Manchester United, Erik ten Hag and a summer of red-hot xG wibble

Being bystanders to this week’s Big Cup, Euro Vase and even the Tin Pot Brendan’s brave Leicester boys are trying to win, these are dark days for Manchester United. The Ole dream died last winter and Ralf Rangick is a lame-duck caretaker manager/consultant/assistant to the regional manager. The top four, the last possible positive to glean from yet another wasted year, looks a straight shootout between Arsenal and Tottenham, the latter managed by Antonio Conte, someone reportedly scratched from the United candidates’ list for being the type of troublemaker who made José Mourinho look like a form prefect of the Phil Neville variety.

The word among proper journalists is that Erik ten Hag is to be crowned the new boss of Big Red, a manager fitting the club’s preferred profile of being a young, progressive type with much to prove, nothing like the yesterday’s man appointments of José and Louis van Gaal. Ten Hag, the Ajax manager, is just 52 years old, and by the time he takes control in July, will be a whole 13 months younger than José when he took the job in 2016.

For his first managerial appointment as chief suit since succeeding Ed Woodward, Richard Arnold, a man who once set his sights on the club being as popular on social media disgraces as Vin Diesel, has taken on the advice of back office-bound Ralfie, chief football suit John Murtough and chief tracksuit Darren Fletcher with co-owner Joel Glazer having the final say as, frankly, he and his kin have on everything happening in M16. That’s the Glazer family who, when fans cut up rough last year about the Super League and the general absolute state of things, promised fans could buy shares in the club to have more of a say. According to Big Website, such a venture may