‘Top four is very much alive’ – Man Utd defender as midfielder’s form praised

Luke Shaw felt Manchester United wanted it more than Manchester City in a memorable derby triumph that the left-back believes can be the catalyst to a strong end to the season. Goals from Anthony Martial and Scott McTominay secured a 2-0 win.

United have a favourable draw against Austrians LASK in the last 16 of the Europa League, travel to Premier League strugglers Norwich City in the FA Cup quarter-final and now stand only three points behind fourth-placed Chelsea in the Premier League and five behind Leicester City in third.

Shaw said:” I think today was so important – not just the points but the magnitude of the game and how big it is to everyone in this city,” United defender Shaw said.

“I think if you look at it, maybe we wanted it more. I felt like we wanted it more.

“So, very proud of the team and we need to keep focused now tomorrow, because we’re back in training and we’ve got a very big game on Thursday (at LASK in the Europa League).

“We’re still in two cup competitions and the top four is still very much alive.

“We’ve got to keep putting the pressure on. We’ve got to try not to focus too much on other teams.

“We know this is the Premier League, every game is tough, and I think teams will be dropping points, but we need to just focus on us, focus on our results and the confidence is so high.

“We’re shutting sort of shop and keeping clean sheets, which is a very good positive, so we need to keep going.”

Bruno Fernandes

Ole Gunnar Solskjaer claimed Bruno Fernandes had energised “the whole club.” Solskjaer said: “(It’s) the whole club, because he has everything. He works hard and he is humble enough.

“He has the desire and commitment but he has also got the X-factor, he is a risk-taker. He has the courage, he is brave enough to make mistakes and if you make enough mistakes it’ll be corrected into fantastic assists or goals.”

The win also completed United’s first league double over City for 10 years.

Solskjaer said: “We feel we are improving all the time. We know we lack one or two, three players, and some experience, to be considered a title contender.

“But we are not going to start talking about that now. We are just going to start talking about going up the table, getting more points, to that top four.

“Chelsea and Leicester are still too far ahead for my liking still.

Next game

LASK v Manchester United Thu 12th March 2020 at 5:55pm

Manchester United head to Austria to take on LASK Linz on an impressive 10-match unbeaten run but this Europa League trip does come at a tricky time.

The Red Devils put a lot into Sunday’s emotional derby triumph and have another big Premier League clash coming up at Tottenham three days after this game.