Match Report: Manchester United vs Burnley

Manchester United have now suffered eight Premier League defeats this season after slumping to a 2-0 home loss against Burnley on Wednesday night. The latest result piles further pressure on the under-fire Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, who seems to have lost the confidence of many of the club’s supporters.

The visitors opened the scoring through Chris Wood and then defended resolutely both before and after adding a second strike through Jay Rodriguez. But although the Clarets eventually claimed all three points, Ole was keen to point out the race for a top-four place is far from over and he has already turned his attention to bouncing back in the Emirates FA Cup this weekend.

“In the first half, I felt that with a bit of quality and luck, we could have scored the first goal. If you don’t get the first goal against Burnley, you know you’re in for a tough night because they can defend really well in the box. When they got the second goal, I think that is when all the air went out of the balloon.”

Although United dominated much of the first half, the chances they created were wasted and Burnley were far more clinical, going into the break with a one-goal lead thanks to Wood despite having just three shots to the hosts’ 11.

United were arguably even worse after the interval. The opportunities they had been crafting dried up and a phenomenal strike from Rodriguez ultimately gave them too much to do, meaning fourth-placed Chelsea remain six points clear of Solskjaer’s men.

Anthony Martial, Juan Mata, and Daniel James all spurned opportunities and United paid the price in the 39th minute. Ben Mee’s header fell to Wood, who reacted quickest to turn the ball past David de Gea on the half-volley.

Solskjaer introduced Mason Greenwood for the abject Andreas Pereira at half-time, though it made little difference and United soon found themselves 2-0 down as Rodriguez peeled away from Harry Maguire and lashed a scorching effort in off the crossbar from just inside the box.

While there are not many United players who could have avoided criticism on Wednesday, Pereira was – once again – simply not up to scratch. The midfielder saw a lot of the ball but did precious little with it, his four shots causing Pope no issues. He was unsurprisingly withdrawn at half-time.

“We’re looking to improve, yeah, definitely. We know as well we’ve got our targets and days like this highlight more how well some of them have done so far in the season. Some of the results and performances we’ve had have been fantastic.

Today, that’s the second defeat at home, the first since August, and I’d thought we’d turned that corner winning games like this, but we haven’t clearly and we will keep chipping away.”