The Red Devils suffered a heavy defeat in Ten Hag’s first Manchester derby in charge of United.
Erik ten Hag has admitted Manchester United weren’t ‘brave enough’ in their 6-3 defeat against Manchester City on Sunday.
A dominant display from City saw both Erling Haaland and Phil Foden score hat-tricks against their city rivals. United went 4-0 behind before half-time, but late goals Antony and Anthony Martial weren’t enough to get them back into the game.
“It’s quite simple, it’s a lack of belief. When you don’t believe on the pitch then you can’t win games, that is unacceptable,” the Man Utd boss told BBC Match of the Day after the game.
“We get undisciplined at following rules and you get hammered, that’s happened today. For me it was a surprise. We were not on the front foot, we were not brave on the ball and there were spaces to play but we were not brave enough.
“All the credit to City, but it’s nothing to do with City, our performance was not good. It had to do with the belief as individuals and as team. From the first minute I felt it and at half-time, we changed things and we changed attitude.
“We saw a different Manchester United after half-time and we scored goals, we created some more. On the ball we were more brave, we came in the opponent’s half and we scored three goals.
“In this moment I can’t think about positives. We let our fans down, we let ourselves down and we’re hugely disappointed.”
The derby defeat came after Man Utd’s run of four consecutive wins before the international break.
Ten Hag’s side will face Omonia in the Champions League before returning to the Premier League to meet Everton next Sunday.
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