Van Gaal claimed United, who require a win in Wolfsburg to qualify for the last 16, were “afraid” to attack in the second-half of their goalless draw with PSV.
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United have scored only six goals in their last eight games, and looked directionless after their high-tempo start failed to yield any reward.
He said in a news conference: “Of course I am anxious but I know also that goals are coming and going”. It’s not a outcome of good performances and bad performances.
“Today we could have scored at least three goals – they were not the most hard chances, but we didn’t score”.
“I can not say every game in the interview with you that we didn’t finish but it is the truth”.
The best chance of all fell to Jesse Lingard who could have wrapped up the win for United but blasted over the bar after 73 minutes. “In the first half it was average but in the second, despite my changes [the introduction of Juan Mata, Ashley Young and Marouane Fellaini] it did not improve”. You’ll never know, but you as a journalist you are thinking, “Yeah, it is like that”. We can win everywhere. PSV have won both their matches at home and United on the other hand haven’t registered an away victory in the Champions League Group Stage this season.
We keep saying defensively they’re sound and I think they are but their forward play just wasn’t good enough tonight.
“In the second half we showed a lack of composure so that was not great, overall a draw was probably fair but this is what we did not want”.
But on the 10th anniversary of the death of one of their most prodigious attacking talents, George Best, United were once again left wanting in the final third, as Anthony Martial was twice denied by PSV goalkeeper Jeroen Zoet in the opening period.
“We stayed compact and on the counter we had our chances”, he said.
Hot on the heels of United’s appallingly tiresome nil-nil draw with PSV Eindhoven comes a tantalising (though sadly anonymous) snippet from the Telegraph’s Jason Burt, who we think is pretty reliable.
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“They could not find a solution, how to break us down, and towards the end maybe they did not believe they could do it”.
