Man United banished the demons of their Manchester derby humiliation on Saturday afternoon
Manchester United’s defeat at the Etihad Stadium in October was a major shock to the system.
Erik ten Hag’s men looked like they had turned a corner following their August wobble but were brought back down to earth with a bang against Manchester City. The 6-3 scoreline was not as humiliating as it could have been but the Reds were dominated across the pitch.
Speaking on his podcast post-match, Gary Neville highlighted the main undoing for United on that forgettable afternoon. He explained: “I don’t think if you come in off this game, you’re analyzing Manchester United’s performance, you should be saying: ‘Why wasn’t Casemiro starting alongside [Scott] McTominay – that’s a really big mistake from Erik ten Hag’, I don’t feel that at all sat here.
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“I feel the players he put out on that pitch have been confident together and I know there’s been the disruption of the international and the Queen passing – which isn’t helpful when the team is on a good run but all the teams have had to cope with that. It was the unforced errors, anxiety on the ball, and lack of composure.
“I’m not talking about players in defensive positions who are being pressed, I’m talking about the midfield players and the forwards; [Marcus] Rashford, [Christian] Eriksen, [Bruno] Fernandes, McTominay – I could name more – they were all giving it away first-half unnecessarily. It just brings further negative vibes throughout the team when your best players aren’t keeping the ball well, they should’ve been better, forcing it far too early.
“It was almost like when they get it: ‘We’ve got counter-attack we’ve got to put it behind City,’ but to do that you’ve got to play those two or three passes through midfield to set it up. You can’t just think you can play one pass, knock it over the top – even if they’re not City’s best center-backs – they read that, it became really simple for City’s defenders to cope with it.”
At Old Trafford, United showed that they were able to keep the ball much better than their opponents who on this occasion were the ones guilty of sloppy decision-making. This was exemplified by Aaron Wan-Bissaka’s brilliant play to keep hold of the ball as Blues players chucked themselves toward him.
For the controversial equalizer, Casemiro showed great vision and composure to split open the City defense. As for the winner, Alejandro Garnacho showed how far he is progressing with a perfect cross for Rashford.
In total, this was a much better performance for United than the one last year but their ability to do the basics well helped them walk away with the bragging rights.
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