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A night like no other
Sunday was a night like no other in top-flight English football. Twenty-five goals were scored across five venues, but not by the teams fans would have expected. The most astonishing result was a 7-2 defeat for defending champions Liverpool against last season’s relegation survivors Aston Villa. Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s Manchester United suffered a chastening 6-1 defeat at home against a rampant Tottenham Hotspur, marshalled by former United manager Jose Mourinho while high-flying Leicester City were brought down to earth with a 3-0 defeat at home by West Ham United.
photo: twitter
Agencies
On a night when Serie A saw as bizarre an event as the Napoli-Juventus fixture being abandoned as Napoli players weren’t allowed by their local health authority to travel to Turin due to coronavirus fears, La Liga meted out a tensed 1-1 draw between Barcelona and Sevilla and the Bundesliga witnessed yet another one-man show from Bayern Munich’s Robert Lewandowski who scored all four goals including a stoppage-time penalty to give the German champions a 4-3 home win over Hertha Berlin, the focus still turned to the Premier League.
Champions Liverpool suffered a humiliating 7-2 defeat at Aston Villa and Tottenham manager Jose Mourinho savoured a 6-1 win over his former club Manchester United in one of the most astonishing days in Premier League history.
Bitter rivals Liverpool and United were joined in misery on Sunday after chastening defeats that rank among the worst that English football’s two most successful clubs have ever suffered. Historians were reaching for the record books as the goals flowed, first at Old Trafford as United conceded six goals in a match for only the third time in the Premier League era, then at Villa Park as Liverpool surrendered seven goals for the first time since 1963.
For the first time since 1986, United have lost their opening two home league games of the season and manager Ole Gunnar Solskjaer labelled their heaviest home defeat since 2011 as “my worst day ever”. “It’s very embarrassing, it hurt all the players. It hurts me as the manager,” Solskjaer said.
“I’ll hold my hands up, I’m responsible for this. I promise we’ll do everything we can to turn this around.”
We lost the plot, says Klopp
Stunned Liverpool manager Juergen Klopp said his side did “all the things you should not do in a football match” as they “lost the plot” to play into Aston Villa’s hands in their 7-2 humbling at Villa Park.
Ollie Watkins’ first-half hat-trick set Villa en route to an astonishing victory, as Liverpool slipped to a first defeat of the season thanks to a woeful showing at the back in the Midlands. “We played into their hands, with all the goals,” Klopp said. “Then the game has a specific direction.
Mourinho bites back
Tottenham Hotspur’s Jose Mourinho delivered a sharp riposte to critics of his “defensive” style on Sunday, saying after their 6-1 Premier League win over Manchester United that they would have scored 10 if only they had a more attacking coach.
Mourinho came in for criticism last season due to some defensive displays and disappointing results after he took over from the sacked Mauricio Pochettino in November. However, Sunday’s victory, which followed a 7-2 win over Maccabi Haifa in Europe on Thursday, saw Spurs join Premier League top scorers Everton and Leicester City on 12 goals from four games.
“Imagine if they have an attacking coach,” Mourinho told beIN Sports. “With a defensive coach, they scored ... six. With an attacking coach they’ll score 10, 11, 12.
Rashford sorry,
Shaw embarrassed
Manchester United forward Marcus Rashford has apologised to the club’s supporters for their 6-1 hammering by Tottenham Hotspur.
“First and foremost I’m a United fan. This is my club. I’m so proud to wear this shirt but there are no excuses, it’s just not good enough and to every single fan around the world that tuned in today, I’m just so sorry,” Rashford tweeted.
“I feel horrible but I promise you we will do better.”
“A club like United shouldn’t be losing, but losing in this way ... it really hurts and it is kind of embarrassing,” defender Luke Shaw told Sky Sports.
photo: twitter