Manchester United captain Harry Maguire has described Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s sacking as an ‘emotional day’, revealing the outgoing boss left the club on good terms with the players.
United officials were left with little option but to dismiss Solskjaer on Sunday morning following another embarrassing Premier League defeat. The 4-1 loss to Watford a day earlier only compounded earlier heavy defeats against Liverpool and Manchester City.
Maguire has revealed that Solskjaer, who wanted to conduct one final public interview to reaffirm his love for the club, spoke to the players before he left and passed on his support.
“The manager came and spoke to us. It was an emotional day and everyone has got a huge amount of respect for Ole and what he’s done for the club,” the centre-back said.
“He’s a legend of the club and he will remain a legend. I don’t want to go into too much depth about what he said, but he wished us well. He said we need to get back on track, get focused for the game against Villarreal now and make sure we go into it with a positive mindset.
“One thing he said is that he will be supporting us and wanting us to win every game of football, which obviously shows the values of the man.”
Maguire was addressing the media at a press conference alongside new caretaker boss Michael Carrick, with United already preparing to face Villarreal in the Champions League on Tuesday.
"We know it’s not been good enough, the recent performances haven’t been good enough," Maguire continued. "We haven’t been delivering individually, but also collectively, and when you’re not doing it collectively, the results pay the price and, like I said, it’s snowballed from one thing to another.
“We’ve got to take huge responsibility for that and we’ve got to find something within ourselves.
“We’ve got to look forward, we’ve got to move this club forward and find something within ourselves, within the group to find that focus and mentality to produce a good performance tomorrow and get the result we need for this club.”
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Source : 90min