Ten Hag blames “stupid mistakes” in draw with Liverpool as Man Utd player
Mainoo was initially blamed for losing Luis Diaz at a corner, before the Colombian forward finished from Darwin Nunez’s flick to the back post. However, a later set-piece saw the youngster tasked with slowing the likes of Diaz and Virgil van Dijk down in his zone rather than sticking with them.
United were under late pressure from Liverpool as they defended their lead, but Aaron Wan-Bissaka mistimed his tackle inside the box on Harvey Elliott, bringing the midfielder down and referee Anthony Taylor immediately pointed to the spot. When asked for his feelings with points shared at Old Trafford, Ten Hag rued individual errors from his squad.
He told the BBC: “Very mixed emotions. On one side I am disappointed that we have dropped seven points in one week after being in winning positions, but we have to blame ourselves for making stupid mistakes.
On the other side I am very proud. You see how we are improving and the potential of this squad is amazing – I am proud.
In decisive areas we were losing battles especially with young players we were not confident to win them (duels). We encouraged in the second half to do better and they stepped up.”
Ten Hag was quick to single out one of his players for praise, however, as the head coach was impressed by young defender Willy Kambwala. The 19-year-old was thrown into just his second start as a result of an injury crisis, but handled the occasion admirably.
“He has been training a while with us and progressing well,” Ten Hag added. “The next generation need to step in and he is doing brilliant.
The challenge for him is doing it consistently. Great opportunity for him and we have other options like bringing Casemiro in at centre-half, but today he deserved it and he showed it on the pitch.”
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