How McTominay’s late winner helped Manchester United defeat Aston Villa 2-1 in the Premier League

How McTominay’s late winner helped Manchester United defeat Aston Villa 2-1 in the Premier League..

Erik ten Hag’s have closed the gap to Aston Villa to five points after McTominay’s late header secured a vital win at Villa Park.

Aston Villa 1-2 Manchester United
17′: After Maguire heads a corner, Hojlund knocks in from point blank range.
67′: Luiz uses a flicked finish in the six-yard area to tie the score.
86′: McTominay heads in a Dalot cross to give United a 2-1 lead.
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What happens to Aston Villa and United next?
Aston Villa will be on the road the next weekend, traveling to west London to play Fulham on Saturday, following a dismal run of results in front of their home crowd.

Meanwhile, United’s trip to Luton Town presents one of the most unusual challenges in the Premier League.

In other news, Manchester City will host Chelsea in the key game of the next weekend, which we will be live-streaming here at The Athletic.

This is how the Premier League table looks with one game remaining in the weekend’s action (Crystal Palace vs. Chelsea tomorrow).

It was a successful weekend for United as they raised their hopes of finishing in the Champions League, while both of Aston Villa’s biggest rivals triumphed spectacularly.

Over the next 14 games, there will be a true race for fourth and fifth place.

Ten Hag attests that Shaw was removed as “precaution.”
Ten Hag was questioned about Shaw’s withdrawal at the half.

He told Sky Sports, “Precaution (was the reason he was taken off).” “Due to his history of ailments, we are unable to take any chances with him despite his complaints. We’ll have to wait and see how the following several days go.

“Everyone is aware of my belief that having left-footers at left center-back and left back is advantageous, therefore losing him is not an advantage. We are forced to compromise, and this is not in our best interests.”

Now that we’ve heard from Ten Hag, it’s time to hear from his opponent, who was visibly perplexed as to how his team lost the match.

“Everything we had planned was done,” Emery said to Sky Sports. “We controlled the game, we prevented transitions, we didn’t allow a lot of chances and we created chances.

“We didn’t score those chances but I’m very proud of our work, of the players. Manchester United, a stronger opponent than us, is the team we are playing against.

“Overall, in summary, we deserved more and the result is difficult for us to accept but this is football.”

In the build-up to today’s game, Ten Hag compared it to a cup final and said that winning is what matters most in cup finals, which his team was able to accomplish.

“We’ve had a huge victory,” he said to Sky Sports. “We are closer (to Aston Villa) and that was the aim for today, that was our target.”

“I thought we did a good job, and I really enjoyed controlling the game for the first twenty minutes. After that, we let up a little too much, but we still had our moments going after the counterattack.

“Then, to fight back after Aston Villa made it 1-1, we’re really happy for today.”

traveling together and enjoying life
That marks United’s sixth away Premier League victory of the year.

With eight and seven victories on the road in the English Premier League this season, respectively, only city rivals Manchester City and Arsenal have achieved greater success.

United’s victories away
Sep. 23: Manchester United 0–Burley
October 21: 1-2 for Sheffield United United Manchester
Nov. 4: Manchester United 0–Fulham
Everton 0-3 on November 26 United Manchester
February 1: Wolves 3–4. United Manchester
Feb. 11: Manchester United 1-2 Aston Villa.

McGinn: “We must never forget how far we’ve come.”
He emphasized that McGinn and his teammates’ efforts have made Villa’s inclusion in the Champions League conversation.

He said to Sky Sports, “We’ve got to remember how far we’ve come as a club.” Many people are hurting in that dressing room, but it’s my responsibility to keep us together. We don’t want to accept that defeat.

As a team, we’ve gone a long way, and we still have a lot of potential to accomplish this season. We’re having a bad run, but if we keep playing that way, we’ll win more games than lose.”

Despite the outcome, McGinn told Chelsea that his team had given a subpar performance after the loss. However, today’s game was different.

“It was a really sickening performance, and it was completely different,” he said to Sky Sports. “It seemed like we had opportunity after opportunity in the second half, and we did more than enough to win the game. They chose not to enter.

“That United team includes players of the highest caliber, and they have one outstanding play that has won the match. Although we could have done a better job of defending it and risking more casualties, it was still an incredible cross. Furthermore, huge Scott (McTominay) looks fantastic at that point.

“It’s a great header, but a sucker punch for us.”