FIVE ASIDES Premier League: United 0, Liverpool 5
Wrong, wrong, wrong. Wrong to pick the same team that had gone 2-0 down to Atalanta. Wrong to stick with a back four that had turned into Fawlty Towers. Wrong to pick Ronaldo ahead of Cavani. Wrong to leave out Lingard.
Wrong to ignore the way things were going with all those unclean sheets. And this, by the way, isn’t hindsight: ‘Liverpool,’ we said after Leicester hit United for four, ‘may get eight this weekend.’
Wrong not have a plan. Wrong not to have a system. Wrong not to have a back three today, when Chelsea had shown that that was the way to thwart Liverpool, even with ten men. United did OK with ten men too – but when they had 11, they made it feel like ten.
Probably wrong to sign Ronaldo. Definitely wrong not to sign a holding midfielder.
The question everyone was asking afterwards was whether Solskjaer should be sacked. He’s not the only person to blame here, but he is the main one. But United, with their half-arsed owners and lame-duck chief executive, may well struggle to make that decision. Solskjaer, a decent man, should do the decent thing, grab that wheel, and resign.