“WE ALL BOUGHT INTO HIS METHODS. IF TEN HAG HAD SAID ‘JUMP IN A DITCH’, WE WOULD HAVE DONE IT”
There was rare emotion in Erik ten Hag’s voice, as he stood in front of his players one May morning in 2017. For once, the poker face was gone. For once, he was allowing his squad to stare into his soul.
A day earlier, Ten Hag had vanished, to the surprise of players accustomed to his utter dedication to Utrecht. The decisive match of their season was hours away, and they didn’t know whether he’d turn up at all. That Sunday morning, Ten Hag returned – from the hospital, where he’d rushed after his son had been in a life-threatening traffic accident. He’d been there for his family; now he knew he had to be there for his players.
If Utrecht’s hopes of an incredible return to European competition looked all but lost, after a 3-0 defeat in the first leg of their play-off against AZ Alkmaar, Ten Hag was not prepared to give up. “My son has miraculously survived this accident,” he told his squad. “Now it is up to you to make a miracle, too.”
That day, Utrecht overturned their three-goal deficit to reach the Europa League against all odds. Within two years, he’d stepped up to the big time and created one of the greatest Ajax teams in modern history: Champions League semi-finalists and double winners for the first time since 2002. “Add some injury time, I want to play as long as possible,” midfielder Frenkie de Jong told the referee on the final day of the 2018-19 season – Ajax were 4-1 up, but Ten Hag had created a side so wondrously free-flowing that they simply didn’t want the experience to end.
By the time Ten Hag’s Ajax experience did conclude this May, after four and a half seasons at the helm, he’d ascended to messianic status in Amsterdam. To do the same at Manchester United, he must defeat his former mentor; the man from whom he learned during a two-year spell at Bayern Munich. A chap called Pep Guardiola.
LOOK OUT, HE’S A MANIAC
Erik ten Hag’s role at Bayern didn’t extend further than the reserve team, but just getting that far had taken more than a decade’s hard graft as a coach. This wasn’t a man who was tipped for management from the start – back when he had hair, his playing career had been steady enough, but hardly box office.
Hailing from the town of Haaksbergen, a few miles from the border with Germany, the Dutchman had eschewed a role in the Ten Hag real estate business – its high-rise headquarters bearing the family name in the nearby city of Enschede – to become a professional footballer. The central defender came through the ranks at Enschede club Twente, making his debut just months after the devastating loss of close friend Andy Scharmin, a team-mate who died in a plane crash in Suriname. “At his funeral, I carried Andy’s coffin,” he later recalled. “It happened on June 7, 1989. Every year on that date, I have a day of mourning.”
Ten Hag’s first spell in the Twente first team didn’t last long – within a year he’d moved on to De Graafschap in
