Manchester United boss Erik ten Hag, speaking to TNT Sports: "Yes we started poor, kicking the ball away and defending poorly.
"But you saw we were dominating the game and it was brilliant how we played - we deserved to win the game.
"But, you cannot give it away like we did and we have to manage this game better.
"It is a team performance, you can point to one of the players but it is about team performance.
"When it gets chaotic you have to deal with it as a team and we made the wrong decisions and we didn't help out as a team.
"Out of possession we made bad decision - a lack of concentration.
"Also, I think lucky at the end with the penalty situation, questionable and very soft but we have to do better."
On shots conceded: "It is ridiculous. We showed we were fourth ranking goals in conceding and everyone is talking to each other after, we are good and we have good defending as a team and a good goalkeeper so I cannot do nothing."
On Raphael Varane and Jonny Evans fitness: "I cannot say at this moment."
On the result: "Definitely a setback and now we have to deal with this and get up - we are resilient and you have seen that today.
"The quality of our football is really high, but football is about results and you have to bring it over time."
He's living in cuckoo land. Honestly, we're not at the races. It's clear to see how flaky Chelsea are and we just handed them the game, along with some very dubious refereeing.
A serious team hits another one or two after going 3-2 up and are able to put that game to bed. Putting Rashford up front where he's just not effective was a bad decision. Nobody remembers the performance in games like this. Fact is, we foun
The calamity results he’s served up this season. Genuinely impressive no joke:
- Arsenal (A) - 90th minute winner to win 2-1 gets ruled out and we lose 3-1. Calamity.
- Galatasaray (H) - 1-0 up and dominating. 2-1 up with 15 mins to go. End up losing 3-2 at OT in the CL group stage. Almost unheard of.
- Copenhagen (A) - 2-0 up in the 45th minute then go in at half time at 2-2. 3-2 up in the 80th minute then end up losing 4-3. Complete shambles.
- Galatasaray (A) - 2-0 up. 3-1 up. Draw 3-3.
- Fulham (H) - 1-0 down then equalise in the last minute to draw 1-1. Rather than completing the classic United comeback they go up the other end and score to win 2-1 at OT.
- Brentford (A) - Winning goal in the 96th minute to win 1-0 but still end up drawing 1-1. Genuinely impressive.
- Chelsea (A) - Record breaking levels of calamity. 3-2 up in the 99th minute and lose 4-3. Would be hard to do deliberately.
This is the mentality he’s installed. What’s next seriously? He’s only going to go and lose to Coventry in the cup. It’s not just the bad results, as I said the way we are finding ways to lose is genuinely remarkable. Although when you combine it with getting battered home and away to City, home to Bournemouth etc. then there’s no argument for him to keep his job.
What sticks out to me in those games is that time and again we seem to have these periods when we just go under so easily and can concede 2 or 3 in quick succession. Let's not even add City and Liverpool away from last season.
We have some high moments, but the lows that we can reach in certain periods are some of the lowest lows I can recall seeing of any United team.
In fairness, a lot of that you could say is out of EtH's control. In the heat of battle, what can the manager do if players are doing crazy things on the pitch in a short space of time? Often within a couple of phases of play.
However, the problem is that his tactical set-up seems to foster this type of game, rather than control it. Think of the things you'd use to describe the best teams. Obviously you'll have the entertainment, attacking flair etc etc.. but what I always think the key traits are 'controlled', 'composed', 'measured', 'resilient'.
We are none of those things in reality. I think some of it is down to a young team, but we're also quite an emotional team. Bruno is the prime example, but also Dalot today. He clearly tried to make amends for the pen and we were piling on for the winner in the 97th min or whatever. It's away at Chelsea, just see the damn game out.
