Liverpool vs Manchester United: Ashley Young laments deflections and listless manner of defeat at Anfield

Ashley Young cut a forlorn figure as the full-time whistle blew at Anfield after Manchester Untied succumbed to a 3-1 defeat to Liverpool.

Jesse Lingard had pegged Jurgen Klopp’s side back after Sadio Mane’s early goal, but two second-half strikes from Xherdan Shaqiri saw Liverpool return to the top of the Premier League table with a deserved victory.

Now, after suffering their fifth defeat of the season, Jose Mourinho’s side are 19 points adrift of the Liverpool and Young struggled to express quite how disappointed he was by the result.

“Obviously there’s two deflections, but at times when we got back into the game at 1-1, I think we could have gone on to win the game. But it wasn’t meant to be and, like I say, it’s disappointing.”

United’s captain also lamented the unfortunate manner in which Xherdan Shaqiri broke the impasse – both of his goals coming by way of wrong-footing deflections.

“Obviously, after their goal, we got ourselves back into the game and I think for large parts we had time and space on the ball to play,” Young told MUTV.

“I think at times we did that. I think we could have done that even more. But, like I say, we’ve come off the pitch, we’ve lost the game, so we’re disappointed in there.”

Young did however reserve special thanks for United’s travelling support, who have stuck behind Mourinho and the players.

“They’re fantastic and they have been all season,” Young said. “Obviously for them it’s disappointing as well as for us. Like we say, we’ve got to try and take the positives out of the game and be ready for the next game.

“When you lose a game, there’s obviously disappointment and you want a game straight away.Obviously we have to wait a week so we’ve got to prepare for that game [again Cardiff] and hopefully go there and get the three points.”