Manchester United find themselves in a tough situation right now. Over the last nine appearances across all competitions, they have lost five times. As a result, they find themselves sitting at seventh in the Premier League and are already out of the League Cup. That is not what the club would have expected coming into the season, having signed Jadon Sancho, Raphael Varane, Cristiano Ronaldo and Tom Heaton over the summer.
Naturally, questions have been raised about Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s future at Old Trafford as the Manchester United manager.
The Norwegian will remain the manager for the time being but he will know that he has a short amount of time to turn this season around. And it appears he is looking for inspiration everywhere and not just football.
As reported by Manchester Evening News, heading into the game against Tottenham Hotspur, the Manchester United manager said:
"“You see Tyson Fury when he gets knocked down a couple of times, it’s remarkable how calm and composed he is on the floor, counts to six, seven, eight and he gets up and goes again. We got up too early and tried to sort it.”"
Manchester United manager makes Tyson Fury comments
Tyson Fury is well known as a supporter of Manchester United and is a world heavyweight champion in boxing right now.
It is not hard to see the connection that Solskjaer is trying to make here. Manchester United were in the middle of a bad run of form and were perhaps a little too eager to take the game to Liverpool last weekend. Instead, they should have gone for a much calmer style of play against Jurgen Klopp’s in-form team and most probably the result would have been different.
What is done is done though and the focus must now shift towards the Red Devils’ upcoming games. Solskjaer’s comments might suggest that Manchester United will take a much more measured approach in their future games.
Of course, their run of fixtures won’t make things easier for Solskjaer’s side who face Tottenham Hotspur, Atalanta and Manchester City over their next three games.