Steve Bruce has offered insight on his decision to field Fabian Schar in his engine room against Manchester City.
With Isaac Hayden and Sean Longstaff both injured and Jonjo Shelvey pushed up to a No 10 role, this could have been an opportunity for the midfielder's first start since January in the Premier League.
But Bruce opted to play Schar in a holding role alongside Nabil Bentaleb and United were 4-0 down by the time Matty Longstaff got his opportunity.
Bruce said: "Matty’s only been training for the last week.
"So I thought it was a big call for him as well to get him started.
"I wanted to have Fab Schar.
"He’s been playing in midfield in the training ground area, and I wanted to have a look at that.
"We could talk about formations and this, that and the other, and players playing where they were playing.
"I thought those two were arguably our best performers.
"Whatever we do, whichever way we play, we’ve got to show a bit more resilience than what we put up with. If you don’t do the basics right, they’re going to punish you."
Bruce was also asked if the loanees at the club done enough with Danny Rose, Bentaleb and Valentino Lazaro all hoping for permanent moves.
Bruce added: “I’m not going to highlight just the loan players.
“We’re a team. The strength of this group has been the resilience. I’m not going to comment on the loan players – or any individual.”
