Jose Mourinho was all found to regret poor finishing as they were held to a gloomy 0-0 home draw by West Bromwich Albion on Saturday to miss an opportunity to close in on the Premier League’s main four. The result left United in fifth on 53 points from 28 games, four behind fourth-put Manchester City who visit Arsenal on Sunday. West Brom stayed eighth on 44 points from 30 matches.
“We have a lot of draws this season,” Mourinho told the resources after his side produced a toothless performance despite enjoying the lion’s share of the possession.
“Teams come here just to defend. Goalkeepers come here to be man of the match. We cannot score a goal even when we are one-on-one,” he added. “We beat everyone on quality of play and direction of the game, possession, creation and ambition but we drew too many matches.”
United, who were missing six standard starters through damage or suspension, stretched their unbeaten league raced to 19 games however it will be scant consolation after they neglected to cut out any obvious chances.
The home side, whose last pass continued getting sidetracked, needed to sit tight until the 67th moment for their first shot on target when manager Ben Foster denied Henrik Mkhitaryan.
Foster kept out two long-run Marcus Rashford strikes in the closing stages either side of West Brom’s best shot, when previous United midfielder Darren Fletcher almost stunned United attendant David De Gea who had a tranquil evening.
Fletcher hit a circling shot from distance which De Gea bumbled and was calmed to see the ball skip off the woodwork and once again into his arms.
“David de Gea was sleeping and he did the funny thing at the end, I was laughing with that,” he said.
“One team had the ball, one team didn’t. One team tried to win, the other tried to draw. One keeper did a funny thing, the other made three great saves.”
