Manchester United are thinking more and more about parting ways with Erik ten Hag, and they already surprised the majority of the footballing world this past summer when they decided to keep the manager in charge.
Ten Hag led Man United to one of their worst seasons of the Premier League era, finishing eighth, but he seemingly saved his job in the eyes of new ownership group INEOS by beating Manchester City to win the FA Cup Final and qualify for the Europa League.
So far this season, things have only gotten worse for Manchester United despite a summer of significant transfer investment at all levels of the squad, as the Red Devils are buried in the bottom half of the table after eight matches.
As the dropped points continue to pile up, Manchester United are reportedly already holding talks with other managers around the world as they prepare for a potential Ten Hag dismissal soon.
According to a report from the Daily Mail’s Chris Wheeler, Manchester United are in discussions with former Barcelona manager Xavi, Sporting CP coach Ruben Amorim, former Dortmund manager Edin Terzic, and current Brentford coach Thomas Frank.
There doesn’t seem to be a frontrunner for the Manchester United job after Thomas Tuchel surprisingly took the England national team position, as he was likely uninterested in the uneven Man United project.
Amorim was one of the most in-demand managers in the past two seasons, but, ultimately, top Premier League clubs like Liverpool and Tottenham decided to hire different managers.
Frank has led some exciting sides at Brentford, including this season’s, and he may be the most likely name on the list if Amorim and Man United cannot come to an agreement.
Xavi and Terzic are wild cards. While Xavi won La Liga in 2022/23 and put Barcelona back on the map, he earned a lot of critics from his own fanbase. The same goes for Terzic, who went to the Champions League Final with Dortmund but was poor in the league and famously clashed with club legends Mats Hummels and Marco Reus before losing his job to another club icon in Nuri Sahin.
So there are four intriguing but potentially flawed options for Manchester United to hire during the 2024/25 season, should things with Ten Hag continue to go south – and there is, sadly for Man United, no indication that Ten Hag will be able to turn things around.
The managing editor of The Trivela Effect, Kevin has 15 years of experience in digital media. He covered Real Madrid from 2019-2022 for The Real Champs as a site manager. You can contact him at the site’s official Twitter handle @TrivelaEffect or via the site’s official email thetrivelaeffect@gmail.com.