Manchester United manager Louis van Gaal invoked the belief of the club’s players and supporters after their season took another downward turn with a 2-1 loss at Bournemouth. We have to put the heads up again and believe in ourselves because that is also very important. “This is the league where we wanted to show our qualities, and we can not do that anymore”.
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Although Bournemouth have lost key players to injury like captain Tommy Elphick and striker Callum Wilson, Stanislas felt their heroics demonstrated why they were equipped for survival, despite their lack of resources compared to the league’s elite.
Van Gaal will be looking for a better result than United’s drab 0-0 draw at home to West Ham, when they take on Bournemouth tonight. “But nobody hears that – they don’t want to hear me”. Comparisons have already been drawn between Sir Alex Ferguson and the kind of attacking football he practised with Van Gaal’s composed game of posession.
“We have those three competitions so we will see how we do at the end of the season”.
Van Gaal said he remained confident of achieving a successful season because he retains the trust of his players.
Asked whether Bournemouth’s victor was due to a lack of defensive concentration, the coach said: “You can never tell”. And I had a feeling that we could win in the second half. “But of course you see that there is a gap and you have to sniff that and we didn’t sniff that”. We scored the goals; then they are cancelling [out our] goals.
“The attitude of the players I liked but that is not the only important thing”.
Yaya Toure’s shot in the second minute of injury time struck young substitute Kelechi Iheanacho and looped into the net as City escaped with a win from an unconvincing display against Swansea at Etihad Stadium.
“You have to try something and we were not the dominant team so you have to change something in the position of the players, so you hope that he contributes to the making of a goal and we have tried that”.
“For us it’s been a brilliant week, but the preparation for this game was hard with the news of Harry Arter and his family”, Howe said.
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“Because of the injuries, we have to play with a lot of youngsters, but I have to say that the youngsters have played well, especially Cameron Borthwick-Jackson”. But we have lost.
