Former Manchester United ace defends player who gets made a “scapegoat” by fans

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Former Manchester United midfielder Fred has been defended against his critics by former Red Devils ace Luke Chadwick.

The Brazil international had a bad game against Leicester City at the weekend, making a costly individual error that led to the opening goal for Kelechi Iheanacho at the King Power Stadium.

Unsurprisingly, loads of Man Utd fans hit out at Fred for the mistake and a poor performance all-round, with Leicester certainly the better team as they won 3-1 to progress into the semi-finals of the FA Cup.

Chadwick, however, feels Fred often gets a lot of unfair criticism and that he’s had a strong season for Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s side with some strong, hard-working performances in the defensive midfield role.

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It’s clear Fred is never likely to be the kind of player to produce wonder-goals or blockbuster passes, but Chadwick thinks he’s important to the team and often gets made a scapegoat by fans.

Speaking to CaughtOffside, the former midfielder also pointed out that Harry Maguire probably didn’t do Fred any favours by playing the pass to him in that position.

“I feel both Fred and Harry Maguire are accountable to a certain extent,” Chadwick said. “But that is how Ole wants the team to play, he wants them to play out from the back.

“Maguire could’ve gone with another option but that will happen, it’s also poor technically from Fred. You’d expect the team to be able to get out from that situation because that’s what they practice in every training session.

“It has been effective in previous games but unfortunately yesterday it cost the team dearly, it was a poor goal to give away.”

Fred in action for Manchester United

Chadwick continued to stick up for Fred, though he admitted he looked tired against Leicester, saying: “I think Fred has been consistently a good performer for United this season, obviously he has his critics, he’s not a stand-out player but he does the dirty work really well.

“For maybe the first time in his United career he looked a little leggy yesterday and wasn’t at his best, getting close to people and covering ground the way we’re used to.

“He does get made the scapegoat a lot because he’s not one to score goals or assist goals, but I think his role in the team is really important and the sort of legs he’s got to get around the pitch is massively important and has played a part in United’s good results this season.”

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