Review: Manchester United 0 – 0 Chelsea
After the 0 – 0 stalemate at Old Trafford, Louis van Gaal said that he won’t resign from the helm at Manchester United as he believes that the players are still working hard for him.
The Manchester giants were certainly the dominant side on Monday but they failed to accrue three points against Guus Hiddink’s Chelsea. The Red Devils rattled Chelsea’s woodwork twice in the opening minutes and forced Thibaut Courtois to make two brilliant saves. David de Gea was also at his spectacular best as he pulled off some incredible saves to keep United in the match.
Nemanja Matic missed an easy opportunity in the second half to clinch all three points for the Blues. But the West Londoners were also lucky on two occasions as the referee decided against awarding penalties on clear fouls to United.
United’s Dutch manager was satisfied with his team’s performance, and the under-fire manager still feels the supports of the United hierarchy and the board. Many Old Trafford faithful also applauded the side’s performance after the final whistle.
“Inside of the club the players are willing to fight for every metre, the manager is willing to fight, the members of staff are willing to fight, and the board is very confident in the staff and the manager, so it (the negativity) is not inside Manchester United,” he said.
“I cannot have any influence on that,” he said. “I can only work with my players and you have seen that the players are fighting for me; they have given a good performance.
“After this result the fans were applauding. I cannot say that I am very much concerned, but in this football world you never know.
“When the players can give such a performance with this lot of pressure then it is not any reason to resign for me.
The former Barcelona and Bayern boss has no intentions of resigning before the end of his contract.
“I am under contract so it’s not a question of staying, it is a question of fulfilling my contract.”
Van Gaal was happy on the whole with his team’s display.
“I think it was a very good performance, but you have to score a goal and we didn’t,” he said. “Against Stoke in the first half we didn’t dare to play, but that’s a big difference today – we dared to play and pressed a lot. We were the dominant team, we created chances, we shot on goal and only gave three chances away. Against a team like Chelsea, with such attackers, that’s not bad.”
“We had two penalty cases, one the foul on Mata, the other the handball of Willian,” Van Gaal said.
“When I was on the bench I thought it was not on purpose but when you see on the video, you see the hand is going to the ball and not the ball is going to the hand and then you can only say we are unlucky.”
United haven’t picked up a win in their last seven matches. They face Swansea in their first fixture of 2016, and anything other than three points might completely jeopardize Van Gaal’s future at Old Trafford and pave the way for Jose Mourinho.