Erik ten Hag believed one Man United player was taking important “step forward” before sacking

Erik ten Hag believed one of his Manchester United players was taking an important ‘step forward’ before he was sacked this week.

Manchester United announced on Monday morning that Erik ten Hag has been dismissed following their 2-1 defeat to West Ham over the weekend.

Following a dismal start to the season, which saw United sit 14th in the Premier League, it was not a completely surprising decision.

Ruben Amorim is expected to replace the 54-year-old while Ruud van Nistelrooy is in charge on an interim basis currently.

Before he departed, Ten Hag conducted his final press conference previewing the upcoming Carabao Cup clash against Leicester City.

READ MORE: Every word from Erik ten Hag’s final press conference as Manchester United manager

During that press conference, the former United boss spoke about the progress he had been seeing from Manuel Ugarte, specifically in the Europa League clash against Fenerbahce.

Ugarte signed for the club from Paris Saint-Germain in the summer and was expected to play a big role for Ten Hag but started just one Premier League game before his dismissal.

The midfielder had a slow start, partly due to a minimal pre-season, and has been playing catch up, but Ten Hag believed that he was making positive steps before his dismissal.

“My midfielders, I have different types. The holding midfielders, the box to box, the 10s, most of the time we have four midfielders there. We rotate them,” began the Dutchman.

“Specifically for Manuel Ugarte, most of the time he will be playing the holding midfielder position and what we expect from him has already been said.

“Holding, but also linking and building the attack. Making the links into attack and it is very important that he is the rest defence and defensive transition.

“I think every player can do better but I was very happy with his performance in Fenerbahce, I think that was definitely a step forward.”

Ugarte will be pleased to see that Amorim is set to take over from Ten Hag. He worked with the Portuguese manager during his time at Sporting Lisbon.

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