Erik ten Hag must use Cristiano Ronaldo’s exit from Manchester United as an opportunity to find the kind of consistency in personnel that has been the platform for Manchester City and Liverpool ’s recent success.
That’s the verdict of one-time British record transfer Stan Collymore, who reckons the Portuguese’s departure can only be a good thing for the club. Mirror Sport columnist Collymore was calling for Ronaldo to be moved on from Old Trafford as early as last season. And now the relationship is over he wants Ten Hag to put together a team rather than a collection of individuals.
As United prepare to return to Premier League action against his old club Nottingham Forest, Collymore said: “Ronaldo’s departure means United can finally have closure on what has been a tumultuous few months.
Erik ten Hag isn’t going to be asked questions about him week in, week out, and we’re not going to be having cameras panning to Ronaldo on the bench and then to Sir Alex Ferguson in the stands with everyone asking, ‘What would Fergie have done?’ All of which are relevant and valid in terms of a club needing to move forward.
“It’s now really vital that if they are going to do any business, whether it’s incoming or outgoing, it seems to make sense among the United supporter base and they say, ‘Yes, we understand why we are getting that player or selling that one’, or ‘We understand why we are linked with him’.
United have wasted a lot of money over the years and they need to get back to being a team whereby United fans and football lovers in general can say, ‘That’s the system, that is going to be the side eight times out of 10, these will be the substitutes and they will be used at this stage or that stage of a game’.
“Being able to do that is so important and it hasn’t been the case with United for a while now. For too long it has been about so-called galacticos , about, ‘Let’s throw something at a board and see if it works’. So getting Ronaldo out the door gives all of us an opportunity as Manchester United watchers, to a greater or lesser extent, to be able to say, ‘What is the style, who are the main XI and who are the people off the bench who can come on and do damage?’
“That’s all you can really ask for, because if it’s just a free-for-all you are never going to get any momentum and consistency. City and Liverpool have been consistent because you pretty much know who the main protagonists are at both clubs.
"So as the New Year approaches, there’s a massive opportunity for Manchester United to start doing again what they have done for decades, which is win more than they lose, play with a swagger and be in the conversation at the end. Ronaldo going massively enhances that.”
