Maguire explains United tactical change in Young Boys defeat

Jason Soutar
Manchester United defender Harry Maguire

Manchester United captain Harry Maguire has explained Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s decision to switch to a back-three at half-time in their defeat to Young Boys.

The Red Devils were defeated on Tuesday night in Bern to start their Champions League campaign in disappointing fashion.

They went 1-0 up early on thanks to a 13th minute Cristiano Ronaldo goal, but an Aaron Wan-Bissaka red card in the first-half gave their Swiss opponents some hope going into the second period.


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Jadon Sancho was hauled off before half-time for Diogo Dalot to fill in for Wan-Bissaka.

And Solskjaer changed United’s shape at the break. Subbing off Donny van de Beek for Raphael Varane to give the defence more width.

However, Young Boys were able to work around the change and equalised through Moumi Ngamaleu before a 95th minute winner from Theoson Siebatcheu.

Siebatcheu pounced on a short backpass by Jesse Lingard to succumb United to an embarrassing defeat.

“We started the second half well, I think the shape helped us defend crosses a lot better, you saw towards the end of the first half they put a lot of numbers in the box and with a back four we couldn’t really control the box very well,” Maguire told MUTV.

“The shape worked really well, it’s two goals we’ve conceded and not really any major chances, a few long-range shots and crosses across our goal which you expect with 10 men.

“We could have been more of a threat on the counter-attack, but it’s disappointing to take.”

Maguire added: “We put ourselves in a strong position, it was a tough game, a tough surface, away from home we found ourselves down to 10 men, we looked comfortable in the game, we conceded a scruffy goal, it was really unlucky.” said Maguire.

“We weren’t playing our greatest football, we weren’t the biggest threat at the other end of the pitch, we looked really solid, we didn’t concede too many chances and then the big sucked punch at the end.

“It’s the first game in the group, we’ve got many games to bounce back and we must do.”

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