Manchester United manager Erik ten Hag has insisted that the emergence of Kobbie Mainoo and Alejandro Garnacho has shown that the club already have a base and a game model even before the arrival of new technical director Jason Wilcox.
Wilcox has been roped in by Manchester United as their new technical director and he has been tasked with devising a set playing style or a ‘game model’ for the club.
The former Southampton director of football has also been asked to assess Ten Hag with the club still waiting for the arrivals of Omar Berrada and Dan Ashworth.
Wilcox has been tasked with aligning every team from the academy to the first team with a consistent style, but Ten Hag insisted that a game model already exists at Manchester United.
He feels that the emergence of Mainoo and Garnacho is a testament to that and it was one of his early tasks when he became Manchester United manager in 2022, to align everything.
Ten Hag told Sky Sports when asked about Wilcox designing a game model for the club: “I understand in the first place that it is the job of the technical director but in the meantime, there is a game model here.
“What do you think why Alejandro Garnacho and Kobbie Mainoo came up? It is because one of my jobs or objectives or tasks from the previous leadership to bring that in.
“They were already improving the academy; you can see that when they won the FA Youth Cup and now again they won another cup.
“The teams in the academy have also become champions and that is the structure that was laid out a couple of years ago.
“Now you see some revenue from it and the best revenue you see the players coming up to the first team like Kobbie and Garnacho.”
Wilcox has reportedly asked Ten Hag to play more possession-based football for the rest of the season.
