Marc Skinner delivered a scathing assessment of his team’s performance after their 3-1 defeat at Old Trafford in the Manchester derby.
“We were second best in a large proportion of the game and that’s not like us,” he told club media in his post-match interview.
United took the lead through a Katie Zelem penalty before United had a second ruled out as the ball was judged to have gone out of play in the build up.
Two quick goals for City proved to be the undoing of United before the hosts made it three just after half-time through Bunny Shaw.
Skinner said that his team allowed the opposition to get into their heads in the historic game, which saw 43,000 people in attendance.
“We got what we deserved,” he said.
“We weren’t aggressive enough with the ball in terms of switching play quickly enough,” Skinner continued.
“We allowed their lock and their press to get into our heads and it stopped us playing how we want to play.”
However, he ended on a positive note saying, “The best thing about our group is as soon as we’ve seen it, we’ll recognise it and we’ll bounce back.”
Meanwhile, Katie Zelem reiterated that whether the team plays at Old Trafford or Leigh, they want to win every game, especially Manchester derbies and simply said, “We know we need to be better.”
The result leaves United fourth in the table, one point behind City but seven points adrift from league leaders Chelsea.
United travel to Liverpool midweek as they hope to bounce back to winning ways in the Conti Cup before facing Bristol away next Sunday.