PURE STUPIDITY!

Ten Hag slams United flops for ‘unacceptable’ defeat at Villa

ERIK TEN HAG lambasted his ‘stupid’ Manchester United players after they slipped to a 3-1 defeat yesterday in Unai Emery’s first match in charge of Aston Villa.

Having gone 12 hours of football without conceding, United were 2- 0 down inside 11 minutes at Villa Park through Leon Bailey and a Lucas Digne free-kick.

A Jacob Ramsey own goal halved the deficit but the Villa midfielder redeemed himself by finishing off a counter-attack at the right end as

Emery returned to the Premier League in style. And Ten Hag was furious after his side fell to a first Premier League defeat in six that leaves them 11 points behind leaders Arsenal.

‘Collectively it was a bad performance,’ said the Dutchman. ‘I have been in football a long time and players are not robots.

‘Sometimes this is the way it is, it is psychological but it is not acceptable. We have to be ready for every game and not give it away so easily. It was stupid to try to cross the ball in the way we did, too quickly and from too far out, with too much force.’