Ruud van Nistelrooy is Manchester United’s interim manager after Erik ten Hag was sacked on Monday morning.

An official statement on the club website said that Van Nistelrooy will be supported by the current coaching team while a permanent head coach is hired.

Van Nistelrooy’s coaching career began in June 2013, working with PSV Eindhoven’s U17s before moving to Guus Hiddink’s Netherlands team after the 2014 World Cup. In 2016 he returned to the PSV academy as a striker coach and two years later took over the U19 team.

Ahead of the 2022–23 season, he was appointed as PSV’s first team manager, succeeding Roger Schmidt. PSV finished second in the Eredivisie and won the KNVB Cup (Dutch Cup), but Van Nistelrooy was eliminated before the final league game of the season. He joined United in July as Ten Hag’s assistant and while we can’t know for sure how he will approach this latest promotion at Old Trafford, we can take some lessons from his time in the Netherlands.

Here’s a cheat sheet about Ruud van Nistelrooy, football manager.

Ten Hag and Van Nistelrooy in Sunday’s 2-1 defeat against West Ham United (Graham Whitby Boot/Sportsphoto/Allstar via Getty Images)

How does Van Nistelrooy set up his teams when in possession of the ball?

Throughout the 2022–23 season, Van Nistelrooy favored a 4-3-3 formation, slowly building up from the back and central areas before hitting the balls directly to the wingers.

(The above lineup is PSV’s starting lineup from their 4-3 win over Feyenoord on September 18, 2022.)

Van Nistelrooy’s youth teams tried to ensure there was always one more man compared to the opposition when passing the ball through central areas, and some of these lessons were passed on to the senior team. During Eredivisie games, midfielders Ibrahim Sangare and Joey Veerman (an excellent progressive passer in the Eredivisie) dropped deep to collect the ball from the center backs, contributing to a 2-2 formation.

Once the ball passed the halfway line, the impetus was for the wingers to move outwards while the advanced full-backs moved inwards, assisting the central midfielders.

Once the ball approached the final third, the attacking momentum was transferred to the talented wingers who would attempt to beat their opponents one-on-one. Cody Gakpo was one of the Eredivisie’s standout players in the 2022/23 pre-World Cup season. He operated on the left wing and often scored goals by cutting inside and shooting onto his right foot. His set-pieces (he has impressive corner-kicking technique) gave PSV another tool to break through stubborn defenses. Combine this with Noni Madueke’s work on the right wing and you can glimpse Van Nistelrooy’s approach with two strong wide players who can stretch the defense to the breaking point.

The squad also had top-class players in the central areas. Xavi Simons, who came from Paris Saint-Germain, quickly developed into a dangerous attacking midfielder. Luuk De Jong – a prolific striker in the Eredivisie – scored 14 goals in 24 games in the 2022/23 season and dominated the defense almost weekly.

Van Nistelrooy’s PSV team often overloaded one side of the pitch, pushing a full-back up to join an attack and letting the attacking midfielder support the winger. This numerical advantage would either break through a defense or draw opponents across, creating additional space for the winger on the other side to call for a substitution. If the wingers played their best, the team would probably get a positive result on match day. But when opponents denied Gakpo and others room to maneuver, things got a little tricky.

It is important to note that despite the club’s financial problems, the squad available to Van Nistelrooy featured some of the best talent in the Netherlands. In addition to the above names, the club had Marco van Ginkel and Jarrad Branthwaite on loan (at this point his positioning was still uncertain, but a frightening physical presence in a Dutch league where central defenders often face many problems). crosses) and a cub Savinho (who was not used this season).

Van Nistelrooy will manage PSV away to Arsenal in October 2022 (Julian Finney/Getty Images)

How does he want his teams to defend?

Without the ball, Van Nistelrooy’s PSV mostly defended in a stubborn 4-1-4-1 formation, with Sangare in particular tasked with maintaining order before opponents ventured too close to PSV’s penalty area.

(The above lineup corresponds to PSV’s starting lineup from their 2-1 win over Ajax on November 6, 2022.)

The Ivorian’s ability to make up ground and win duels stood out during this period (long-term subscribers may remember that he became something of a statistical darling).

Van Nistelrooy made attempts to replicate this, with PSV occasionally switching to more of a 4-4-2 shape and pushing further upfield, but the quality of the front pressing was often inconsistent and uneven. For the most part, when his team lost the ball, the two players closest to him tried to win it back, while their teammates retreated and Sangare was prepared.

Rest defense was a problem in several parts of the season (particularly after the World Cup in Qatar), as many players were often in front of the ball when the ball was lost. Sangare could only cover limited spaces in games and PSV tended to leave worrying counter-attack opportunities to the opposition.

One could argue that such an approach bears some similarities to Ten Hag’s United team of 2022-23, where Casemiro erased any defensive errors before attempting to find Marcus Rashford on the left wing.

Van Nistelrooy scored 95 goals in 150 Premier League games for United (Gary M. Prior/Getty Images)

Tell me more about Van Nistelrooy not lasting the whole season

Van Nistelrooy resigned from PSV with just one game left, citing a lack of support from his superiors.

“A head coach needs to be in sync with the board and directors and aware of plans for the future,” he later told Coaches Voice. “If not, it will be impossible to continue.”

PSV’s difficult financial situation at the start of the 2022/23 season meant that Van Nistelrooy would likely lose Gakpo, Madueke and others to bigger clubs in Europe at some point, but the situation became even worse when the club failed to reach the group stage of the Champions League and lost to Rangers in the qualifying phase in August. Without this additional income, PSV signed some of their best players early in the January window, which greatly frustrated Van Nistelrooy.

Convinced that he would not be able to build on what had been achieved in 2022–23, he decided to step down early. Fred Rutten (an experienced coach who has managed several Eredivisie clubs) took charge of PSV’s final game of the season, a 2–1 win over AZ Alkmaar, which secured second place in the league and Champions League football for the following season consolidated.

Peter Bosz was appointed PSV’s permanent head coach on July 1, 2023 and led the club to the league title the following season. Such was the dominance of their title win (they finished five points ahead of Arne Slots Feyenoord and only lost once) that some sections of the Dutch media began to question Van Nistelrooy’s claims that the team was no longer due to player sales/finances Competitive is dispute.

PSV’s 2023/24 season was an improvement on the previous season in almost every way.

Which United players are likely to benefit from this approach if Van Nistelrooy tries to replicate it?

At a glance? United’s wingers could direct even more balls their way, although the lack of a fit left-back complicates matters further.

Will this style of play get United back into the league?

Only time will tell, but it’s worth noting that Van Nistelrooy has spent some time refining his approach to the game since leaving PSV.

Taking over at United is a difficult task for even the most experienced managers. Van Nistelrooy’s time at PSV provides some clues as to how he might approach this transition period, but the upcoming games will be the true test.

(Header photo: John Walton/PA Images via Getty Images)