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22nd November 2023
03:38pm GMT
Manchester United's players have a theory about why they have been so bad this season, and it probably isn't what Erik ten Hag will want to hear.
United had enjoyed a very fruitful campaign in their first year under the Dutch manager, winning the Caraboa Cup and earning a Champions League spot, leaving the team in a very healthy place for the next season.
However, this year has been very poor so far, with defeats in the Premier League currently leaving them out of the top four, and they have already been eliminated from the Caraboa Cup, and struggling in Europe.
Although it is much the same team, with the added bonus of players like Sofyan Amrabat and Rasmus Højlund, they look to be a shadow of their former selves, and some players believe they know why.
According to a report from The Guardian, a section of the United team believe that they are underperforming due to an extensive pre-season regime implemented by the manager, and that they are burnt out from it.
Preparation included eight friendlies: four in Norway, Scotland, England and Ireland and the others played during a 12-day trip to the US that ranged across three time zones, taking place in New Jersey, San Diego, Houston and Las Vegas.
When you consider the added load of last year's World Cup campaign, which many of this team were involved in, then the squad has played a lot of matches over the past 12 months, and they have suffered with injuries since then.
The extensive pre-season was implemented in the hope that it would turn Man United from being outside hopefuls into genuine title contenders, but it appears to have backfired on the Red Devil's manager.
It is possible that Ten Hag was governed by commercial demands and that was one of the reasons behind the long pre-season tour, but although the players have not aired their grievances about the manager's preparation publicly, it appears that they are unhappy with the consequences of this tiresome regime.
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