Manchester United have ended their pre-season and that was not on a high, as Erik Ten Hag’s side disappointed in a 3-0 loss to Liverpool, in a friendly match in South Carolina. Things did not start well right away, as Fabio Carvalho pounced on Diogo Jota’s assist to put Liverpool ahead just 10 minutes into the match. Curtis Jones doubled the lead after 36 minutes of play, following Mohamed Salah’s assist, before Kostas Tsimikas made it 3-0 right after the hour mark.
Ten Hag fielded a starting XI consisting of Andre Onana in goal, Victor Lindelöf and Jonny Evans as centre-backs, and Aaron Wan-Bissaka and Harry Amass as the two full-backs. Toby Collyer got the chance to start in central midfield alongside Casemiro, while Mason Mount was used in a number 10 role. Amad Diallo was on the right wing, Marcus Rashford in his usual left-wing spot, while Jadon Sancho was the one deployed as a ‘false nine’, something we might see happen against Manchester City as well.
New Signings In Defence Much Needed
Man United are really in need of improving their defensive options. The starting back four of Wan-Bissaka, Evans, Lindelöf, Amass is far from what Ten Hag will want to use as his first-choice defence. Wan-Bissaka could leave, while both centre-backs are to be replaced with Lisandro Martinez and potentially Matthijs De Ligt, as well as Leny Yoro once he recovers from his injury. At left-back, Luke Shaw will be expected to be the first option, but still, reinforcements are needed here. Evans and Lindelöf are simply not good enough and could only be backup options. Hopefully this season United will not always be one injury away from big defensive troubles. United need to get those deals in as soon as possible.
Amass Could Be Part Of The Squad
On a more positive note, Harry Amass brought some positives from this match. The 17-year-old had a big task in trying to stop Mohamed Salah and he fared quite well. The youngster won most of his 1v1 duels against the legendary Egyptian, but he did still have his defensive problems. At times it looked like Amass switched off, something he did against Real Betis and Arsenal as well. Sure, he is still a young kid with lots of work to do ahead of him, but his talent was on show too, so he might be part of this squad throughout the season, particularly given all the problems United have had with the lack of options in his position last season.
United Look More Organised
When you lose 3-0 against Liverpool, it is easy to say nothing worked well and everything is really negative. But this time, there were some positives. Man United controlled the play and dominated large parts of the first half and it looks like Ten Hag’s side is more organised than what we were used to seeing last season. Clearly, the bar is set very low if we compare our organisation to the one this team had last season, but it should also be noted some of these positives occurred when United were without a big number of their best players. There were no Bruno Fernandez, Kobbie Mainoo, Diogo Dalot, Joshua Zirkzee nor Alejandro Garnacho in this match, so their inclusion could only make things better.