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By Martin Graham | 21st Apr 2023
Manchester United boss Erik ten Hag has stated that his team were disappointing in their 3 – 0 loss to Sevilla in the UEFA Europa League.
The Dutch manager went into the tie on a 2 – 2 aggregate scoreline, hoping to finally beat the LaLiga team in European competition for the first time in a while. Instead, he met a resolute defence and a hostile Ramon Sanchez-Pizjuan crowd that made the tie difficult for his team.
Three unreplied goals – two from striker Youssef En-Nesyri and Loic Bade – saw the 2023 Carabao Cup winners knocked out by a 5 – 2 aggregate scoreline. Mistakes led to Sevilla’s goals just like in the first leg and the manager noted that his team were disappointing for playing the way they did.
The manager said to Manchester United’s official website: “[It was] a disappointing performance. It was not good enough. We have to do better. No composure on the ball and we made the wrong decisions to quickly concede the goal and we never came into the game.
“We changed [things] but, straight after half-time, [we conceded] another goal which was avoidable. It can’t happen at our level.”
He also touched on the individual errors which led to the goals scored by the Andalusians. “It’s always about the team performance. Win together, lose together. We deal with the setback and have to deal with that,” he said. “It is clear when we make these mistakes, it is difficult to win a football game.
“We have to be better, that is the demand. I think we lost a bit of our coolness in the build-up, they went high pressure, we didn’t really do well with that, I think we made more mistakes than we normally do. I think that the whole team today, we couldn’t catch up on the mistakes that team-mates made.
“I think every football player makes mistakes in the game, of course, mistakes like this, they punish us straight away on this level, so of course, we had to take that away. In the end, I think it’s how you bounce back from the mistakes, and I think today, we weren’t strong enough to bounce back from the mistakes we gave them.”
Manchester United will now turn their attention to their FA Cup semi-final tie against Brighton and Hove Albion on Saturday.
A win will get them closer to their second title this season, which, despite all the setbacks, will be a very successful one for Erik ten Hag.
Martin Graham is an MFF sports writer
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