Goals will come but Man United are hard to beat, says Ten Hag

Manchester United have been inconsistent and struggled to score goals this season but the Old Trafford club are pulling in the right direction, manager Erik ten Hag said on Friday ahead of their Premier League derby against Manchester City on Sunday.

United have been far from convincing, especially at Old Trafford where they lost two of their last three league games and beat Brentford thanks to stoppage-time goals from Scott McTominay.

But Ten Hag’s side have won their last three matches in all competitions and the Dutch manager was upbeat ahead of the clash with the treble winners.

“We are back where we wanted to be. This is a hard team to beat, they find a way to win. So we’re going in the right direction,” Ten Hag told reporters.

“We have a way to go, I see positives and I also see negatives. We are not consistently in positions at the level we can be where we show in games…. We don’t take benefit in the attacking transition moments.”

United are eighth in the table and one of their biggest issues has been the lack of goals. They have scored only 11 in the league — the fewest by teams in the top half.

“At the moment, (we are) six points back (from City) so we have to catch up. We know we have to progress the team, to make developments. It has to do with the cooperation, the movement around it, we have to work on that,” Ten Hag said.

“The cooperation has to click, but we showed this week some examples where there are so many overload positions… and we don’t net or don’t even hit the target.

“We don’t have time to train this, we give some coaching and I’m convinced with the quality from our players that they will go and score more goals.”

Ten Hag said Aaron Wan-Bissaka has resumed training after a thigh injury and Casemiro is in a “race against the clock” to be fit.

The club are also talking to the Football Association over Alejandro Garnacho’s social media post in which he used gorilla emojis in a picture with Cameroonian goalkeeper Andre Onana.

“I’m not concerned… but what you see, and I want to emphasise, is that we are united. You saw that with the post of Andre,” Ten Hag said.