Man Utd humbled as stunning new reason Ratcliffe WON’T sack Ten Hag emerges

A troubling new reason why Manchester United won’t axe Erik ten Hag this summer has emerged and it makes grim reading for the scope of Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s revolution at Old Trafford.

The Red Devils have taken a step backwards under their Dutch manager this term, with Man Utd highly unlikely to qualify for next season’s Champions League.

Winning the FA Cup would salvage some pride, though that may merely paper over the cracks.

New co-owner Sir Jim Ratcliffe has full sporting control following his partial takeover and along with right-hand man Sir Dave Brailsford, has already set about appointing the ‘best in class’ to key roles.

Omar Berrada has been prised out of Manchester City to serve as the new CEO. Dan Ashworth has been lined up as the new sporting director and TEAMtalk exclusively learned on Friday that a compromise on the compensation fee with Newcastle is close.

Furthermore, the highly-regarded Jason Wilcox has agreed to become Man Utd’s new technical director. Per the Athletic, Wilcox will replace Darren Fletcher – the current technical director – whose new role will be recalibrated and renamed.

The Athletic’s piece came via Man Utd specialist Laurie Whitwell and detailed a series of reasons why Ten Hag will not be replaced this summer.

Among the many clues listed were the fact he’s heavily involved in pre-season preparations and is being consulted on summer transfers.

Furthermore, Ratcliffe and co believe the club’s injury crisis this season is a mitigating factor that must be taken into consideration.

Elsewhere, Whitwell claimed Ratcliffe and Brailsford will leave the final decision on whether to sack Ten Hag to Berrada and Ashworth.

But with both officials on gardening leave and unable to take part in day-to-day activities at United just yet, sacking Ten Hag is not something that’s in the pipeline.

Now, according to a fresh update from i news, there’s an additional and worrying new reason why Ten Hag’s position is safe.

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Top managers don’t want Man Utd

They stated that despite arguably being the biggest club in world football, Man Utd are finding it difficult to attract top tier managerial candidates.

It’s claimed Gareth Southgate is unlikely to ditch England for Man Utd at a time when the English national side is arguably at its strongest since the mid-2000s.

Elsewhere, Julian Nagelsmann is admired, though hopes to continue for the long haul in his current role as manager of the German national team.

There’s further bad news for Ratcliffe and United, with i news adding the chances of ever hiring Zinedine Zidane – who won three consecutive Champions League titles as manager of Real Madrid – are virtually nil.

Roberto De Zerbi and Ruben Amorim are both mentioned as possible successors to Ten Hag. However, De Zerbi has been installed as Bayern Munich’s No 1 target and there’s growing belief Amorim will replace Jurgen Klopp at Liverpool.

As such, i news state the only two remaining candidates Man Utd like who could replace Ten Hag are Graham Potter and Thomas Frank. As yet, there’s little information on whether either manager would say yes to Man Utd.

The report concluded that with so many top class managers ‘lukewarm about the prospect of taking over at Old Trafford given the monumental task at hand’, the likeliest outcome is Ten Hag remains in his post.

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