STOP THE PRESS...

Rangnick: I knew heavy-metal strategy wouldn’t work when we struggled at relegated Norwich. No one’s fault, but United must find Ten Hag right players

RALF RANGNICK took just 90 minutes of his first game in charge to realise Manchester United could not play the pressing game he is famous for.

Jurgen Klopp and Pep Guardiola were both disciples of his highenergy, Gegenpress style.

But after labouring to a 1-0 victory over Crystal Palace, Rangnick quickly discovered United were not strong or fit enough for the heavy-metal football loved by Kop king Klopp.

And, as the German coach bids farewell to a brief spell as a Premier League manager, he claims United’s priority now must be to ditch their scatter-gun, big-name transfer policy and find the right players for the football new boss Erik ten Hag will demand.

Rangnick said: “We all could and should have done better.

“But, in order to play that kind of football, you need all the players in their best possible positions who can play like that.

“Again, I’m not blaming anyone – you can’t blame the group here because they have not been signed on the basis of ‘how do we want to play, what kind of football do we want’.

“If you take a look at Manchester City or Liverpool and the changes in the last six years, all the players signed were on the premise of how does Jurgen or Pep want to play.

“That is what has to happen in the future here.

“For me, it’s obvious it should and will happen and I’m very positive from all the conversations I’ve had that the board is willing to do that.”

Rangnick (right) pulled no punches about his disappointment at failing to get United’s stars to play the pressing game he wanted after taking charge in December.

“Believe me, I am the most disappointed and frustrated about that,” he said.

“At one stage, even when we played away for example at Newcastle or Norwich, we just realised that it was difficult. We had no pre-season, we couldn’t really physically develop and raise the level of the team.

“Sustainably, we never came near to that aggressive, proactive football. To attack them in their half, to keep them under pressure how I’d normally want. That has to do with physicality.

“Wherever I have been before I have tactically developed the team.

“It always happened, not always after eight months or even in the first year.

“Unfortunately, I didn’t have that chance because I came in December and we were always thinking from one game and from one week to the other, but this is no excuse.

“At one stage we just had to find compromises – attacking a little bit deeper, how can we make sure that we get our offensive players into their positions?

“Cristiano scored a few goals. But, again, Cristiano – and I’m not blaming him at all, he did great in those games – is not a pressing monster.

“He’s not a player – even when he was a young player – who was crying, shouting, ‘Hurry, the other team has got the ball, where can we win balls?’

“And the same with quite a few other players, so we had to make some compromises at one stage, maybe we made a few too many

– that is also possible.

“We never found the balance between what we needed to do with the ball and without the ball.

“Even in possession of the ball, we didn’t create as many chance as we should have done.”