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For once, there won’t be a miraculous comeback for Ole Gunnar Solskjaer and Manchester United against RB Leipzig; just a long litany of regrets and what might have happened.
Doubts and hindsight are curses for the modern football coach and Solskjaer was left with more than most to ponder as his team prepared to fly back to Manchester, tail between legs, to prepare for Saturday’s derby. with City.
A penalty from Bruno Fernandes in the 80th minute and a scrambled header from substitute Paul Pogba two minutes later ensured a dramatic finish, but it was not enough to repair the damage done earlier in the night and early in the competition.
There was an inexplicable, amateur loss in Istanbul against Basaksehir early in the group and last week’s 3-1 home loss to PSG, when a point would have pushed United into the knockout stages rather than leaving them needing a draw. to pass. On tuesday night.
Solskjaer’s tactical performance had been widely scrutinized, and especially criticized, after the defeat to the French champions, and in Germany he again rolled the dice with his formations and teams.
When the dust settled, not just in Leipzig but in Paris, where there were dramatic scenes of an anti-racism protest that saw both sets of players leave the field during the first half, all that mattered was the tough results.
And they wanted to say that United was out of the Champions League and in Europe.
Another fact will be very important for the nice Norwegian this morning. In his 10 Champions League games as a manager, Solskjaer has lost six, something no other English club manager has done in the competition.
Solskjaer and United had a habit of coming from behind to win away from home, having done so in their last three away games.
And when Ibrahima Konate stormed Mason Greenwood and the Spanish referee signaled the point, Fernandes calmly converted the penalty and the game was briefly alive.
Furthermore, two minutes later, Pogba rose hard to find a corner with a header that, according to Leipzig, had entered Harry Maguire’s arm but that the VAR left standing. It would even take a final stoppage time from the local goalkeeper after a deflected cross from Pogba.
But, relative to Everton, Southampton and West Ham, who were similarly beaten by United recently, this Leipzig team is operating at a higher quality than Premier League teams and it was hard to see them survive after trailing for him. Same score 13 minutes from now at Red Bull Arena.
The start was nothing short of a catastrophe for United and their coach, who, of course, had to deal with the pre-game aftermath of the bomb dropped on the club the day before the game by Pogba’s controversial agent, Mino Raiola. .
France’s World Cup winner was left on the bench in Germany purely for tactical reasons, according to his coach, but United’s shocking organization and non-existent defense displayed in that first half hour cannot be blamed on Pogba or your motorcycle representative. .
Solskjaer went for five defenders but, in the way they conceded those killer goals, it seemed like he had no defenders in his lineup.
Less than two minutes had passed when Marcel Sabitzer floated over a brilliant cross from the right, over Harry Maguire, for Angelino to run and, with Aaron Wan-Bissaka desperately trying to make up lost ground, the winger drove in a magnificent, finishing by first time.
It was a shocking start and one that confirmed what most suspected, that United’s 5-0 win against the Germans at Old Trafford in late October was very flattering for Solskjaer.
Leipzig’s brilliant young manager Julian Nagelsmann had spoken hauntingly on the eve of the match about having learned lessons from the defeat in Manchester. And how.
Angelino, on loan from Manchester City and enjoying the night, managed to get another shot before scoring the second goal in the 13th minute.
Striker Amadou Haidara started the play, leaving Sabitzer, who swung the ball to the left, where Angelino had acres of space and time to launch himself over a far post center that found the Mali midfielder unmarked who finished from six yards.
It was an astonishing opening and appeared to turn into a complete defeat within half an hour when Willi Orban intervened and VAR avoided United who correctly ruled that they had been offside.
A switch to a back four marked an improvement and perhaps confirmed that one of the reasons behind United’s chronic slow starts is Solskjaer’s tendency to switch systems with such abandon.
Donny van de Beek, eventually making trouble-causing runs from midfield, also made things better and former Liverpool reserve goalkeeper Peter Gulacsi had to make decent saves from Scott McTominay, Greenwood and Fernandes, who also hit the crossbar.
Those mistakes were costly when, in the 69th minute, Angelino crossed again from the left, United again couldn’t deal with him and, with Maguire and David de Gea misjudging, Justin Kluivert finished clean from six yards.
Gulacsi 8; Mukiele 6, Konate 7, Orban 7, Angelino 9; Sabitzer 8, Haidara 7, Kampl 6 (Adams 75, 6); Nkunku 6, Forsberg 6 (Poulsen 55, 6); Elm 7 (Kluivert 55, 7).
Tschauner, Sorloth, Halstenberg, Martínez, Martel, Wosz.
De Gea 5; Lindelof 5, Maguire 5, Shaw 5 (Williams 60.5); Wan-Bissaka 4, McTominay 6, Matic 5 (Pogba 61, 7), Telles 5 (van de Beek 45, 6); Fernandes 7; Greenwood 5, Rashford 5.
Bailly, Mata, Grant, Lingard, James, Fosu-Mensah, Ighalo, Henderson, Tuanzebe.
A Lahoz (Spain) 5
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