Ruud van Nistelrooy joined the coaching team at Man Utd as recently as in the summer, but suddenly found himself with the main responsibility a few months later. At the time, the rumours were that he was afraid of being seen as a traitor if he were to be given the task of ten Hag’s successor.
However, the club confirmed him as their interim choice after Erik ten Hag. Ruud van Nistelrooy took over the team as an interim head coach, with help from the staff at the time, until a permanent head coach was recruited, and as we all know ended with RvN leaving the club and Ruben Amorim being appointed.
Daily Mail writer Sami Mokbel called the situation the “elephant in the room” at the time, and believed that people were raising eyebrows about what was about to happen.
Much because it was the owners of INEOS who brought in van Nistelrooy, not ten Hag himself. However, this was not van Nistelrooy’s first job as head coach, as he also had managerial responsibility at PSV Eindhoven from July 2022 to May 2023.
After just over a year in the job, it became clear that he gave up, and even said in a press release from PSV that he felt a “lack of trust from the club”. In the Dutch media, however, it was claimed that the players had revolted and reported to the board about van Nistelrooy’s “lack of coaching skills”.
These accusations should also have kept Heerenveen away from signing him as manager this summer. Van Nistelrooy is also said to have made accusations against his former assistant Fred Rutten. The accusations are said to have been that Rutten allegedly went behind van Nistelrooy’s back when he took over the job from the current Leicester manager.
“A performance where we can build on” – Ruud reacts to #LIVLEI 🗣️
— Leicester City (@LCFC) December 27, 2024
Rutten was never appointed head coach, but worked under the appointment of being an interim alternative, later to step down and assisting new manager Peter Bosz. Bosz made fantastic success in his first season in charge with PSV, ending as league winners. So the board at PSV must have backed their new manager with what was needed to bring success. They continue their cruising this season, at this point the leaders of Eredivisie. PSV are also competing in Champions League, being 23 among 36 teams. A number of impressive results so far, 4-0 win vs. Girona and a 1-1 draw away to PSG, stands out as the most positive highlights.
Looking at the money used since, €49million were used on new players the season after RvN left. This became possible, bringing in €53million. Then in front of this season PSV have invested €38million in new players. €13million brought in on sales, so this looks a grand backing to build the team even stronger.
PSV do have a good plan on their squad build as players such as Luuk de Jong (F), Walter Benitez (G), Guus Til (M), Joel Drummel (G), Johan Bakayoko (F), Oliver Boscagli (D), Armando Obispo (D), Isaac Babadi (M) looking long term squad members and of course some of them very important for the team.
We all know that Ruud van Nistelrooy had great results during his days at PSV Eindhoven, but over such a short period, you have little or no real idea of what this could have looked long term, but to believe the fact that he would not be trusted at PSV, looks a different story, with the historical facts in hand.
The job at Leicester is one major, but it looks very difficult to see any answers, just yet. The games played under the management of Ruud van Nistelrooy give few or now answers so far. We cannot judge much and very difficult to read anything out of the games so far.
We have not yet seen a playing pattern, mostly because so many injuries and suspensions has happened. We do believe a number of changes will be done in January, but so far not easy to see what will be happening regarding transfer in and out.
As we earlier wrote in an article a few days back, be careful what you believe should be done, as players being often critisized and thrown into the cold water by especially fans, are in real not as bad as you would like to make them when wearing a Leicester shirt. The critisism of Wout Faes and James Justin is far off, both players are good Premier League professionals and if made available, will be snapped up fast by other teams at this level.
Relational weaknesses and of course not being ready for first team action, becomes one major reason, played out of position is another. But again Leicester do have a great number of good players, and at this point it will be very difficult to find players at the same shelf.
You could be lucky and get a player in who can evolve, but as we did see with Jamie Vardy, he needed two seasons or a bit more, to become the player he became. Players who can go in and become an instant injection has price tag we all know is a heavy one, hopefully Ruud van Nistelrooy has that backing and it will be interesting to follow him during January as his first moves in the transfer market will give indications on him either following the top managers this club have seen, or if he becomes one flying in the opposite direction.
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