Louis van Gaal: possession based approach is working

Louis van Gaal hailed "the confirmation of our philosophy" after Manchester United came from behind to beat Southampton thanks to two goals from Anthony Martial and a third from Juan Mata following a 44-pass move the United manager called "unbelievable".

The win sent United into second place in the Premier League and Van Gaal was jubilant, particularly with Mata’s goal. “Fantastic,” said Van Gaal of the move. “And then you can finish it – unbelievable! With that amount of passes you control the game. I always say to the players that the gaps in the defensive organisation shall exist when you play a kind of positional game. We did it today and I was very pleased, of course it is confirmation of our philosophy.”

United’s first two goals came via the expert finishing of Martial, the 19-year-old summer recruit from Monaco who was making his first Premier League start. He put away his chances with the coolness of a veteran marksman and Van Gaal believes the youngster’s temperament may be his finest quality. “He has great talent and he showed it under pressure, and that may be his greatest talent.”

Martial also scored after being introduced from the bench against Liverpool last week, meaning he has netted three goals in two Premier League appearances since his €80m transfer. Van Gaal warned that, in view of the player’s youth, it would be unreasonable to expect him to carry on scoring at such a rate in the short term. “You cannot expect consistency from a player of 19 years of age,” he said. “Emotionally they shall have a lot of dips so I expect also from him but that is not a big problem. I’m very happy his talent is at a high level and he adapts to the system of how we want to play. Not every player can adapt in that system but he shows he wants to do that and he can do that.”

United had fallen behind early when Graziano Pellè fired home and they had to hang on for victory after the Italian striker scored again towards the end. He also hit the post in the match and David de Gea made several excellent saves. But Van Gaal rejected Ronald Koeman’s suggestion United were weak defensively, calling his counterpart’s comments “remarkable”.

Van Gaal insisted United defended well throughout the game, apart from the final 15 minutes when Southampton sought an equaliser. He admitted, however, that he replaced right-back Matteo Darmian with Antonio Valencia at half-time because "he gave too much space on Dusan Tadic and Tadic was the most dangerous man. I didn't see Tadic in the second half."

Guardian services