Manchester United lined up 3-5-2 at Loftus Road on Saturday yet failed to make headway against one of the Premierships struggling teams until manager Louis van Gaal gave into the traveling fans shouts of “4-4-2” and “attack, attack, attack”.
United eventually ended up winning 0-2 thanks to goals from Marouane Fellaini and James Wilson, yet they still did not look convincing when on the ball.
“It’s more impatience than unhappiness [from the United fans],” Gary Neville said on Monday Night Football.
“They haven’t been taking risks in the 3-5-2 system and in the first 57 minutes at QPR there were no goals, only five shots, four on target and 68% possession.
“Then, when they go to the back four, there’s less possession but goals, more shots and generally a far better performance from them in the last half hour.
“It’s partly the system but it’s a mentality thing as well. I’m not a fan of 3-5-2, when you play that, you end up with your centre backs being the free men and that becomes a careful option, then it kicks into your mentality: ‘I’ve always got a safer pass’.”
Neville went on to complain about how much time the defenders spent on the ball saying:
“They play the ball out from the back – as most good teams would – but the tempo is too slow. They play too many passes. Those back three players are on the ball far too much.”
“In the first half on Saturday, Manchester United centre-backs had 114 passes of the ball.
You look at the other teams that played away from home this weekend, Southampton (57), Chelsea (37), Arsenal (26) and it’s a miraculous difference.
“When they go to the back four in the second half it goes to 54 passes. It’s a big difference. They started looking at diagonal passes, playing risky ones, making QPR work and doing things that are unpredictable.”
