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Diogo Dalot Reveals Tactical Reason Behind Poor Positioning vs AS Roma
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- Diogo Dalot Reveals Tactical Reason Behind Poor Positioning vs AS Roma
Michael Carrick needs to be more flexible with his tactics!
Manchester United finally ended their historic nine-game winless streak against Roma with a 3-2 comeback in the Champions League.
Despite only having a cameo, Shea Lacey stole the headlines with his performance as he helped shift the momentum back into United's favour and also set up the winner that Matheus Cunha went on to score.
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However, it was not all positive with a disasterous first-half with a mix of a dysfunctional tactical system and individual errors putting the side 2-0 down. The Red Devils were very lucky that it was only two and not three or four.
With Aston Villa on the weekend, United will be hoping that they can use the momentum of the victory to put on a good performance, rather than fall back into old habits.
Dalot confirms the tactical reason for positioning
Like most of the Manchester United squad, Diogo Dalot has struggled to find form this season. He hasn't been helped by being asked to play both right-back and left-back.
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The game against Roma was a damning indictment of his season so far. For the first goal and before the shot that led to the penalty, Dalot was nowhere to be seen, with Matias Soule having acres of space. The full-back had pushed up to the left-wing position, leaving the defensive area exposed.
While the Portuguese international has received criticism for his overall performance, as his lack of confidence was there for all to see. However, he has revealed the reason for his positioning, which could be a damning indictment of the tactics that Michael Carrick used.
Speaking to Steven Railston , he said: "Yes, obviously [about whether he pushed high up for tactical reasons].
"We knew that they were going to play man-to-man, but that requires some things that we need to avoid, especially losing balls in the middle, because we knew that we're going to be too open.
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"But after, obviously, after the second goal, we tried to fix it straight away."
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Both Carrick and the players need to step up
Usually, in these cases when Manchester United are struggling, it is usually a common consensus that either the manager is the problem or the players are the problem. However, in this case, both parties need to step it up.
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The issue with what Dalot said is not entirely the tactical decision, but more so that it took until the second goal and half-time for the coaching staff to make a change to the system to try to overcome the issue.
It's cases like this where Carrick needs to be more proactive with his changes when there are fundamental flaws that can clearly be seen by not only viewers but also the opposition when they constantly exploit them.
Yet, the players themselves with their overall application and desire in the first-half was not good enough and summarised the clubs season so far. At the very least, the tenacity shown in the second half needs to be shown against Aston Villa from the beginning, not as a reactive change in the second half.
