Those who love Erik ten Hag as a manager have probably realized sporten.com the editorial staff has not been particularly impressed by what the Dutchman brought to Manchester United during his reign at Old Trafford. The belief that Ten Hag will be able to live up to the expectations of Bayer Leverkusen supporters after charismatic Xabi Alonso’s great success in the last two seasons is therefore rather small. A loss against an U20 team, during the month before the start of the season, does not of course help.
Jonathan Tah, Jeremie Frimpong and Florian Wirtz are gone, Granit Xhaka is pushing for exit. Ten Hag has lost his tribe in Alonso’s Leverkusen team, but has promised the supporters success.
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It was therefore painful for victorious supporters to start with a 1-5 defeat in Ten Hag’s first friendly with Leverkusen. And the opponents? Flamengo’s U20 team in Brazil.
In familiar style, Ten Hag blows off weak results in individual matches.
“I knew in advance that we couldn’t field a good team for 90 minutes. The most important thing was that we got through it without injuries. In the first 60 minutes, however, it was clear that there had been too little time between the players coming back and our first game,” the former United manager begins, according to Kicker.
Who put in several from the season’s starting eleven in the second half.
“It was a completely different game afterwards. We dominated and created chances, but there were many of our regular players on the pitch as well, and then we saw a different level. I don’t really care about the results in the pre-season. It’s about what I see, and in the last 30 minutes our approach was good,” Ten Hag said.
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Scoring 1 and conceding 5 against an U20 team, even with Erik ten Hag’s analysis, is unlikely to reassure the supporters. On Sunday, Bochum awaits.
