Former Manchester United midfielder Fred has delivered a severe assessment of Erik ten Hag’s handling of the dressing room, while still rating the Dutchman among the strongest tactical coaches he has worked under.
Speaking on the Charla podcast, Fred described a manager whose methods on the training pitch impressed him but whose relationships with players repeatedly broke down. The Brazilian said he was among those to clash with Ten Hag, alongside Cristiano Ronaldo, Casemiro and Marcus Rashford, and linked his own lack of minutes to mounting frustration.
Fred’s account concerns the 2022-23 campaign, Ten Hag’s first at Old Trafford and the only season in which the pair worked together. Fred left for Fenerbahce after that season; reports now place him at Atletico Mineiro.
A sharp divide between coaching and connection
The striking part of Fred’s verdict is not simply its hostility. It is the clear distinction he makes between Ten Hag the strategist and Ten Hag the manager of people.
He credits Ten Hag with exceptional tactical ability, but alleges that the coach fostered divisions within the squad and gave preferential treatment to Dutch players. That is a significant claim, although neither report provides examples of selection decisions, training-ground incidents or internal evidence that could test it. Nor is there a response from Ten Hag or anyone who worked on his staff.
That gap matters. Players often interpret limited involvement through the lens of trust and fairness, particularly in a squad with competition for places. Fred’s recollection conveys how he experienced the environment, but it cannot on its own establish whether nationality dictated selection or whether choices were based on form, fitness, tactical plans or other factors.
Still, the consistency of the central detail across the reports is notable: Fred sees Ten Hag’s coaching strengths as inseparable from a serious weakness in building consensus. It is not an argument that Ten Hag lacked ideas. It is an argument that his delivery of those ideas alienated important members of the group.
Ronaldo episode revisited
Fred also returned to the breakdown between Ten Hag and Ronaldo. His explanation centres on the manager’s demand for intensity and his belief that the veteran forward could no longer meet every physical requirement. In Fred’s telling, Ronaldo’s removal from the regular starting side was the trigger for the relationship to deteriorate.
Both reports present that account as context for Ronaldo’s eventual exit, but neither settles how much responsibility lay with selection, communication or the wider circumstances around the forward at the time. The episode had already become public and contentious, so it would be too simple to treat Fred’s version as a complete explanation.
What it does add is a former teammate’s view that the dispute was rooted in a practical football disagreement before it became an institutional crisis. Ten Hag wanted a side capable of pressing and running aggressively; Ronaldo’s status and career stage made that a particularly difficult judgment to impose. The broader question is whether the manager could have handled that decision without turning it into a rupture.
Different memories of United’s managers
Fred’s comments draw an implicit contrast with Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, whom he portrays as more effective at bringing the squad together. He also spoke positively about Jose Mourinho, who signed him for United and later worked with him again at Fenerbahce.
That does not make Solskjaer a superior tactician, nor does it resolve the debate around Ten Hag’s results. It does, however, underline a recurring tension at United: the club have often sought a manager with a precise football identity, then found that implementing it in a high-profile, fractured squad demands diplomacy as well as authority.
Ten Hag did deliver domestic cup success during his time in Manchester, winning the League Cup in Fred’s final season and later the FA Cup. Those achievements support Fred’s contention that the Dutchman had the capacity to prepare teams effectively for specific challenges. Yet Fred’s comments suggest that success did not erase resentment within the playing group.
An account with limits, but lasting relevance
The reports agree on the substance of Fred’s criticism, though they offer little independent detail beyond his podcast appearance. One focuses more heavily on his present-day remarks, while the other also includes his warmer reflections on Solskjaer and Mourinho. Together, they present a former player giving a personal, not detached, account of a turbulent spell.
Fred has no apparent reason to soften the language of his verdict, and that makes it revealing rather than conclusive. His testimony cannot answer whether Ten Hag’s difficult relationships were widespread, whether they were unavoidable in a major rebuild, or whether other players viewed the same decisions differently.
It does reinforce the central contradiction of Ten Hag’s United tenure. A coach can be admired for the clarity of his football and still lose the dressing room if players feel the standards are unevenly applied or the dialogue has failed. Fred’s assessment suggests that, from inside the squad, that contradiction was felt long before the final judgment on Ten Hag’s reign was made.