Manchester United have plumbed new depths with their dismal Europa League defeat at FC Midtjylland, according to a prominent supporters’ organisation.
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United had taken the lead through a goal from Memphis Depay, but conceded a goal in each half in an uninspiring display.
The loss has considerably turned up the heat on under-pressure manager Louis van Gaal. Then again, given United’s injury list and their lack of form, who’s to say Midtjylland won’t win when the two sides meet again in Manchester next Thursday? “With a performance and a result like that we’re going home very disappointed”.
“I have explained that we have to cope with this list of 14 injured players, and that’s not easy”.
United now have it all to do next week at Old Trafford in the second leg, but there has been many matches down the years where they have managed to turn the tie in their favour and progress through in Europe.
Van Gaal criticizing the teams second effort to win the ball, “We were not winning the second balls – that is my analysis”.
Statistics show United have won just nine games out of their last 27 games to suggest the road they are in is an unknown territory.
Although they also hit the crossbar via Jesse Lingard with the score at 1-1, the visitors did not threaten a great deal overall and De Gea’s replacement Sergio Romero was key in ensuring they did not suffer a heavier defeat.
United will next play Shrewsbury in the fifth round of the FA Cup on Monday, 22 February.
Between October and December, there was the run of five 0-0 draws in nine games that highlighted the anaemic nature of United’s attacking play under Van Gaal.
“It’s something that I think is a little bit of a mystery in football – when you go through a bad spell you seem to pick up even more injuries”, McLeish said.
“All the players want to perform in an excellent way”.
Midfielder Michael Carrick said: “It’s just not good enough, it’s not acceptable, the performance and the result, it’s nowhere near good enough”.
“We have to win at Old Trafford, and then we are in the next round”.
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“He is obviously the main focus of our plans, but we can’t blame that injury or the previous injuries on our performance tonight”.
