Manchester United goalkeeper Senne Lammens has revealed that he and his teammates are fully behind Michael Carrick despite Bruno Fernandes’ tactical swipe in the aftermath of the Como defeat. After United were humbled 4-1 by Como in Italy, Fernandes shocked everyone by calling into question Carrick’s tactics.
The United captain seemed particularly unhappy with instructions not to press man-to-man, while Carrick criticised his players’ work rate and application before strongly disagreeing with Fernandes’ remarks. A report covered by The Peoples Person explained that Fernandes will not be stripped of the captaincy despite his outburst.
Speaking at his pre-match press conference ahead of Sunday’s meeting with Bournemouth, Carrick delivered an emotional statement, insisting upon his care for the club and reiterating his belief that he is the right man for the job. Carrick acknowledged the shortcomings from himself and his players, vowing that they will do whatever it takes to set things right.
Lammens sat down with Sky Sports and spoke at length about United’s current predicament.
Stance on Carrick
Asked whether the changing room is united, Lammens answered, “For me personally, I think it is.”
“I think it’s easy to see maybe after a game when players are very frustrated, and I get it, I’m very frustrated as well because we all really want to do better and we all want to win and then we might say sometimes things we don’t really mean or fully explain what we mean.” “Of course, the people at home can’t see that, so we need to also try to look like that when we are on the pitch in the weekend.”
“But I can assure you that we’re doing everything we can and we’re all together behind the coach, as a staff, players, front office.”
“Everyone knows, of course, they have to do better, but I think we are united and we are trying to get better as a team and together.”
Leaky defence
Lammens was further pressed on the subject of United’s leaky defence, which conceded an early goal for the second Champions League match in succession.
The Belgium international answered, “It’s difficult. We have to learn from that as well fast, because you can try to come up with plans and tactics, but if you get a goal against in the first or second minute, it kind of screws up a little bit your game plan and you’re kind of chasing the game from then on.”
“That’s probably one of the biggest things we need to work on right now is to keep ourselves in the game and to try and get that first goal ourselves, instead of being 1-0 down straight away.”
“I get people thinking it’s an easy fix, or like, why don’t you just try harder or something like that? Trust me, we are trying harder every day and trying to come up with a solution, but sometimes when it’s not going your way, everything falls into place for the other team.”
“You only need one performance to turn it around, and I think that’s what we’re trying to aim for and what we’re working really hard on right now. As you mentioned, it’s very easy to have narratives or stories and headlines and something that’s been targeted at the team as well.”
Decline
On why United have declined so much between last season and this term, Lammens said, “Last season I felt like, playing-wise, maybe we played sometimes better this season, but last season everything just clicked and went the right way for us.”
“We struggled as a team together when they pressed us, but we didn’t concede that many goals, and then I think as a counter team a bit more last season we did really well, but you also know, I think everybody knew that we had to improve as well from that, that teams were going to change the way they played against us.”
The shot-stopper continued, “So that’s why we had to evolve this season and in preseason, we tried to do some different things to get us in the best position to win games.” “I think we need a little bit more like last season, the way we fought together, even when it wasn’t going the best and just trying to fight as a team and defend as a team, I think that’s probably something we need to try to get back to.”
“I get it, I see people talking about numbers and maybe stats and data, I’m not sure about that, because every game is a little bit different. I think, like I said, with the ball we try to do a bit of different things, try to improve, because last season we weren’t always the best with the ball. I think we have improved in those sort of things, but maybe the mindset of having the ball and trying to play around has that mindset of when you don’t have the ball and try to fight for it the way we did last season.”
“We need to get a bit of both. It is a fine line, to be honest, that aggressiveness. When you don’t have the ball and when you have the ball, you want that calmness, that being able to play from the back and being able to play through the press. I think it’s just finding that fine line in ourselves.”
United vs. Bournemouth kicks off on Sunday at 3 pm.
Featured image by George Wood via Getty Images
