Erik Ten Hag: Man Utd players are fighting together to turn around poor form

Erik Ten Hag insists Manchester United are fighting together to attempt to turn their season around.

The Red Devils have misplaced 4 of their first six matches, with Wednesday’s 4-3 defeat by Bayern Munich within the Champions League following a 3-1 reversal towards Brighton, leaving Ten Hag embattled little over a month into the brand new marketing campaign.

The Dutchman stated: “It’s my second 12 months. I do know it’s not all the time solely going up, you should have your gaps and also you get stronger from it so long as you keep together, and that’s what we’re doing.

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“The dressing room, staff, all the staff, coaches, medical, everyone is united and at United you fight.”

Stories of disgruntlement within the dressing room have begun to seem whereas the angle of players has additionally been query.

Ten Hag tried to paint a constructive image, saying: “I don’t know if it’s a leak but I know opinion, I know my players. Everyone can make suggestions, we are OK with it.”

There have additionally been recommendations of unhappiness on the affect of Ten Hag’s agent, Kees Vos, and his Sports Entertainment Group on switch dealings.

“It can’t be because we make very good agreements about it from the start, how we cooperate in that manner,” stated Ten Hag. “For player decisions, transfers, it’s always 50-50, we both have a veto – the club, represented by John Murtough, and me. So there can never be a distraction.”

United’s poor form has made Saturday’s journey to Burnley a high-pressure event, and they’re going to once more be with out Jadon Sancho, who stays absent from the squad.

“It depends on him,” stated Ten Hag. “For the rest, we are preparing for Burnley and that’s our focus. He will not be in the squad.”

United haven’t been helped by a large number of accidents however may have Raphael Varane, Mason Mount, Sofyan Amrabat and Harry Maguire again for the conflict at Turf Moor.

Central to United’s issues has been a scarcity of defensive solidity, with 14 objectives conceded of their final 5 video games.

Goalkeeper Andre Onana held his arms up after making a mistake for Bayern’s first objective however Ten Hag believes the issues are collective.

“It’s about team and, as a team, we don’t have the results in this moment so then also individuals don’t bring the performance you expect, not only one player, there are more, including the manager,” he stated.

“I always tell my players we attack with 11 and we defend with 11. When one or two are not doing their job, it’s like a pack of cards, so that is not only one or two players.”

Burnley picked up their first level on their return to the Premier League towards Nottingham Forest final day trip and Ten Hag is a fan of their type of play beneath Vincent Kompany.

He stated: “As all the time, it’s about how we play towards Burnley. There’s no straightforward video games, positively not towards Burnley.

“We know how intense they play football, we know their approach. I like the approach from them, the adventure, high intensity and dynamic in their game, so we have to play our best.”