Manchester United will be keen to get their first points of this Champions League season against Galatasaray in a group clash on Tuesday night.
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Manchester United have not started the season in the best way possible. In fact, it has been a big struggle till now for Erik ten Hag and company in the 2023-24 campaign. In the Premier League, they are just a shadow of their previous self that finished third last season. Heading into this game, the Red Devils had suffered a shock 1-0 loss to Crystal Palace at the weekend. Besides, they also started the Champions League on a losing note, with a 4-3 defeat to Bayern Munich in Germany.
Hence, Manchester United will be keen to get their first points of this Champions League season against Galatasaray in a group clash on Tuesday night. Erik ten Hag was asked whether the upcoming game against the Turkish opponent is more about the result or performance. The manager, quoted by the club’s website, said during the pre-match press conference, “As I said previously, top football is always about results but if the execution is not right, if the process is not right, you don’t go to win. So both.”
Then the topic shifted to Marcus Rashford who has struggled to live up to the levels he showed last season. Asked about it, ten Hag replied, “The facts are that he is not scoring at this moment but also he had opportunities. For instance, the game against Brighton, he had five or six occasions that he was in a very good spot. If he works hard and if he invests every day, and goes into every game with the right focus, and if the team around him supply him and help him with movement, it will come. Marcus Rashford is a player who is always capable to score in every game. When he is coming in the right spots, he will score.”
Many expected goalkeeper Altay Bayindir to start for United during the League Cup win over Crystal Palace last week. However, ten Hag went with Andre Onana instead. Explaining his reason behind it, the manager said, “You will see, but we chose against Crystal Palace in the League Cup to play Andre because both came new in and both have to adapt to the English standard, so that’s why we preferred Andre to play in that game.”
He added: “It’s important for him to use every game in this moment, but yeah, we also have to progress Altay, that’s clear. He makes a very good impression in training, he’s really developing, progressing, so we’re very happy with that and we are convinced we have the two right goalkeepers in our squad to do the job for us.”
It was pointed out to ten Hag that Galatasaray have couple of dangerous players, Mauro Icardi and Wilfried Zaha. Asked whether he has any strategies for them, the manager replied, “Absolutely, we know that they are [dangerous]. But it’s not only Zaha and Icardi, there is also Dries Mertens, if Hakim Ziyech is available, if Tete [is]. so they have more good players. Angelino can be very offensive and creative, [Kerem] Demirbay [can too] so it’s about [the] team and we have to defend that as a team, we will be aware we have to play our best to get the right result.”
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