MANCHESTER United manager Ralf Rangnick admitted that his team’s performance was below par in Monday night’s 1-0 Premier League home defeat to Wolverhampton Wanderers.
Joao Moutinho scored late to hand Wolves their first away league win against Manchester United since February 1980, ending a run of 10 visits to Old Trafford without a win.
The visitors dominated and created the best chances against a disjointed United team and Rangnick was left fuming afterwards.
“We didn’t play well at all, neither individually nor collectively,” the German said in his post-match interview.
“In the first half, we had big problems to keep them away from our box and from our goal.
“In the second half, we changed to a different formation, with a back three, and we had more control on the game. The game showed that we have a lot of work to do, especially against the ball.
“We had too many u forced errors and we have to get better. This is an issue of the whole team.”
Rangnick, who will be in charge until the end of the season before taking up a consultancy role, confessed that it was difficult to deal with Wolves’ tactical set-up.
“We knew it could be a complicated game because Wolves, with a back five, are very flexible in midfield,” the 63-year-old said.
“They had almost four or five central midfielders and we had problems to control that part of the pitch. Whenever they tried to release, via their wing-backs, we were also struggling.
“We had a spell of 15 minutes where we could have scored, we hit the crossbar, but the goal that we conceded again showed we had enough players in the box but we allowed Adama Traore, back to goal, to turn, gain speed and bring in the cross.
“The cross was already defended by Phil Jones but the goal was one of too many [like it] this season as Joao Moutinho could shoot, completely unmarked with no problems and no pressure at all.”
It was the first defeat under Rangnick, who replaced Ole Gunnar Solskjaer in November, and he called for an improvement in his team’s performances.
He added: “We missed out on scoring the first goal with Bruno [Fernandes], it would have been possible to get the important first goal. We had two situations, one with Bruno and the other with Cristiano [Ronaldo], who was unfortunately offside. “In general, we just need to find a better balance within our team, defensively and offensively.
“The game showed we still have a lot of work to do and still have to take quite a few steps, both collectively and individually, especially against the ball, but in the first half in particular, in possession of the ball, there were too many unforced errors, too many giveaways.
“In those parts of the game, we just have to get better. I don’t want to speak about individual performances of players, it is an issue of the whole team.
“We can only improve the team if we get better collectively. It doesn’t make sense now to talk about individual performances.”
The result left United stuck in seventh place with 31 points while Wolves rose to eighth with 28 points.
Comments are closed.