Pogba return only plus point says Solskjaer

OLE Gunnar Solskjaer says Paul Pogba was the only positive in United’s embarrassing defeat at Premier League basement club Watford.

The French World Cup winner made his comeback from nearly a 12-week lay-off in the 64th minute at Vicarage Road and lifted the Reds amid their attempts to salvage something from the game.

The 26-year-old is almost certain to start in the visit of Newcastle United on Boxing Day and Solskjaer said Pogba could have played for longer.

“The last half-an-hour, when Paul came on, was probably the only plus,” Solskjaer said.

“He gave us that little bit of edge, quality, urgency, played great passes over the top, he had some nice combinations, he had a chance himself.

“The boy’s been working really hard to get fit and he was maybe ready to play more, let’s see how he reacts to this.”

The United coach was 30 minutes later than its planned arrival time of 12.30pm and not every player had disembarked the coach when the team news had been confirmed at 1pm. United were infamously late for London defeats at Tottenham and West Ham in 2016 but Solskjaer refused to use it as an excuse for their anaemic display against Watford. “There are many different reasons for the outcome in a game of football,” he explained. “You create chances, you don’t score goals, we created loads of chances towards the end but that was only after they went 2-0 up. “So it’s got to start with more urgency, we’ve got to play better. “We had loads of set-plays against other teams like City and Tottenham and didn’t make the mistakes we did.

“No excuses at all, we prepared well and there’s nothing I can put my finger on.

“You can’t really blame the incident with the traffic either, we were a little bit late, but then again sometimes you think, ‘does that little affect us? Is that going to affect us?’ I don’t think so.

“An hour here should be enough for us to prepare for the game.”

Ole Gunnar Solskjaer