Ralf Rangnick\u2019s reputation had preceded him before his arrival at Old Trafford to take over from sacked Ole Gunnar Solskjaer and the more knowledgeable United fans were overjoyed when he was appointed as their manager on an interim basis before tanstioning to a longer term consultancy. However, through no fault of his, the German tactician is yet to impress many at Old Trafford.<\/p>\n
One of the key problems is Manchester United players \u2013 out of a combination of laziness, lack of dedication and discipline \u2013 obdurately not buying into his training methods and regimentation, the tools of his trade that the German tactician has long earned his impression reputation on in Germany, being highly-acclaimed as the Master of Gegen-pressing.<\/p>\n
Hence with this background of complacency and total lack of inspiration, it was totally unsurprising that the Red Devils threw away a two-goal lead in the final 13 minutes of their match against Aston Villa at the weekend, leading again to anxious questions being raised about their second-half performance. Needless to say, blame would automatically deflect over to the head coach as United\u2019s form has improved only marginally since his appointment, with even the sceptical ones highlighting that the overall displays are not markedly better than when Ole Gunnar Solskjaer was in the dugout.<\/p>\n
To be candid, this is a totally unfair assessment of the German tactician as it is now an open fact that the United team aren\u2019t entirely on board with the former RB Leipzig boss, which is pretty alarming insofar as the attitude of the players is concerned. This is due primarily to the fact that Ralf Rangnick’s training methods involve winning the ball high up the pitch, which requires a supremely high level of fitness, dedication and discipline to achieve and to maintain.<\/p>\n
Former Schalke star Tim Hoogland has provided a clear insight into what life would be like playing under Rangnick, which provides an insight as to why the current batch of motley United players are unhappy under the German coach.<\/p>\n
Hoogland told The Athletic: \u201cRangnick had clear rules in training sessions\u2026 if you arrive in the second third of the pitch (midfield), you weren\u2019t allowed to play the ball backwards.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf you win the ball, the first instinct has to be to the opponent\u2019s half, towards the opponent\u2019s goal. Often in training, when we got the ball, we would have, let\u2019s say, six or seven seconds to get a shot on goal. If not, the other team gets the ball.<\/p>\n
“If you\u2019re doing things like that in training, you will do it in a game. A lot of coaches and teams are doing something like this now, but 15, 20 years ago, it was more unusual.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe changed the way we trained \u2014 you\u2019re not training because you want to train, you\u2019re training because you have a really, really clear vision of how it has to be in the game.\u201d<\/p>\n
The disclosure from Hoogland comes just days after the Daily Mail revealed that United stars had been laughing at Rangnick because he turned up to Carrington for training on Tuesday morning when he had given them a day off, with the mistake thought to be the \u2018talk of the training ground\u2019.<\/p>\n
Hoogland continued in his appraisal of Rangnick\u2019s approach, which spoke volumes for the latter: \u201cHe was always a little bit more than a coach.<\/p>\n