A scathing analysis of Man United’s problems
Manchester United were fortunate to come away from St James’ Park with a point on Monday night as an Edinson Cavani goal levelled the scoring after Allan Saint-Maximin’s first half strike had put the hosts in front.
It was a disjointed performance from the visitors, with a lack of aggression and tactical cohesion reminded everyone that this cobbled together collection of individuals is still adapting to Ralf Rangnick’s system.
Speaking in the Sky Sports studio, Gary Neville described United players as “whinge bags”, criticising their body language as nothing seemed to be going right.
After the game, he doubled down on his criticism, calling out the two senior attacking players in the side: Bruno Fernandes and Cristiano Ronaldo.
“He’s run off again tonight,” Neville said after Ronaldo went straight down the tunnel without paying tribute to the travelling fans.
“He ran off at Watford, when everyone knew he was going to get sacked, and at Norwich.
“And I think that Bruno’s whinging… They’re the two senior players in that dressing room. It’s devastating for the younger players if the two best players in the team are look at the others as if they’re not good enough.”
🗣 "It's devastating for the younger players if the two best players are looking at the others as if they're not good enough." @GNev2 blasts Cristiano Ronaldo and Bruno Fernandes for their whinging and running off the pitch at full-time pic.twitter.com/euSz2kXLg0
— Football Daily (@footballdaily) December 27, 2021
Neville added that the goalscorer on the night, Cavani, “takes that away,” adding that the Uruguayan doesn’t “wilt in the presence of Ronaldo.”
“He stands up to them. He helps the other younger players on the pitch and I think he needs to be on the pitch, because they need to get rid of that whinging attitude.
“You’ve got to go and clap the fans at the end of the game, I don’t care how you’ve played. I don’t care what the result is, get over to them fans and clap them, walk off with your teammates. You have to do that, particularly when you’re the best player in the world, one of the greatest players of all time,” Neville said of his former teammate Ronaldo.
Asked by presenter Dave Jones whether it was Fernandes and Ronaldo in particular Neville was frustrated with in this regard, the former United right-back responded: “Yeah. It’s annoyed me for about two months.
“I made massive mistakes as a young player at Manchester United. But I had great senior players… Yeah, they would have a go at me, but they would also put their arm around me and help me. I don’t get the feeling that that’s happening.
“I think there’s something wrong in there.”
