Stoke City handed United their fourth consecutive defeat in all competitions on Saturday to heap further pressure on boss Van Gaal, who hinted after the match that he could walk away from the job before Chelsea visit Stamford Bridge on Monday.
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Van Gaal watched in horror at Stoke as Manchester United crashed to a third-straight league defeat after two goals in seven first-half minutes by Bojan and Marko Arnautovic, writes Steve Bates in the Sunday People.
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Campbell indicated that rookie cornerback Tony Lippett would get more playing time in the final weeks of the regular season. That’s what delivered the win in another close game, the type Tom Coughlin’s team has struggled to close out all season.
Van Gaal dropped Wayne Rooney for the game at Stoke, but there was no change in the quality of United’s play. “I try to do everything, but the pressure will be higher and higher with every match”.
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But speaking to the media after the Boxing Day loss at Stoke, Van Gaal said: “I feel the support of everybody in the club”.
Van Gaal said after the match that his players were too scared of playing their best football, which is a startling admission given that this was hardly a Champions League final against Barcelona.
How will Louis van Gaal play this game? “Not with you (the press), I don’t think that is the sequence”.
Bojan Krkic of Stoke City scores the opening goal past Chris Smalling and Phil Jones of Manchester United on Saturday in their Premier League contest.
And when Van Gaal was asked whether he expected to remain in charge for the Chelsea match, his response was hardly emphatic.
Former Manchester United goalkeeper Mark Bosnich believes Louis van Gaal looks a “defeated man” and MUST be replaced with Jose Mourinho.
Although, the compact Premier League fixture list during the holidays makes the timing hard for the Red Devils to sack their current head coach, nothing in the world of soccer should surprise you.
The biggest indictment of the malaise afflicting England’s biggest club was Van Gaal’s belief that his expensively-assembled team “did not dare to play football in the first half”.
Adding however, that it is very hard to do that in just two days.
“In the second half we played better than the first half but the problem is we didn’t dare to play, and that’s my analysis”.
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“We talked about being on the front foot and having an intensity to win and we produced the same first half as against Manchester City”.
