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Manchester United visited Everton on Sunday with the hope of strengthening their chances of making the top 4 but the home side had other ideas. The Toffees won 4-0 on the day, thanks to goals from Richarlison, Gylfi Sigurdsson, Lucas Digne, and Theo Walcott.
In the first half, Everton were bossing Manchester United about and the home side were creating all the chances. Richarlison took one such opportunity and gave the home side the early lead.
The second goal was a stunner from Sigurdsson as he hit a brilliant shot from 30 yards out and beat David de Gea to make it 2-0. United had all to do in the second half as the first had been disappointing, to say the least.
The second half followed the same pattern of play as Everton were always looking the better team. The Toffees made it 3-0 after Lucas Digne struck a brilliant volley past de Gea. It was another goal conceded by United from outside the box.
The fourth was scored by Walcott, who came on for Richarlison in the second half. The former Arsenal man was slipped through by Sigurdsson and he finished it past de Gea.
This was Manchester United's 5th consecutive away loss in all competitions and Ole Gunnar Solskjaer now has some serious questions to answer.
In this slideshow, we discuss the 3 observations made from that lethargic United display:
#3 Another awful performance from the Manchester United attackers
All the talk about Manchester United's defense has somewhat taken all the attention away from United's attackers and how bad they have been since that Paris Saint-Germain win in the Champions League.
It was another one of those bad performances and it was so bad that United managed to get their first shot on target in the 86th minute of the game. United started with Romelu Lukaku, Anthony Martial and Marcus Rashford and all of them were sloppy in possession and weren't working hard enough off the ball.
At one point of the match, it almost felt like they weren't bothered and that tells you so much about the desire of this Manchester United team. Lukaku wasn't able to hold onto the ball, Rashford was taking meaningless shots from the distance and Martial just wasn't in the game.
All of these players have been poor since that PSG win and they need to step up in order to gain some respect from the Old Trafford faithful.
#2 Manchester United lack quality full-backs
This has been a problem that has been highlighted in the past couple of weeks, especially after those torrid displays from Ashley Young.
With Luke Shaw suspended and Young in the worst form of his life, Solskjaer decided to go with Diogo Dalot at left-back and Victor Lindelof on right-back.
I don't blame Solskjaer here as he is clearly short on options and in a hope of improving the full-back play, he made those decisions. But it was the same story as both Lindelof and Dalot struggled for most of the game.
Dalot especially had one of the worst games in the Manchester United shirt and he was being bullied by Richarlison and then his substitute, Theo Walcott. Lindelof, on the other hand, played at right-back only for the first half as Young was brought on in the second half for Phil Jones.
That also didn't change things and Young was being overrun by Bernard on many occasions on the right-hand side. These performances only highlight the need of signings at Manchester United and full-backs should be added to that already long list of players required.
#1 Manchester United's big players fail to step up again
When your team is out of form and nobody is performing at a high level, you look for inspiration from the best players in your team and at the moment, those big players of Manchester United have been nothing but disappointing.
Starting with David de Gea who made a huge error against Barcelona and against Everton, he was beaten from outside of the box two times which is just not good enough for a goalkeeper of his calibre. Everton's second goal, especially, was struck by Sigurdsson from 30 yards. It was indeed a great strike but it was something you expect the Spaniard to save.
Another disappointing performance came from Paul Pogba who was being bossed by Morgan Schneiderlin and Idrissa Gueye. These are the matches in which you expect Pogba to dictate the play but he wasn't doing anywhere near enough.
Now that he has been given a free role in the midfield, he really doesn't have much of an excuse for his poor performances from the last couple of weeks and if he doesn't step up, don't be surprised if he is dropped from the team by Solskjaer.
