Defiant Ten Hag insists Man Utd still going in right direction despite Fulham setback

The Cottagers earned a late, dramatic win on Saturday. 

Manchester United manager Erik ten Hag after the defeat on Saturday.  Pic: Mike Egerton/PA Wire.

ERIK ten Hag boldly insisted Manchester United remain “in the right direction” but there was enough evidence in this, a 10th Premier League defeat of the season, to suggest that Jim Ratcliffe’s prediction that he will need three years to turn around the club’s fortunes are wildly optimistic.

There were alarm bells all over the field throughout what was just Fulham’s second Old Trafford win in 61 years and, while the absence of key injured stars Rasmus Hojlund and Luke Shaw was obviously to be taken into consideration, ten Hag knows he has some pressing issues that need to be dealt with long before the passing of that unofficial three-year milestone.

Looming above all is the status of £86 million Brazilian misfit Antony who “celebrated” his 24th birthday by being unceremoniously ignored by his manager and left on the bench on Saturday.

To make matters worse, his place went instead to 19-year-old Omari Forson, who had a grand total of seven minutes of first team football to his name before Fulham’s visit and who was so underwhelming he was replaced well before the hour mark.

Not for Antony, though. By the time the United substitute was told to warm up by ten Hag, we were well into the nine minutes of added time and, by the time he entered the fray, his side had conceded the winning goal to Alex Iwobi and there were 55 seconds left in proceedings.

If none of this was a surprise, that was probably the most damning commentary on Antony’s fall from grace this season and his snub by ten Hag, in a game in which United needed a win to maintain their Champions League hopes, told its own story.

In his first season in England, a return of four goals and two assists in 25 appearances, including two off the bench, was hardly the stuff of legend, but United won the Carabao Cup, reached the FA Cup Final and qualified for the Champions League.

This time around, his sub-minute cameo on Saturday made it 11 starts and 9 substitute appearances and still we await a first goal or assist.

If last season was barely acceptable, given the astonishing over-the-odds value placed on Antony when he left Ajax for a reunion with ten Hag in 2022, then this campaign has been little short of career-ending, at least when it comes to a career with United.

To paraphrase a movie title, it was hard not to think that, like the length of his appearance on Saturday, Antony’s Old Trafford career was gone in 60 seconds.

It was hard to draw any other conclusion, although there are many precedents for players who have come back from the brink, of course, not least within United’s own current first team squad. Ten Hag appeared to spend most of last summer trying to offload Harry Maguire and Scott McTominay, for example, failed and the pair seem to have won their way back into the manager’s good graces, for now, at least.

But Antony has also had to contend with off-field distractions this season, along with the weight of the fee paid for him, plus the dramatic loss of form and often questionable body language, have seen supporters turn on him, something that never happened to that extent with Maguire or McTominay.

Ten Hag, after seeing his team lose to Alex Iwobi’s winner seven minutes into stoppage time, tried to explain Antony’s predicament in pure football terms, implying effort in training can end his exile.

“It was nothing to do with fitness. He is fit but we have many options on the right side where we lack in other positions due to injuries,” he said.

“The form in Antony we all have seen and he has to step up. I see it in training but also other Omari and Amad Diallo and Garnacho deserve to play.” 

But at the end of a week in which new minority owner Ratcliffe garnered favour with fans by talking about knocking neighbours City “off their perch,” Antony is emblematic of how the rot has set in at Old Trafford and the difficulties incoming sporting director Dan Ashworth will face in trying to sell off over-priced, over-paid and under-performing stars - and the Brazilian is not alone in that category.

After Maguire seemed to have rescued a point with a late equaliser of Calvin Bassey’s opening goal for Fulham, ten Hag may have been accurate in claiming that this one defeat cannot completely undo Ratcliffe’s big picture thinking.

But, perhaps, Ratcliffe may also choose to ponder the comments of Fulham goalscorer Bassey who claimed that this side simply showed more desire.

“I don’t think you can just come here and overrun them,” he said. “You can see the quality of the players they have.

“They have got top players and a top manager and players that can have an effect off the bench, but we were just at it more and I felt we wanted it more today. That showed in the way we played.”

Man United (4-2-3-1): Onana 7; Dalot 6, Varane 5, Maguire 7, Lindelof 5 (Antony 90); Mainoo 6 (Diallo 80), Casemiro 5 (McTominay 52, 6); Garnacho 7, Fernandes 5, Forson 5 (Eriksen 53, 6); Rashford 5. Substitutes (not used) Bayindir, Amrabat, Antony, Evans, Kambwala, Collyer.

Fulham (4-2-3-1): Leno 5; Castagne 7, Tosin 6, Bassey 7, Robinson 7; Reed 7 (Traore 77, 5), Lukic 7; Wilson 6 (Diop 80), Pereira 7 (Cairney 67, 6), Iwobi 7; Muniz 8. Substitutes (not used) Rodak, Tete, Broja, Traore, Ballo-Toure, Ream, De Corodova-Reid.

Referee: M Oliver 6