it's always a big deal if things are not going well at Old Trafford.

Erik ten Hag is the latest United boss to start feeling the heat and in many ways it feels harsh given the Dutchman qualified for the Champions League and reached two domestic finals last season, winning the EFL Cup in the process.

If you swear by the league table never telling tales then it was full steam ahead for United this term, but there were many clues beyond the bare results that may suggest things were never quite as rosy as a third-place finish would imply.

Remember, Brighton were favourites to beat United at Wembley in their FA Cup semi-final so the betting markets were giving clear indication of the direction of travel, as were the expected-goal statistics.

Fbref.com ranked United sixth on xG last season and it was a similar story on Understat's expected-points table which suggested Ten Hag's men collected almost nine points more than they should have.

That was the difference between qualifying for the Champions League and remaining in the Europa League, while a goal difference of plus 15 showed just how fine the margins were. By way of comparison, Arsenal were plus 45 and Newcastle plus 35.

So in overrating last season's efforts, expectations, understandably in some respects, jumped to levels which left it open for them to fall flat on their face. United could have played exactly the same and organically gone backwards without actually being worse.

As it is, United have been worse and Wednesday's 4-3 defeat at Bayern Munich highlighted just how far off the top table they are. It doesn't look too bad a result on paper, but anyone who watched the game could see the substantial difference in quality between two teams who should be on equal footing. 

There are some mitigating circumstances with so many players missing, but Ten Hag has to take some of the responsibility for that.

It was he who openly picked a fight with Jadon Sancho in the full glare of the public, and his transfer policy of mainly looking at players who he has previously worked with is somewhat amateur in the data-driven world of 2023.

The Dutchman lost credibility with his laughable complaints over supposed badly drawn VAR lines in United’s defeat at Arsenal before the international break, and reports suggested he was open to integrating Mason Greenwood back into his first-team squad which, if true, would go down as another serious error of judgement.

One newspaper claimed this week that Ten Hag is losing the dressing room, following a similar pattern to other previous United managers who have been unable to bring about a consistent level of improvement. Worryingly for the Dutchman, all of those departed relatively quickly.

It's too early to give Ten Hag the boot but it would be equally wrong to believe the job he did last season was as stellar as the table suggested.

Premier League predictions

Brighton to win & over 2.5 goals

Brighton have not won three league games in a row since Chris Hughton was in charge but Albion can bring up the hat-trick by beating Bournemouth on Sunday and bounce back from their shock Europa League loss to AEK Athens.

Albion have dazzled for much of this season and, with every game going over 3.5 goals, add in at least three goals to boost their win price. 

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