Harry Maguire sends angry message to teammates after Champions League exit
In the end, it was yet another forgetful night in Europe for Manchester United and skipper Harry Maguire.
The Red Devils capitulated to a lively RB Leipzig side who now take our spot in the last 16 of Europe’s premier competition. To say that the players did not seem up for it would be an understatement.
Needing only a point, United went into the game knowing exactly what they needed to do. However, they found themselves immediately on the backfoot after Angelino fired the Germans ahead in the second minute.
Amadou Haidara doubled Leipzig’s lead after 12 minutes to throw a real spanner in our hopes of progress.
“We started the game too slow. It wasn’t good enough.”
Speaking to BT Sport (h/t Express), United skipper Harry Maguire was not happy with his team’s performance on the night. He believes RB Leipzig started with more intent while the Red Devils were slow to get going.
“We have to look at ourselves, we gave ourselves too much to do. You’ve seen how close we came at the end but we started too slow and we can’t keep falling behind.”
Rather than make excuses, Maguire’s comments are an indication of the abject nature of our performance. The defence failed to deal with Leipzig’s attack with the shape and form crumbling in key moments, especially for crosses.
“If you can’t defend crosses you’re going to lose games. I don’t want to look at shape – it’s not an excuse..”
Despite acknowledging the difficulty of their group, Maguire believes United should have done better. Having worked hard to reach the competition and also start off well this campaign, our efforts have all gone down the drain.
“We have to do more.”
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United started off well in the second half but a third Leipzig goal by Justin Kluivert made our task tougher.
A penalty by Bruno Fernandes and an own goal by Ibrahima Konate saw us get back to within touching distance of completing a late turnaround. However, lady luck was not on our part this time around as Leipzig saw out the game.
United are the only English side to drop out of the competition in the group stages this season.