Ten Hag reveals motivational dressing room talk that inspired Man Utd to beat Barcelona with five key tactical tweaks
ERIK TEN HAG has revealed the five tactical changes he made that helped Man United beat Barcelona.
The Red Devils dumped the LaLiga giants out of the Europa League with a 2-1 win at Old Trafford last night.
Fred and Antony fired back for United after Robert Lewandowski has initially given Barcelona the lead from the spot.
But it was not until the second half that the hosts started to really play well.
Manager ten Hag after the game revealed to the press that there were five tweaks that needed to happen.
The Dutchman wanted his players to have more “belief” and to use midfielder Casemiro more.
He also wanted Aaron Wan-Bissaka to get more of the ball and for the team to be braver in the press as well as bringing on match-winner Antony.
He said: “I emphasised the belief. It was too flat first half.
“We had our spare man, Casemiro we didn’t use enough.
“Aaron Wan-Bissaka had a lot of space on the right side, we didn’t use enough.
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“I think in the pressing we could be more brave.
“So that is what we emphasised.
“The second was to make the sub with Antony, who brought more speed in the play and who brings belief on the pitch.”
United midfielder and goalscorer Fred praised the team-talk after the game.
He told BT Sport: “He said in the first half that we didn’t play like how we [normally] play.
“But in the second half we were much better, we started very well and scored early.
“We had a good talk in half-time with the coach, we changed our minds at half-time and the second half went very well.”
United will find out their round of 16 opponents today with he draw starting at 11am.