Manager Ruben Amorim was delighted with his side’s fight during their screamer-free 2-2 draw against Premier League leaders Liverpool on Sunday, but admitted he wanted more.
A week after Amorim announced that his sulking club might be relegated, Lisandro Martinez and Amad Diallo both hit United’s first goals in the pot at Anfield since 2018, taking it head-to-head with the title contenders in a deserved draw.
“Today I can be the only guy who is mad at the team,” Amorim told reporters. “But today we were a team.
“I’d love for my team to be playing so much better but the biggest thing today I think that we need to fix mentality. And that is the secret to all. We weren’t the same team today, not because of the system, not because of the technical part of the game, the tactical part of the game.
“We took on the competition as we are supposed to every day, in practice and on the pitch. “Anywhere we go… we got to do that everyday”.
This result took United up a place to 13th, 11 points away from sixth placed Manchester City and 13 behind fourth-placed Chelsea, but it was a reward for those delighted travelling United fans who made the wintery journey.
It was a game that frustrated United captain Bruno Fernandes, who played the best of the day.
“I’m pretty upset,” he said. ‘We do this at Liverpool, first in the league, why can’t we do it everywhere? Amorim agreed.
“It’s really clear,” he said. “We’ve lost 3 games in a row at home, some games we got 2 goals and nothing (defense).
Amorim had hoped that since there would be no midweek matches, at least for the first time since he’d arrived in mid-November, he’d have a week to train.
“I’m not going to take that, but yeah, when you go out and train, you know what we are playing, where we’re positioned, the personality of the players, all that stuff, that’s important. ‘But I don’t want to play that today,’ he said.
“Today it is about, the concentration when you play football, the concentration on the set pieces, the concentration on passing the ball, not in the lazy way, but in the way that we don’t lose one ball because in the other side of the pitch is (Mohamed) Salah, is (Luis) Diaz, so you don’t lose the ball.
‘If you give up the ball on parts of the pitch, you know that we are going to lose. When you do that every day, you’re another team and I think that is really obvious.
The last kick of the game from Harry Maguire, which United almost dominated, saw the reds win by one.
“I don’t think anyone would have picked them to get two goals today or to get almost a penalty on the final play. But they need to support it,” ex-United skipper Roy Keane said.
“The counter-point to all of this though is you can’t choose whenever you want to turn up to a Manchester United game.