Erik ten Hag comment is damning admission of his transfer policy at Manchester United

Honesty is the best policy, of course, but honesty comes with it the possibility of damning yourself in the process. That's kind of the point.

But from football managers, you often see precious little of it. At least where it matters. 'I didn't see that incident,' 'that clearly wasn't a sending-off,' 'we played well today and got desperately unlucky.' All are nice and easy ways to deal with tough questions rather than just shoot straight. It's not their fault. Everyone in football has been media trained to within an inch of their life in order to give away as little controversy as possible in a world where the simplest of words can be misconstrued. Sometimes, it's even beneficial to the team to bend the truth to keep confidence intact.

But other times managers have little choice but to front up about how bad things have got or their senses and integrity may come into question. Erik ten Hag finds himself in one such situation at Manchester United.

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It's been a terrible start to the campaign. United have gone backwards and all but eroded all the progress built last season. They're already nine points off Manchester City with any hopes of a title challenge already snuffed out. They have been hammered by their rivals and lost to the league's other top sides. Their few wins have been narrow and fortunate affairs, relying on late drama and moments of singular inspiration rather than winning through a plan. They have scored just 12 times, the lowest in the top 10, and they're in danger of going out of the Champions League in the group stage. Not to mention all the off-field chaos which has reduced morale to a