Manchester United yesterday crashed out of the champion’s league after falling to secure a much needed draw to advance to the Champions League last 16.
RB Leipzig beat United 3 – 2 to book their place in the last 16 and condemn their opponents to the Europa League.
Ole Gunnar Solsjaer’s side at the Red Bull Arena in Germany found themselves two goals down within 15 minutes, after strikes from Manchester City loanee Angelino and Amadou Haidara.
Man United further fell behind as substitute Justin Kluivert took advantage of hesitant defending to put Leipzig three goals ahead with 20 minutes to play.
As usual with Solsjaer’s side known for staging a second half comebacks in recent matches, Bruno Fernandes scored from the spot and substitute Paul Pogba heading in off the back of Harry Maguire in the final 10 minutes.
But it was a small solace for United as they drop into the Europa League – a competition they won in 2017.
United should not have found themselves in this position as they had won their first two games against Paris Saint-Germain and Leipzig, only to lose the third against fourth-seed Istanbul Basaksehir due to poor defending.
Even after that, they only needed a point from their final two games but they lost last week to PSG. They only needed to avoid another defeat last night but also lost that chance.
Speaking after the game, Ole felt the damage was done with his team poor first-half showing, while he also reflected on other results which cost them a place in the next round.
“Close at the end, but you can’t expect to go through when you go three goals down against a good team like Leipzig.
“I can’t fault the character and effort and pressure that we put on them all second half, where we deserved more almost. But you can’t give a team a three-goal lead and expect to come back. Just too late, unlucky towards the end.
“Today, we started too passive. Not aggressive enough in closing down the crosses or the diagonal balls and, of course, this is something that we prepared for. We knew they were going to put loads of crosses into the box and we just couldn’t deal with them.
“Today, we just didn’t turn up until we scored the second goal; suddenly again we started playing again. We had one chance at 1-0, Greenwood had a good chance, but after 2-0 we started playing.
“The second half was one-way traffic more or less and the one chance they had they managed to score. So 3 – 0 was always going to be difficult, but they all gave everything, very good character and effort.
“I can’t fault anyone and we were close to getting the third and that would have been some achievement against a team like Leipzig,” the United boss said.
