Either the players aren’t listening or they don’t want to do it
Scholes’ brutal verdict
TFORMER Manchester United midfielder turned BT Sport pundit PAUL SCHOLES pulled no punches assessing his old club’s current players following yesterday’s 1-1 draw with Southampton, accusing them of a lack of fight and suggesting Bruno Fernandes has become a problem.
HERE’S a lot of talent in this Manchester United team, some really good players, but with talent you have to work hard as well — and these players do not want to do the ugly side of the game. You watch the game and it is glaringly obvious the players do not want to put a shift in for this club, which is crazy really.
I actually feel sorry for the manager. He’s clearly trying his best to set his team up and they’re either listening and can’t do it, or they just don’t want to do it.
I think Bruno Fernandes could be a little bit of a problem. As much as he’s a talented lad, when he first came to the club scored goals, made assists, but now he’s all over the football pitch.
From a defensive point of view how can you set up in a shape when you’ve no idea where the start of it is? It starts with Cristiano Ronaldo, then Fernandes. How can you set traps when you don’t know where some of your players are going to be?
Paul Pogba tends to wander about, you saw Fernandes playing left-back, right-back, at the end of the game he was playing behind Diogo Dalot for five minutes. They are either not taking instructions on or they don’t want to.
They’re a all over the place. One time Scott McTominay is left on his own in midfield, then it’s Pogba left on his own in midfield. And, as I said, where Fernandes is playing I do not know.
The two wide players for me just don’t work anywhere near hard enough.
And sometimes you’ve got to do the stuff that is ugly. It gives you a bit of pain, you don’t like doing it. But so often this team jog back, it’s so easy to play against. You look at the difference in United’s team to Southampton in this game.
Southampton were brilliant. I thought the coaching, the methods, the patterns of play, the two centre-forwards, the midfield players, they were fantastic.
I think the feeling around Old Trafford is a lack of interest now this season. It’s been a bad seven days, but really it’s been a bad six or seven months.
The season has not been good enough. The sack for Ole Gunnar Solskjaer was coming, we all knew that. But where was the plan? You think there’s got to be a plan, they must be bringing in an elite, top coach into the football club.
Listen, this is Manchester United, they should have the best of everything, and to not have a plan and bring in what is technically a sporting director — he’s coached a team two years out of the last 10 years.
Don’t get me wrong, I like the man, I think Ralf Rangnick comes across well, but he looks like he’s lacked experience in coaching in the last five or six years and his team are a team of individuals.
O Paul Scholes was speaking on BT Sport’s live match coverage.