Ole Gunnar Solskjaer needs his players to put in a strong performance in this week’s Champions League game almost as much as he needs the win – that’s the opinion of United legend Paul Parker.
Solskjaer faced more pressure after the loss at Leicester on Saturday and with defensive issues and form woes all over the pitch, it feels the worst possible time to prepare for a tough run of league fixtures.
And while Parker agrees the run could be defining, he stresses that it’s about more than results now at a critical time for the under-fire boss.
“When he came in United needed someone to pacify the club due to the previous regime,” Parker said exclusively on this week’s Talking Devils podcast. “It wasn’t a great club to be around, and Ole has come in and got it somewhere near to where it was under Sir Alex. But we were winning games, then, and had a good start.”
Parker believes that along the way, results have become more important, but that the mindset needs to change quickly for Ole if he’s to have a long term future at the club.
“Sir Alex’s whole thing was about good performances,” he said. “I get shouted down by people who say it’s just about winning, but I say if that’s your mindset, you should be going to support a lesser team. Performances give you a mentality, a good vibe to go into the next game, something to aim for. When you have a big game coming up, the game before is important, because yes you want to win but you want to play well. If you don’t, it puts you on edge for the next game.”
“Sir Alex would always go on about that game before the big game, to make sure we were mentally prepared. The problem at United is there are no good performances at the moment, and little to suggest it is going to get better.”
“United certainly do need a win and good performance in Europe. I can see Atalanta being solid at Old Trafford, they won’t be as extravagant as Villarreal. United will have to play on the counter, they don’t have the platform for much else, the game against Villarreal showed that. A good performance is needed to give everyone a feel-good factor going into this big, big game at the weekend. They need to lift the fans so everyone can believe they can win at the weekend.”
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