This is Man Utd’s worst moment - there’s no defence left for Erik ten Hag

If Erik ten Hag’s time in English football is indeed drawing to a close, Selhurst Park will always bring back galling memories.

It’s where his introduction to life as a Premier League manager began, when he watched from the stands as Manchester United were easily swept aside by Crystal Palace. There were 715 days between Ralf Rangnick’s final game in charge and Monday’s 4-0 drubbing by the Eagles, and few can really point to any semblance of progress in that time.

United were keen to move on quickly from that lifeless showing at Selhurst Park two years ago, and Ten Hag held his first media briefing the following day at Old Trafford as the club looked to put a disastrous campaign behind them. He shook hands with journalists as he entered the room, now he’s banning them from asking questions in press conferences.

How United move on from Monday’s capitulation is another matter, and the mortifying 4-0 defeat may go down as the club’s worst performance in Premier League history. That’s some statement given the dross supporters have witnessed over the last decade. Even being the worst display this season is some doing, given the performances at the Vitality, the City Ground and St James’ Park, not to mention shambolic home defeats by Bournemouth, Newcastle United and Manchester City.

Monday’s excruciating showing lacked passion, organisation, attacking threat and any sort of plan. United’s patched-up team sit eighth in the table with three games remaining and have a minus three goal difference. This is the club’s lowest moment in the post-Ferguson era.

For Ten Hag, this also has shades of the latter stages of the Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, Jose Mourinho and David Moyes eras. Their final losses were 4-1 to Watford, 3-1 to Liverpool and 2-0 to Everton - none as shambolic as what Ten Hag’s lot produced on Monday.

The 54-year-old has outdone his predecessors in so many different metrics this season. United will need to win two of the final three to avoid their lowest Premier League points tally in a season, have lost 13 Premier League games - the most in their history, and have conceded 81 in all competitions - the highest number since 1977.

Sky Sports’ pre-match coverage highlighted that United rank second bottom in the league for expected goals (xG) conceded in 2024 (they’re presumably bottom now) and showed a chart listing shots faced and xG against in this calendar year, in which United’s rank as the worst in the entire league.

Post-match, Jamie Carragher claimed the Red Devils are one of the worst-coached teams in the top flight, Paul Scholes said it felt like the ‘final nail in the coffin’ for Ten Hag and Michael Owen called a managerial chance to happen before the FA Cup final. 

When Ten Hag watched that game at Selhurst Park two years ago, surely he never envisaged it could go this spectacularly wrong. Ralf Rangnick called for a team with ‘cohesion’ after the 1-0 loss in May 2022 and said United need players who ‘will invest in the team spirit’. That simply hasn’t happened, and even more alarming is that seven of Monday’s XI were Ten Hag signings and two more - Kobbie Mainoo and Alejandro Garnacho - are the Dutchman’s proteges.

Ten Hag watched that first trip to Palace alongside John Murtough and Richard Arnold. They’ve both gone in the Ineos shake-up and it’s feeling increasingly inevitable that another high-profile departure will be confirmed before next season.

Gary Neville last week referred to Ten Hag as the ‘last man standing’ from the club’s senior employees, following an interview in which the ex-Ajax boss clung to the same points he’s trotted out all season. Injuries, a lack of consistency in his selection and transfer failings are to blame for this woeful campaign, while Ten Hag pointed to the successes of last season and that United will play in back-to-back FA Cup finals. None of that absolves him of Monday’s calamity.

Ten Hag advocates will claim that the circumstances at executive level have not been conducive to on-field success, and point to a third-place finish and a Carabao Cup triumph in his maiden campaign as how things could go once the Sir Jim Ratcliffe era gets fully up and running.

Ironically, it was a trip to Palace last season that ended Ten Hag’s best run in charge, when Michael Olise’s injury-time free-kick secured a point for the Eagles and halted a nine-game winning streak for United.

Olise also netted in Monday’s trashing and has impressed Old Trafford officials to such an extent that he is one of their primary transfer targets this summer. At best, there must at least be some trepidation from the 22-year-old at the thought of being on the other side of such a one-sided encounter next season.

Transfers have also been Ten Hag’s undoing at United, and the decision at 3-0 down to replace £86m Antony with a defensive midfielder was emblematic of Ten Hag’s downfall. That his replacement, Sofyan Amrabat, a player the United manager pursued all of last summer, can’t get into this injury-ravaged XI also says everything. He won’t be at Old Trafford next season, United will hope Antony isn’t either. 

Experienced professionals Casemiro, Jonny Evans, Aaron Wan-Bisska and Christian Eriksen also had shockers at Palace, in a United side that continued their unwanted penchant for flaky, porous performances.