Peter Schmeichel slams Man Utd sub for ‘not doing anything’ against Galatasaray

Joe Williams 30 Nov 2023 8:27 AM

Peter Schmeichel during his role as a TV pundit.

Peter Schmeichel has hit out at Manchester United boss Erik ten Hag for his decision to bring on Anthony Martial in place of Rasmus Hojlund in their 3-3 draw against Galatasaray.

Having lost three of four Group A games, Wednesday’s key clash in Istanbul began in dream fashion as Alejandro Garnacho’s early effort was followed up by a Bruno Fernandes rocket.

Hakim Ziyech pulled one back from a free-kick that Andre Onana will be disappointed to have been beaten by and he was guilty of an even worse error after Scott McTominay scored Man Utd’s third.

The summer signing somehow failed to deal with another Ziyech free-kick and substitute Kerem Akturkoglu soon lasered past him as a mad match ended 3-3.

The result leaves Man Utd bottom of their pool heading into the final round of fixtures, with the concession of 14 goals in just five Group A games the key issue.

Schmeichel thought the Man Utd defence “played really well” despite conceding three goals but criticised the introduction of Martial in place of Hojlund.

“I actually think that the back four played really well today. I don’t think they could have done much more,” Schmeichel told CBS Sports.

“I thought they played well, but, again, you can’t argue that the mistakes by the goalkeeper are very, very expensive.

“Every time a goalkeeper makes a mistake it is a goal, it’s a fact of life.

“I think again, when you go back to Sunday, I thought everything worked really, really well. But when you play at this level, every little mistake you make is being penalised and you’ve got to learn that.

“When you’re 2-0 up – and it’s not the first time we’re 2-0 up in this tournament – you kill the game. You make sure the other team can’t get into it.

“You keep the ball, you make sure you don’t make mistakes – and a lot of mistakes were made today.

“And of course you also have to look at players like when Hojlund came off, a lot of the pressure from the very, very front disappeared.

“The guy he [Ten Hag] put in doesn’t do anything, where you had before someone who works really, really hard for the team up front all of a sudden you don’t have that pressure.

“And that gives the other team a lot of opportunities to pass the ball around.

“So there are many, many things you can look at, but, again, if you score this amount of goals you expect to have more than one point.”

Manchester United Anthony Martial