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Erik Ten Hag Has Brought Back A Sir Alex Ferguson Rule On His First Day As Manchester United Manager

Erik Ten Hag Has Brought Back A Sir Alex Ferguson Rule On His First Day As Manchester United Manager

Erik ten Hag has already taken a leaf out of Sir Alex Ferguson's book.

Josh Lawless

Josh Lawless

New Manchester United manager Erik ten Hag has immediately brought back Sir Alex Ferguson's 9am starts.

On Monday, Ten Hag took charge of his first United training session as a number of first-team and under 21 players returned for pre-season.

The Dutchman arrived at the AON training complex at around 8am, not long after returning assistant boss Steve McClaren.

And according to the Manchester Evening News, Ten Hag has already implemented one of Ferguson's strictest rules.

On the first day one batch of players arrived at 9:30am, before a second came in 11:30am. Many had already been in on the Friday for the mandatory medical testing and did gym work to begin with before taking part in running drills and ball work for two hours on the Monday.


But for the second day, Ten Hag ordered players to be in at Carrington for 9am sharpish - the same start time that Ferguson demanded during his glittering 26-year stint at the club.

Image: Alamy
Image: Alamy

Under Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, players were allowed to rock up an hour later at 10am and the Norwegian's management approach has been described as "soft".

Early on it was reported that Solskjaer refrained from parking in the space allocated for the manager as a sign of respect to long-time manager Ferguson.

Ten Hag, meanwhile, has made it compulsory that players eat and mix together after training sessions in a bid to build what developed into a fractured dressing room.

Another key alteration the 52-year-old has made involves the grass at the training ground.

Image: Alamy
Image: Alamy

As per The Mirror, Ten Hag instructed ground staff to trim the grass to exactly 15mm in order to allow the players to get up to speed to his philosophy.

United's pre-season tour will see them jet to Bangkok, Thailand, for a friendly against Liverpool, before they face Melbourne Victory, Crystal Palace and Aston Villa in Australia.

The final two outings will be against Spanish sides in Atletico Madrid and Rayo Vallecano, the latter game taking place at Old Trafford on 31 July.

Featured Image Credit: Image: Alamy

Topics: Sir Alex Ferguson, Manchester United, Erik Ten Hag

Josh is a sports journalist who specialises in football and wrestling. He has been published by Curzon Ashton FC, Late Tackle, Manchester City FC, The Mirror, Read Man City and Manchester Evening News. He provides coverage of professional wrestling and has interviewed some of the biggest names in the field - including the first UK interview with The Hardy Boyz after their return to WWE. He has never sported a pair of Lonsdale Slip-ons, contrary to reports.

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