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Manchester United manager Erik ten Hag has once again reiterated his displeasure with the referee’s decision to order Matthijs de Ligt off the pitch, during the club’s comeback win against Brentford.
United fell behind just before the break as Ethan Pinnock headed in from a corner kick. Pinnock found the back of the net while the hosts were down to 10 men.
This is because De Ligt was off receiving additional treatment for a head injury he suffered earlier. The Netherlands international had already gone off the pitch twice to have the issue tended to by United’s medical staff.
However, blood could still be seen as the team prepared to defend a Brentford corner. After the Bees scored, De Ligt, his teammates and the coaching staff were up in arms at the referee and other match officials for the incident.
In fact, Ten Hag and Ruud van Nistelrooy were both booked for their passionate protestations.
The Red Devils restored parity immediately after the break, through Alejandro Garnacho, who connected with a sublime ball from Marcus Rashford. Rasmus Hojlund completed the comeback in the 62nd minute as he dinked a superb finish over goalkeeper Mark Flekken.
In his interview with Sky Sports, Ten Hag argued that De Ligt shouldn’t have come off as it was only dry blood.
The Dutchman repeated the same sentiments in his presser as he delved into greater detail about how events unfolded.
The United boss told reporters, “It was dry blood, so he was already treated for that injury. Just dry blood. No one from us understood why he was sent off.”
“I went over to Matthijs and he said, ‘it’s just dry blood so I have to come off, I don’t know why’. It’s a huge moment because Brentford is very good at corners when you miss a header and they benefit from it, you are disappointed.”
“It is hypothetical, we will never know (if the moment sparked United into life), but definitely we were mad, we were angry at half-time. We had the idea, it was not perfect but we controlled the game. We didn’t concede chances, we created some chances and then it felt injustice when you concede like we did. He (De Ligt) was okay, that is what he told me. I asked him when he came off, is there a problem. No, he was 100 per cent there and not at any time was there a doubt to take him off.”
On the result, Ten Hag remarked, “Every game you win is important. This team you see the togetherness, the fighting spirit and today we add some determination to score goals, that is what we need.”
“The stats show we play good football, we come in the right spots but we don’t score enough, we’re not clinical enough but today we scored two brilliant goals and we’re very pleased with it.”
“Today the two goals we scored are high quality. We have seen this team has the capacity to score very good goals and when you score and win you add some belief, some confidence. That is what we needed.”
“In the start of the season, we had some good performances. You see it also the clean sheets we had. We had enough chances but didn’t score enough and then everyone is negative, disappointed. It can help us but it is only one win and we have to build on this.”
“Pressure is always there, we have to win every game and when you are 1-0 down, we have to see how we turn it around. We felt some injustice and we used this as fuel for the second half. We increased the tempo, scored two great goals. I really enjoyed the performance. Especially the second half.”
He admitted that while United have not won their last few games, there were circumstances that led to that. He named Bruno Fernandes’ red card against Tottenham Hotspur as an example of these reasons.
Ten Hag noted that United’s main problem has always been scoring goals and if this problem is sorted out, then the Reds will have no issues winning games.
The 54-year-old explained that Rasmus Hojlund’s return from injury will help the team a lot going forward.
Featured image Michael Regan via Getty Images
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