Who was to blame for Manchester United's miserable 4-1 defeat at Como in the Champions League? Bruno Fernandes criticised the tactical plan of the Man Utd coaches. Michael Carrick questioned the motivation of his players.
If only Man Utd's performance on the pitch in Italy was as forceful as the post-match interviews. After losing at Atletico Madrid last time out in the Champions League, Lisandro Martinez hit out at the club's hierarchy, calling out technical director Jason Wilcox for failings in the transfer window. This time captain Fernandes took aim at the club's coaching staff in a stinging take-down of their pressing plan.
Asked by TNT Sports about a lack of cohesion in United's work out of possession, Fernandes defended his team-mates and put the blame on Carrick and his coaches. "It's a decision from the staff to not press man-to-man and sometimes leave a little space in behind and try to get the ball in the first moment, to wait for them, to give them the ball," he said. Como completed 594 passes, the most by a team in a Champions League game against Manchester United since Barcelona in April 2019 (725).
"But sometimes when you give too much the ball to these teams they get confident, they have so many bodies behind the ball that make you run a lot, make people get frustrated, and then obviously when you recover the ball the legs are, and the brain, much more difficult to make it work." Was that tactical idea what cost Man Utd in Como? "That's on the manager and on the staff to see it, it's not on me," said Fernandes. "I just said, I think sometimes we have to be more brave on the pressure, trying to take a risk of getting that press very high and making them uncomfortable - as they did to us." A meeting between Carrick, Martinez and Wilcox repaired relations after the centre-back's comments in Madrid.
But Carrick gave a blunt response in his post-match press conference on Wednesday when Fernandes' thoughts were put to him. "We half pressed man-to-man in the second half and ended up conceding a goal from that," he said. "Whatever tactics you play, it you don't run back, you ain't going to win." Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player Carrick is usually measured in front of the media but he made his feelings clear after the club's winless run stretched to seven games with this loss.
"I'm really angry," he said. "For us to play in that way is not acceptable." Manchester United are the first English team ever to concede inside the opening two minutes of back-to-back major European games (47 seconds vs Atletico Madrid, 118 seconds vs Como). For all United did wrong in the game, it was the application of his players which was prominent in his post-match assessment.
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