Louis van Gaal had described winning the Europa League as the club’s “best route” back into the Champions League but, after Thursday’s display, fans won’t be booking their flights to Basel for the final just yet.
The scoreline is far from a disaster. United have been knocked out on seven of the last nine occasions they’ve lost the first leg of a European tie, but they’ll expect to reverse the aggregate score next week, with the help of Memphis Depay’s away goal.
But it’s the performance, not the scoreline, that’s the problem for under-pressure Van Gaal.
Midtjylland hadn’t played a competitive game for over two months but it was Manchester United, not the Danish champions, missing chances, misplacing passes and making mistakes.
While Sergio Romero – in for David de Gea, who was injured in the warm-up – was forced into superb saves in either half, Juan Mata’s tame tackle on Ebere Paul Onuachu, moments before Midtjylland’s second goal, will be rightly criticised.
The Spain international, along with Depay and Jesse Lingard, was also culpable for wasting opportunities at the other end.
Anthony Martial, playing as a striker in the absence of Wayne Rooney, didn’t unleash a single shot and had the fewest touches of any player to complete 90 minutes.
In fact, Manchester United managed just three shots on target in the whole game, against a team which conceded more times in the group phase than any other qualifier.
The travelling support, who had protested before the match at the cost of their tickets, were presented with a poor return for their money.
Van Gaal had got his excuses in early, criticising the small pitch before the game and complaining Midtjylland’s shape – “like Sunderland”, the relegation battlers United lost to in the Premier League on Saturday – didn’t suit his team.
However, the Dutchman also pointed to his side’s failure to win the second ball. United came out on top in just 45.1 per cent of their duels, while a fired-up Midtjylland won 90 per cent of their tackles.
United were out-fought and, when they did have the ball, they all too often wasted it in good areas.
“We need to speak about it, why our players were not capable to win these second balls and to keep the ball in our possession,” said Van Gaal. “We had a lot of unnecessary losses of the ball.” – Skysports.
