Former Manchester United right-back Gary Neville believes Erik ten Hag’s side have ‘switched off’ at times away from home this season.
The Sky Sports pundit insists their performances won’t get any better before the end of the season.
United are currently seventh in the Premier League table with just six games left to play. They are also 13 points shy of the top four after Aston Villa’s win over Arsenal on Sunday.
The Reds travelled to the Vitality Stadium on Sunday and drew 2-2 with Bournemouth, in a game we really should be winning, despite losing to the Cherries 3-0 at Old Trafford in December. We are in such a dire position because of results like that.
That means our only hope of salvaging something from this season is winning the FA Cup, with a semi-final against Coventry City to play at Wembley on Sunday.
Neville hints that failure to win the FA Cup could spell trouble for Ten Hag and claims he has spotted a worrying trend when United play away from home.
He told his Sky Sports podcast: “They have to win next weekend. The season would be completely over if they didn’t.
“Erik ten Hag, I think, has got to look at this season now as being a season whereby he could finish his first two seasons at Manchester United with two trophies in the bag, winning one in each season, and obviously he has still got a chance of that. That should never be sniffed at because in years gone by, you always said if you won a trophy a season you were okay.
“I don’t think there is anything left to say about some of the league performances that we are witnessing and some of the things that we are watching. The tweets, the ‘likes’ and the body language… all that stuff, we have said it so many times before. There is no point going over that again.
“What we can say is that Ten Hag’s future is largely dependent on the FA Cup, because the performance levels in the league have gone. They are like this and they are not going to change now.
“What we’re seeing from United is what we’re going to get for the rest of the season. The players have almost, in some ways, I think, switched off in the league away from home at times.
“At home they turn it on because they have to, as there are 75,000 people there who won’t allow them to sort of get away from it.”
Ten Hag must find out why his players appear to be throwing the towel in away from home. They can’t afford to do the same at Wembley this weekend.
Neville also spoke about how Liverpool have overachieved up until this point of the season.
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