At the time of his appointment, Van Gaal had two objectives: to regain Champions League football and then challenge for silverware.
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Schweinsteiger was taken off with twenty minutes to go in Wolfsburg. “United are just an average team and with an average team you get average performances”.
Van Gaal said: “The circumstances were not so good for Manchester United to play this game”.
The trio were commenting after a 3-2 loss at Wolfsburg condemned United to the Europa League.
The Red Devils will now be playing the the Europa League after only managing to finish third in Group B following the latest round of European fixtures.
Senior figures at Old Trafford believe it will be almost impossible for United or any other English team to win Europe’s elite competition until they have the same support as clubs in Spain and Germany, where the league is not as intense but games are moved to accommodate Bayern Munich, Barcelona, and Real Madrid.
“You don’t want to come out of your house or walk around Manchester”.
When asked if United were facing a crisis, Scholes replied: “Yeah, probably”.
“If you strip it back this squad needs a hard look”.
“You look at people looking at you thinking “You are not good enough”, questioning you and questioning the team, a team that haven’t gone through a group stage they should have”.
Michael Owen, another member of BT Sport’s punditry team, added: I think he [Van Gaal] is under severe pressure now.
Van Gaal was left fuming after Jesse Lingard curled home a cross from outside the area, but the linesman spotted Juan Mata was offside and chalked off the goal, which would have made it 2-2 at the break.
Injuries played a part, sure, but Van Gaal has let go of players like Adnan Januzaj, Javier Hernandez, Danny Welbeck and Rafael da Silva since he took charge, weakening the squad’s overall strength. “Every word I say is wrong”.
With their Champions League participation over, United will now focus their attention on domestic matters where they trail Premier League leaders Leicester City by three points after 15 games. Galatasaray denied Astana a famous first group stage win and the chance to continue their continental adventure in the Europa League as Selcuk Inan cancelled out Patrick Twumasi’s opener in a 1-1 draw in Turkey.
“I am not agreeing with any opinion that this was an easy group”, Van Gaal said, even if the United of old would have had no problem getting through.
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For Van Gaal, the fact that there remains a split – for now at least – shows he is doing something right.
