Some Manchester United players were training at Carrington during the recent international break, while many were away with their national teams.
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With the last international break of the calendar year done and dusted, Manchester United will hope to put their recent troubles behind them in the coming weeks. The Red Devils suffered two demoralising defeats at home against Liverpool and Manchester City in recent weeks. United are currently sitting at 6th place, having accumulated 17 points from 11 Premier League games. The Manchester Reds will hope to bounce back immediately starting with a trip to Watford in the league. When asked has it been good to get away after a tough spell, manager Ole Gunnar Solskjaer told club media, “Of course, times like this when there is an international break, we always use it in the best possible way.”
“This time, we had a few players that were injured and had to pull out of their games, and they’ve been working on their rehab and recovery. Some have been working on their fitness here, some have been allowed to go back home, to see their families with the staff working closely with them, of course. That’s one of the things we learnt through the pandemic; we can still keep in touch through Zoom and all the technology. And this week, they’ve come back bright. It’s been a very, very good week so far and we’re well prepared for Saturday.”
Solskjaer has a few injuries to deal with ahead of the weekend clash. Speaking about Marcus Rashford and Luke Shaw, he said, “They’ve been part of the last couple of days of training. They had different sets of protocols to follow and they have to tick them off before the doctor sends them to me.”
The manager then provided an update on the injury situations of Paul Pogba, who was injured in training with France, and Raphael Varane. “Yeah, Raphael’s improving, but he’s still a few weeks away. He’s working hard on his fitness and unfortunately, he got this injury now and it’s never a good time to get one, but after just coming back into the team, he was hoping to stay there. But he’ll work diligently, and he does work diligently and he’ll be back soon,” he added.
Referring to Pogba, Ole said, “It’s one of those injuries… how long is a piece of rope? I know that Paul, he’s working really hard, he’s determined to come back, he’s already started on the rehab and he wants to come back fresh and ready. If it’s two months, or six weeks or twelve weeks, I’ve got to tell you in a few weeks, when we can see how he’s healing.”
On Edinson Cavani, he said, “He’s one of the doubts as well. Unfortunately before the City game, he had to pull out after more or less the last training session, and he didn’t feel right. He’s one that we assess every single day, he’ll contribute when he gets back in. If it’s this weekend or not, I can’t tell you.”
Finally, speaking about Scott McTominay, the manager informed, “Scott has had a bad illness and a throat infection, he’s also trained the last couple of days. He’s looked bright and fit, to be fair.”
United still have 11 games left to play in 2021. “The good thing about this period now is that we have no international break, no distractions; it’s us, we’re here together for four months until the next international break. We know we need to do better, we know we’ve not been playing as well as we can, we should do better, we can do better, I’m sure we will do better. Everything I’ve seen this week in training bodes very well; they’ve been bright, they’ve looked after themselves when they’ve been away and it’s important now that the Watford game is the start of what’s to come,” he explained.
