In October, Erik ten Hag filled his bags with some solid millions of pounds in compensation and was put on Manchester United’s private jet on his way out of town. In the summer he was the long-term coaching salary for Ratcliffe and the INEOS gang, four months later a problem that had to be “removed”. The Dutchman disappeared for a few weeks to recalibrate, but has been spotted back in the football sphere for the past month. This week, Ten Hag will be back.
When Ten Hag was spotted touring Borussia Dortmund’s stadium by the management, everyone understood what was going on. Of course, the tour of the Bundesliga club’s facility was not supposed to be related to Nuri Sahin’s time as Dortmund coach quickly coming to an end, but there was still little doubt that Ten Hag and the Dortmund management had established dialogue.
Ten Hag knows key people at Dortmund well, the Dutchman has a background as coach of Bayern Munich’s second team (2013-159), so the Dutchman is well known in the German football community.
According to German Sky Sports, Sahin will be fired if Tuesday’s match against Bologna on Tuesday in the Champions League is not won, and convincingly.
After the 0-2 loss to Eintracht Frankfurt on Friday, Dortmund director Lars Ricken gave coach Sahin his support, and in a later interview with German media spoke in completely different terms.
“Nuri will be on the bench against Bologna, but of course we all know that, Nuri knows it too, with the clear expectation that we now simply need wins and successes,” said the Dortmund boss.
With three Bundesliga defeats in a row, few believe Sahin can convince the Dortmund management that he is the right man, even with a win against Bologna on Tuesday. Now it’s about the club agreeing with Erik ten Hag. The minute after this is in place, Sahin is probably history at Dortmund.
We think it will be around 22.45 on Tuesday, right after the Champions League game and four days until the very important home game against Werder Bremen in the Bundesliga on Saturday.
