Former Manchester United defender Paul Parker feels Paul Pogba should not take the blame for Southampton’s first goal yesterday.
Pogba has been heavily criticised for a poor performance which was typified by his early concession of the ball on the edge of his own area. Danny Ings robbed him of the ball and started a move from which the Saints scored; but Parker believes too much happened afterwards for the French midfielder to shoulder the majority of the criticism.
“It’s easy to come out and blame Pogba for the first goal because he got caught in possession,” Parker said on this week’s Talking Devils – United Review show. “But I don’t think De Gea helps him. He plays the ball to him and there’s a man on. If he gives him an early shout Pogba can turn around and play it back to where it came from. But he loses the ball there, and the ball still goes wide and across the box. Where was Luke Shaw? Where had he gone? Maybe a better question is where had he been to be so far up the field that he was jogging back. Gary Neville was on commentary but I haven’t heard him tearing into Luke the same way he did to Alonso a couple of weeks ago. You can blame Pogba but you’ve got to question de Gea – and I’m a fan of him – but the ball comes in too easily. It wasn’t as if the player who took the ball off Pogba went and scored a goal. If it was, that would be on Pogba. But there are three phases of play which all need to be looked at.”
There was, however, a more obvious culprit for Parker when it came to the second goal. Victor Lindelof was standing in a poor position as Michael Obafemi scored a tap-in, and Parker feels the Swede made a basic error.
“Why is Lindelof behind a player when the ball is coming in from the other side?” Parker asked. “Why isn’t he standing in front of him, getting his shoulder across? Even if you can’t see the ball, step across your man to block him. Even I did that at my size and I made it awkward for people to beat me. If I couldn’t win it in the air I’d step across. Lindelof isn’t born to defend – I don’t know what kind of centre half he is. He’s not a footballing centre-half and he’s not an out-and-out defender.”
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