Manchester United crashed out of the Champions League group following a 1-0 defeat to Bayern Munich at Old Trafford.
The Bundesliga champions, who had long since booked their spot in the round of 16, lost to United without even earning a trip to the Europa League thanks to a goal from Kingsley Coman.
With United lagging in the Premier League and an embarrassing early exit from Europe’s top competition, manager Erik ten Hag is under more pressure.
Long before Bayern arrived, United’s chances of qualifying for the Champions League were severely damaged after they lost three of their four games against Copenhagen and Galatasaray.
With the Turkish powerhouses finishing third, Copenhagen defeated Galatasaray 1-0 on Tuesday to move on to the round of 16 and join Bayern.
“We didn’t lose it today, that’s clear,” said Ten Hag.
“We had I think opportunities in games (against Copenhagen and Galatasaray). We were in winning positions; we scored many goals and we gave it away.”
Only four times in history has an English team placed last in their Champions League group.
Ten Hag’s season came to an end on Saturday when Bournemouth defeated Manchester United 3-0 to win at Old Trafford for the first time ever.
In response, Raphael Varane was called back to the starting lineup by the former Ajax manager for the first time in almost two months.
Surprisingly, Ten Hag has kept the Frenchman out of action. However, he will probably play a significant role in the upcoming weeks as Harry Maguire and Luke Shaw had to be substituted during Tuesday’s action, adding to an already extensive injury list.
“We are losing players and losing players who are very decisive,” added Ten Hag, who was also without Marcus Rashford, Lisandro Martinez and Casemiro.
“In many games it was the case in this campaign that we didn’t have players available.”
Although Bayern was already guaranteed to win Group A, Thomas Tuchel’s team needed to prove themselves after losing badly to Eintracht Frankfurt 5-1 on Saturday.
“It’s never comfortable at Old Trafford, but I think we deserved to win. “We needed a reaction, and we got a reaction,” said Tuchel.
After making his comeback to England, Harry Kane started and set up Coman for the game-winning goal, which he scored by blasting past Andre Onana.
Bayern has extended a competition record of nine straight away wins at this stage of the competition and is still undefeated in the Champions League group stages since 2017.
However, as they prepare for the knockout stages in 2024, the German giants hardly ever had to shift out of second gear.
“After the result at the weekend we had a really high motivation here,” said Kane.
“I think there could have been a bit more in the final third. We had a good start to the season, but I feel like there are a few more gears to go up.”
United bowed out with a whine, offering no such justification for their lack of urgency.
The only shot on target for United came from a long-range effort by Shaw, which Manuel Neuer easily batted behind.
However, Ten Hag’s problems were made worse by the loss of Maguire in the first half and Shaw at halftime due to an apparent groyne injury. This comes just before Ten Hag’s difficult trip to Liverpool on Sunday.
United did have a great opportunity to take the lead early in the second half, but their lack of quality and composure in the last third was summed up by Bruno Fernandes’ wild effort that flew well over the bar.
Bayern were also far from being at their most fluid.
But Kane’s clever flick of Thomas Mueller’s pass into Coman’s path to score his fifth goal of the season 19 minutes from time was all they needed to win the match.
Photo by EPA/ADAM VAUGHAN
