Manchester United boss Erik Ten could not explain how his side fell to a 7-0 humiliating defeat to arch-rivals Liverpool on Sunday at Anfield.
The Dutchman who just a week ago led Man United to their first silverware since 2017 in form of a Carabao Cup was made to painfully watch United side suffer their biggest defeat since 1931 courtesy of Cody Gakpo, Darwin Nunez and Mohammed Salah who each bagged a brace and Roberto Firmino who scored the seventh goals.
“I don’t have an explanation. I have to find out, it’s only going on what I’ve seen,” A disappointed Ten Hag said while speaking to SkySports after the game before going on to state he didn’t have a team during the drubbing aside from 11 individuals.
“In defensive transition, there was no team any more. We didn’t stick to the plan, there were 11 individuals. I don’t know, it was really bad.
“I’ve given my opinion [to the players]. It’s unprofessional, you have to stick together as a team, fight with each other, and we didn’t do that. We were really indisciplined in our jobs.
“You can have setbacks, but what can’t happen is that you don’t stick together. You have to do your job. It’s not possible that we made the wrong decisions in the transition and then we didn’t run and match the runs. We didn’t track back. For me, that’s unprofessional.”
Ten Hag didn’t hide away from making his disappointment and frustrations known.
“I’m really disappointed and angry, especially for our fans. We let them down, but also as a squad, as a team, you can’t allow this. You have to stick together, you have to fight with each other and support each other, and you have to defend. That’s what we didn’t do.
“It’s one game, but a big defeat, unacceptable, especially for our fans, especially against Liverpool, but we will bounce back. This team is strong enough, we will reset ourselves, and we will bounce back.”
Manchester United had since the turn of the year been on a roll! The side had prior to the Liverpool encounter won 13 of their last 17 games in all competitions. They were on surge and talk of winning a quadruple that included the Premier League title were gaining ground.
But now with this defeat, United fans may feel, the league will be a bit of a stretch. The defeat was one that left them placed third in the table standings, but now just seven points ahead of Liverpool who are positioned third.
