Manchester United manager Erik ten Hag was visibly less than impressed with Sky Sports’ line of questioning in the wake of Sunday’s 1-0 defeat against Arsenal at Old Trafford and lashed out at journamalists.
The sword was put to the Red Devils as they fell to their 14th league defeat of the season against the Gunners, who kept their Premier League title hopes alive with a 1-0 away victory at Old Trafford courtesy of Leandro Trossard.
This negative result continues to pile the pressure on Ten Hag, who was again without a host of injured first-team stars for the game, including club captain Bruno Fernande. Invariably, the Dutchman again resorted to fielding the struggling Casemiro at center-back in the absence of his usual defenders, with the Brazilian veteran again compromisingly caught out for Trossard’s goal.
However, Ten Hag took offense and reacted angrily when he was asked how big the gap between the two sides would be were it not for said injuries during his post-match interview on Sky Sports.
“That is pathetic,” he fumed. “We don’t have to answer this question in this moment. Because it isn’t.
“We have these problems and the problems have caused us an effect in results. But I don’t know where we would be if we had the players on board. If we had all of the players on board, we will get more points and have more consistency in the backline.”
However in his post-match press conference with reporters, Ten Hag did concede that the club’s ridiculous injury list had played a part in United’s poor season.
He said: “Any manager can do better but also I am two years here and I have one time had a full group of players. You can’t progress a team in certain key areas with so many injuries. It’s like swimming with your hands on your back and you have to keep your head above the water level, that is what we try to do.
“We are still in a cup final. This is good. But if you want to progress a team you need fit players and you see our opponent today, they had only one not 100 per cent match-fit player and we had so many.
“I don’t like reactions but you have to always be there, you have to always be spot on when you are Man United. But if it happens, you need a reaction and the players gave the reaction.”
You’ve just got to hand it to the man. He’s an absolute champ when it comes to trotting out an infernal list of the same excuses for his team’s shambolic performances. With such an attitude, it’s almost impossible to see how someone like that can be relied on to restored United’s glories of old for the new era.