Alejandro Garnacho liking posts criticising Erik ten Hag will not have gone unnoticed by Ineos… as Bournemouth draw leaves the beleaguered Man United boss unsure who he can trust to perform for him

It’s never a good sign for a manager when stories emerge of a player ‘liking’ social media posts about how mean he is, but that was the added headache for Erik ten Hag after Manchester United’s sleepy performance at Bournemouth.

There’s always Joleon Lescott’s defense – he once claimed it wasn’t him but his pocket who tweeted a photo of a Mercedes worth £121,000 while he was driving after Aston Villa were humiliated 6-0 by Liverpool – while Alejandro Garnacho was accused of a public backlash at Ten Hag replacing him at half-time during Saturday’s disappointing draw, followed by his post-match explanation for that adjustment.

Screenshots were shared in which Garnacho apparently showed his appreciation for posts written by a YouTuber named Mark Goldbridge, which mentioned how Ten Hag “threw a 19-year-old under the bus who actually delivered for you this season” and that he was “afraid to to upset the biggest earners” in the locker room.

Those in the room for Ten Hag’s press conference heard the full reasoning behind why he made that half-time substitution. It would be a stretch to say he explicitly blamed the teenager, as the United manager explained that he saw the need to tactically restore the right side that Bournemouth were targeting and that Garnacho had missed most of the training week due to illness.

However sensational the reaction may have been, it’s never fun for a footballer to be hooked at half-time, even though Garnacho had already put in a performance that had Bournemouth fans enthralled with his foul and ticket buying antics.

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In these modern times, some United supporters will be keen to take this as a sign of a lack of confidence in Ten Hag from within the dressing room, while the stories will not go unnoticed by the club’s new overlords ahead of a summer in which they are likely to to implement an administrative change.

Garnacho wasn’t the only one to put in a sub-par performance in Bournemouth. On the other wing, Marcus Rashford showed nowhere near the required intensity and did little to dispel the perception that he was disinterested. Casemiro underlined why he was no longer a match for a club aiming for the next level, while Rasmus Hojlund was largely lost at the helm of the attack.

Bruno Fernandes will never win a popularity contest among football fans as he is the Premier League player who moans more than most, but there is a downside to his nooses.

They show that he cares. That’s a trait that seemed lost on many of his teammates. Ten Hag stressed afterwards that they are ‘motivated’ despite the fact that this draw has seen them drop to seventh place ahead of Sunday’s matches – a position that would equate to their worst ever result in a Premier League season . United’s manager hurriedly left his press conference when that subject came up. He said he didn’t want to comment and showed it wasn’t worth talking about.

Love him or loathe him, Fernandes doesn’t care, yet Ten Hag may face the end of this Premier League season not knowing who he can trust to step up for him.