Football Digest: Man Utd urged to give Ten Hag time he needs
Andre Onana has reportedly decided to compete for Cameroon at the Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON), despite making a shaky start to his Manchester United career. The goalkeeper was previously expected to skip the tournament and focus on finding his feet at Old Trafford.
Erik ten Hag will surely have been keen for the 27-year-old to do just that. A series of high-profile errors have cost United over the first few months of the season, leaving both the manager and his goalkeeper under pressure.
It emerged earlier this month that Onana was willing to skip the tournament, having quit international football after last year’s World Cup. But a recent return to the Cameroonian set-up has seemingly changed his mind, and the i newspaper claim that Onana has agreed to compete at AFCON in January.
Doing so could see him miss a whopping seven United matches if Cameroon make a deep run, including four Premier League clashes, two FA Cup ties and a possible Carabao Cup semi-final.
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Ten Hag is unlikely to be pleased with being forced to call on back-up goalkeeper Altay Bayindir in such circumstances. The Turkey international was recruited during the summer and is yet to make his first-team debut for the Red Devils.
Onana abandoning his United team-mates in favour of an AFCON campaign may also irk Ten Hag due to the openness with which he has told the stopper to work on ‘stepping up’ his performances.
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“He knows, we know, he will do much better,” said the former Ajax boss. “Every player who’s coming into the Premier League, you need an integration period, but he has to step up. Big United keepers like Peter Schmeichel and David de Gea started not too good, doomed.
“Andre knows that it is good to know a little bit from history. But we live now, we live in the future and he has to make his future by giving better performances. I’m sure he will do. He showed it at Barcelona, Ajax, Inter Milan, he was in the semi-final and final of the Champions League.”
Ten Hag is under extra pressure for Onana to perform, given that he stuck his neck on the line by allowing David de Gea to leave Old Trafford during the summer. The Spaniard remains a free agent, and there have been murmurs that a humbling return could be on the cards.
As speculation ramped up last week, De Gea, who made more than 500 appearances for United, stoked the flames on social media by posting a thinking emoji.
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