Ole Gunnar Solskjaer has explained why he took Donny van de Beek off at half-time during Manchester United’s defeat to Young Boys.
The Reds were rocked on Tuesday night by Young Boys, losing 2-1 despite taking the lead through Cristiano Ronaldo.
The defeat means United are already on the back-foot given Young Boys are, on paper, the weakest team in the group, Villarreal and Atalanta drawing with each other on Tuesday.
And there is already pressure on Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, who failed to get United out of their Champions League group last season, instead reaching the Europa League final where they lost to their next opponents Villarreal.
Though, much of the pressure has come from the game itself and the way Solskjaer managed it.
Many felt the substitutions were ill-judged, and one of them saw midfielder van de Beek substituted for Raphael Varane at half-time.
Speaking after the game, Solskjaer explained that decision, saying during the post-match press conference, as streamed live by the club: “Like Harry said here as well, the signs were there in the last five minutes of the first-half that we were going to get crosses in the box.
“We knew they’d put the big tall striker on and we had to deal with their switches a lot better.
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“I thought Rapha, Victor and Harry coped with it well. Of course, the deflected goal for the first one, off Luke and it changes direction, but apart from that, it was the best way of controlling them.
“But we should have done better with the ball, maybe, we could have spread out more and sent one of the midfielders higher up in support of Cristiano because he was lonely up there.”