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24th Dec 2017

Gary Neville slams Manchester United’s lack of leadership after Leicester draw

Nothing annoys Neville more than bad defending.

Reuben Pinder

José is not happy either.

It looked like a double from Juan Mata would be enough for Manchester United to take all three points, but it wasn’t to be after a series of errors led to Leicester equalising at the death.

Gary Neville was livid. Nothing annoys Neville more than bad defending, especially when it’s his former team.

Forget the missed opportunities to make it 3-1, the poor communication between United players when defending their lead – while Chris Smalling was struggling with an injury – was the main reason they didn’t win, according to the pundit.

“Smalling has got to flag up as an experienced defender that he’s struggling, get Lindelöf into the centre. Herrera come back to full-back. It didn’t happen for two or three minutes.

“Then Phil Jones recognised it had happened and tried to reorganise – as I saw it, Ander Herrera refused to go to right-back and told Henrik Mkhitaryan to go back there. All over a sudden Smalling sits down on the floor and then goes off the pitch and then comes back on at centre-back. He ends up picking up Harry Maguire.

“You can’t believe the disorganisation and lack of leadership shown by Manchester United at the end of that game in a game they should have won. José [Mourinho] will be furious when he watches that back.”

You could argue that moments like this are even more frustrating for Neville, as in the United sides that he played in under Sir Alex Ferguson, games like this were more often seen out and the win secured.

For a team who are still chasing Manchester City, dropping points as sloppily as this isn’t good enough, and it’s clear that the lack of organisation infuriated Neville, Manchester United supporters and Jose Mourinho.

Ander Herrera’s apparent refusal to go to right-back will stand out as a reason to be angry for United fans. For a player who more often than not is only brought in to the starting XI to replace an injured player or man mark the opponent’s star attacker, slotting in at full-back should not be too much to ask of him.

United face Burnley at Old Trafford in their next fixture.