United moved up to fifth in the Premier League table with a 1-0 victory over Liverpool at Anfield on Sunday, with Wayne Rooney scoring the only goal of the game.
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Manchester United as of late, have failed to produce the level of football that has earned them so many trophies.
The ex-Liverpool boss has been doing the punditry rounds since his sacking, and has backed the under-fire LVG to succeed with Man United.
The report adds that captain Wayne Rooney was involved in “heated exchanges” while van Gaal happily took a back-seat.
The Guardian’s Andy Hunter labelled United’s victory a “smash and grab” job and the stats make it hard to dispute the accuracy of his description.
The goal, his 176th for United, also means Rooney overtakes former Arsenal striker Thierry Henry for the most goals for a single club in Premier League history, although it was clear he was unaware of the milestone in the post-match interviews.
“We didn’t keep the ball in the first half so we couldn’t create anything and they created three chances in the first half – that was surviving”. “It was important because our competitors have lost points”.
Talk of United even challenging for the title would been dismissed as fanciful at the end of 2015, when the team was on an eight-game winless run and manager Louis van Gaal’s future looked precarious.
The Red Devils are unbeaten in their last five matches in all competitions, yet prior to that they went on a nine-game winless streak, which included four straight defeats. Like I have always said, whether you are in the mix or you are not, you have to take each game as it comes. We started 2016 very good with a lot of wins, a draw (3-3 at Newcastle United), and we didn’t lose.
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Smalling is convinced the kick-up the backside Rooney got from Van Gaal was a blessing in disguise. But he maintained that he does not feel the need to enter the transfer market in an attempt to correct their attacking weaknesses and will instead continue to seek improvement on the training ground. Sometimes you play well and get beat and now it is about how we react with a home game in the Cup on Wednesday [the Exeter replay] and away to Norwich on Saturday, which will not be easy. Will FSG back Jürgen Klopp as blindly as they did Brendan Rodgers, I’m not so sure but only time will tell. I don’t think David de Gea has done very much, two or three balls he has to stop, a goalkeeper has to do that.
