Solskjaer Defends Below Par Performance Against Leicester City

By Nigel Phillips

Manchester United boss Ole Gunnar Solskjaer has backed his team's performance against Leicester City on Sunday and says they went for results and not fine play.

The Reds got back to winning ways with a cagey 1-0 hard-fought win at the King Power Stadium as Marcus Rashford graced his 100th appearance for the club with the only goal of the game.

The match day-25 fixture marked Solskjaer's10th game in charge and the ninth win for the Red Devils.

Manchester United controlled the early minutes of the game, but failed to glitter after going ahead as the hosts dominated a good part of the game and had David De Gea to curse for not scoring out of the couple of clear goal scoring chances they had.

However, David De Gea was in good form and Solskjaer was delighted with his goalkeeper's performance.

"Leicester got in a few dangerous positions," he said. "We could have done better higher up the pitch in terms of defending and in the second half I thought we were more concerned about the result than the performance and it showed."

"David De Gea made a few great saves and blocks. We never strung passes together, we didn't control the game as much as I'd like, but we're away with three points, which is fantastic, and we deserved the three points I thought."

"Football is a game of mistakes. Our lads, when we make mistakes, they were fighting for the ball and giving their all. David is very patient in his positioning and reads the game very well - he doesn't gamble."

United are now just two points shy of the Champions League places and despite the mistakes made by his team, Solskjaer was delighted with how they ground out the result.

"Our attitude was spot on," he continued.

"There are a couple of bruised noses and knees. It is supposed to be like this, there are three points on the line. Our lads sacrificed everything they had.”

"They know they can do better than this but a clean sheet is always a foundation to build on. We didn't play particularly well but we defended really well; Eric (Bailly) and Victor (Lindelof) fantastic and David (De Gea) again of course."