The kick-off of the Premier League is less than a month away, and teams are fine-tuning their strategies ahead of the season. Several clubs are on pre-season tours as they look to sharpen the rough edges on their sides. Manchester City and Liverpool are still the teams to beat despite the shenanigans that go with the transfer market.
Despite the massive gulf in class between Man City, Liverpool and the rest of the league, the other teams still fancy their chances of upstaging the Citizens and the Reds.
A constant feature of pre-season is the number of friendly matches played. Serious teams don’t lay much emphasis on the friendlies. The essence is to see their anomalies and work towards correcting them. At Old Trafford, the Red Devils have had nothing worth celebrating and would cling to just about anything to boost their morale. In a pre-season friendly, Manchester United beat Liverpool 4-0, and it had their fans gushing.
Manchester United thrash Liverpool
In a game with nothing at stake, not even as much as ego, Manchester United thrashed Liverpool 4-0 on Tuesday evening and have gone to town singing hallelujah. Former Man United defender Rio Ferdinand could not hide his excitement at the victory, and he showered plenty of praise on Erik Ten Hag.
Ferdinand was captivated by the performance and claimed to have seen signs of things to come. We can’t help but remember how the ex-United man did similar during the reign of Ole Solskjaer and we know how that ended.
Manchester United raced to a three-goal lead before half-time as Jadon Sancho, Fred and Anthony Martial all hit the back of the net. The second half saw Facundo Pellistri add gloss to the scoreline with a fourth goal. The win sees Ten Hag off to a splendid start.
For most parts of the game, Liverpool looked leggy and mustered very little in the game. Klopp changed all ten outfield players after about 30 minutes and repeated the act after 60 minutes. Ten Hag made ten changes at half-time.
Are the Red Devils on track for a great season?
Rio Ferdinand claims to have seen positive patterns of play from United. According to the former defender, the display by United was what they’ve been crying out for years. He was also impressed by the press from the front. The press is a signature pattern of Ten Hag.
The United icon also said he saw a brief glimpse of a blueprint of what Ten Hag hopes to instill at United. He also claimed past managers failed to implement it.
Speaking with MUTV, Ten Hag said he was satisfied. According to the Dutch manager, the team showed great spirit and that they were just getting started. He highlighted some of the things he saw in the game. The Dutchman opined that his side made some mistakes in the press and conceded some chances. Regardless, he was impressed with the many opportunities his side created.
Ten Hag believes the team has to work hard to cut out the mistakes, but he was happy with the progress made so far.
Ole Gunnar Solskjaer started like this and drew plenty of praise from Ferdinand, Paul Scholes and Gary Neville before everything busted at the seams.
