Ten Hag stooping to hit out at Carragher enough to make Man Utd ‘hearts sink’

Jamie Carragher says Erik ten Hag reminds him of Rafael Benitez.

Gary Neville says his “heart sank” when Manchester United boss Erik ten Hag hit out at Jamie Carragher over his analysis of their defeat to Fulham.

Carragher picked apart United’s defensive issues in the wake of their 2-1 loss to Fulham on Saturday, explaining that Ten Hag was asking his players to do the “impossible” and using Kobbie Mainoo to exemplify his point.

Ten Hag conceded the ex-Liverpool defender “had a point” but said he has been critical “from the first moment”.

“Some analysts are very objective in their comments, very good advice, some are very subjective,” said Ten Hag. “Jamie Carragher, from the first moment on, has criticised and now he wants to make his point.”

Neville believes the United boss should have kept his thoughts to himself and instead focused on the Forest game.

“I must admit that when I saw it appear, my heart sank a little, from a Manchester United perspective, that he was getting involved in that. He might be secretly or privately annoyed and think there are some points you made that are wrong,” he told the Stick to Football podcast.

“But [he has to think], ‘We have conceded a lot of chances, I’m not going to win this one, we’ve just lost a game, got a big game against Nottingham Forest, let’s not look like I’m even interested in that’. That was my thinking.”

Carragher also defended his comments, insisting United’s performance against Fulham was not unusual.

“I didn’t say anything too different to what I’ve said this season, and I wanted to discuss this on Monday Night Football two weeks ago. United had won four games on the bounce, and I came into the show thinking that I’d like to analyse Man United when they’ve won,” he said.

“What I was going to say was, ‘this is not sustainable’. They were being a little bit lucky winning these games. The reason I chose United this weekend wasn’t because of the result – it was more the performance that I wanted to analyse.

“They’ve got Nottingham Forest in the cup, and Manchester City in the league. They’re tough games for them – if they lose them, everyone will be saying ‘Ten Hag out’. I thought let’s do it before everyone else does it. It was basically what we’ve been seeing all season.

“Teams now press from the front, press high and everyone is on the halfway line. Man United are trying to do two different things; the front six were going man-to-man pressing, and the back four were miles behind them. You’re either one or the other.”