Manchester United’s players have the perfect time to show their character this week against Brentford.
Manchester United’s 2-0 loss to Newcastle at the weekend was a dismal one. The team were outfought by a team who simply looked like they wanted to win the match more.
Erik ten Hag told club media: “I said after the game in the dressing room, ‘It can’t be that the opponent is angrier than we are
“The race for the top four is going to be a fight, and you can only win that when you match the desire and passion of the opponent.”
Luke Shaw admitted the players had discussed this among themselves after the loss in a post-match showdown.
Newcastle had the perfect motivation to gain revenge, having lost the Carabao Cup final to Manchester United.
Toon winger Jacob Murphy admitted this was a factor, telling Five: “The cup final, they had that on us. We had to get revenge on that… there was lots of motivation going into the game.”
Manchester United have perfect motivation this week
Manchester United face Brentford this week, and it is a difficult match, but also the perfect game for United to answer this particular test of character.
It wasn’t United’s abilities being questioned against Newcastle (although in the case of a few players it should be). It was the mentality. Several of them did not look up for the fight in the same way Newcastle were, not in a cohesive way.
This week against Brentford, there is personal pride at stake. Earlier in the season Manchester United were embarrassed by Thomas Frank’s side.
Brentford raced into a 4-0 lead by half-time in a game many Manchester United fans watching around the world dared not even turn back on for the second half.
4-0 was how it ended, and that alone, was a humiliation. It is one which sparked a revival for the team, with Erik ten Hag’s now legendary training session the day afterwards where he ran 13.8 kilometres with his players at Carrington, the cumulative distance the players ran less than their opponents.
The result was a humiliation, and if Manchester United’s player do care, if they do have the right attitudes, they will be desperate to exact revenge on Brentford this week.
Forget the race for the top four, forget the big picture of injuries, suspensions, cup semi-finals, Manchester United’s players owe Brentford one, and the players have to make it right. They should remember the pain they felt on that hot day back in August, when they were ripped apart, and it was uncertain whether there really were brighter times ahead.
Winning this week is easier said than done, but Manchester United’s players were schooled against Newcastle, and need to flip it around against Brentford.
The match will be a real test, but it is a perfect one to see if this Manchester United squad have enough of the right characters in it, to avoid Erik ten Hag making wholesale changes in the summer.
If there is an ‘attitude problem’ with the players not possessing the right mental qualities, it will be shown up on Wednesday night.
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