Manchester United 3-0 Charlton Athletic: Erik ten Hag is happy with the breakthrough to the semi-finals in the League Cup tournament. The Manchester United manager was also busy preparing their star players for the upcoming Premier League top players on Tuesday evening.
Thanks to a goal from Antony and two late goals from Marcus Rashford, United settled with large numbers in the quarterfinals against Charlton Athletic. The victory over the mid-engine from the League One was already the eighth victory in a row. It is a series befitting United’s stature. But such a series also became rare at Old Trafford in the years after Sir Alex Ferguson’s retirement. In January 2019, eight wins in a row were the last time. Ten Hag also became the manager on Tuesday evening who has booked twenty victories with the club the fastest after being appointed to United.
“We got the job done,” Ten Hag said
“We got the job done,” Ten Hag said on BBC Radio about beating Charlton. “I think we should have finished it earlier. But in the end the goal was to get to the semi-finals tonight and we succeeded. So compliments to the team.”
It was striking that Ten Hag had Casemiro, Marcus Rashford and Christian Eriksen come in after an hour with a 1-0 lead. Half a week before the derby against Manchester City, giving those three a complete rest might have been an obvious choice. The Dutchman was asked afterwards about his thoughts behind that triple substitution. “We had already planned to have them raided in advance. To keep them in rhythm,” Ten Hag explained.
Manchester City will visit Old Trafford on Saturday. A weekend later, another top match awaits in North London with Arsenal away. In between, United will visit Crystal Palace. With that tough schedule coming up, confidence has grown through the streak of wins. Ten Hag is also happy with the strong group feeling, there is healthy competition and everyone is hungry. “That has become the standard in this team. The switches must be ready to come in and we saw that again today. The substitutes played very strong,” said Ten Hag, who also had Aaron Wan-Bissaka and Facundo Pellistri come in. As well as the three supporting forces.
