Manchester United captain Harry Maguire says his team-mates put “everything” into their game against RB Leipzig but insists they must fare much better in future to reach the standards the club expects.
The Red Devils needed just one point from their last two Champions League group games to reach the knock-out phase, but lost to PSG last week and Leipzig on Tuesday, with a 3-2 scoreline sending Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s team into the Europa League instead.
Despite the eventually-close scoreline, United were second best by a distance for most of the encounter until two late consolation goals - and they almost nicked the draw at the death which would have sent them through at Leipzig’s expense.
But Maguire lamented a dreadful start to the match which saw the Bundesliga team score twice in the opening quarter of an hour, an unhappy habit of his team’s this season.
“[We] started the game too slow, [it] wasn’t good enough the first 20 minutes, we [weren’t] at it and they scored the two chances which we failed to deal with the cross, that’s why we’ve been beaten,” he told BT Sport.
"We gave everything, they scored the only attack [in the second half]. We piled all sorts of pressure on them and they go and score their first attack with the little deflection [on the cross].
“We have to look at ourselves. We’ve been coming from behind so we had great belief [but] we can’t keep giving goals away and falling behind. We came close at the end but we didn’t start well enough.”
Put to Maguire that United’s switch to a back five system had hampered their chances, the defender rejected the notion that the manager’s call was the decisive factor, instead pointing to the fact the players didn’t perform well enough either on the night or, given their exit, overall in the group.
"I don’t want to look at excuses. We have 11 bodies out there and we’ve got to defend, stop crosses, do the basics. If you can’t do that you lose football matches. I don’t want to look at shape, it’s not an excuse.
“It’s a tough group but we felt like we should get through, that’s the standards of this club. I’m gutted for everyone because we worked so hard to reach this competition and we deserve to be here, but we’ve got to do more.”
