London - Manchester United manager Louis van Gaal has claimed that his team are defending well, despite a 5-3 humiliation at Leicester last week.
United head into Saturday’s home game with West Ham at Old Trafford still reeling from last Sunday’s embarrassment and missing 10 players through injury and suspension.
But Van Gaal said he was determined to get to the root cause of the physical problems his players are suffering and is looking at the club’s day-to-day training methods in minute detail.
However, the Dutch coach still feels there has been an overreaction to events at Leicester that saw his team concede a 3-1 advantage in the final half hour to suffer one of their worst Premier League defeats in recent memory.
Asked if he felt any sense of panic, Van Gaal said, “No. It is happening, it’s about overcoming it. It’s not a regular occurrence when you see our figures in the Premier League.
“Except (for) this match, we are defending well, our average is less than one and we scored a lot of goals.
“I think we are fifth or sixth in terms of goals, I don’t know. I see the difficulty as, more or less, a lot of journalists…
“We have had some wins and should have (had more) wins. When you are 3-1 ahead after 60 minutes you have to win. Then we are two points off second in the table. But because of the loss we are sitting here and you are talking like that and questioning me like that.
“If we had won this game it was a different story, so you don’t have to make an incident sound as if it is a regular basis. We will overcome and the season lasts more than one competition day.”
Van Gaal confirmed that defender Chris Smalling had become the latest player to break down in training.
Smalling will join Jonny Evans and Phil Jones on the sidelines, while Tyler Blackett is suspended after being sent off at the King Power Stadium.
He added, “I have to admit that I’m never in this situation before, so that’s strange, and that is also what I have said in former press conferences.
“It’s difficult to understand, because we are evaluating what we can do in a different way, but you have to train on a certain level because otherwise you can’t play a game.
“I’ve already said I will adapt to a certain level but I cannot train lower because then you can’t perform in the right way.
“We have a lot of injuries, nine injuries now, and Blackett suspended, so that means that 10 are out.
Meanwhile, Van Gaal held a one-hour crisis meeting to dissect the Leicester defeat, striker Robin van Persie has revealed.
Van Gaal’s Dutch compatriot, who scored United’s opening goal, said the squad had a “proper look” at what had gone wrong as the manager confronted the players the next day.
“It shouldn’t be possible (to lose in such a manner), but it still happened,” Van Persie said. “We have to deal with it. We had a proper look at it the next day. Sometimes it was a bit confronting and it was a long meeting. One hour something.
“We went from there, started again this week (and put) a couple of really good sessions in. Everyone feels ready to face West Ham.”
In the aftermatch of the defeat, Van Gaal said, “When you look at the defensive mistakes, it starts somewhere else. That’s what we looked at as well. It’s not just the one mistake which happens. There’s a mistake before the mistake and before the mistake, maybe positional wise.”
United have just five points from five league matches so far and sit a lowly 12th in the table.
Daily Mail