‘We’ve got to be brave’ – Skinner previews Manchester United’s fixture at Leicester City | OneFootball

Manchester United head coach Marc Skinner says that his side have to be brave as they look to return to winning ways in the Barclays Women’s Super League.

The Red Devils remain unbeaten this season, however, they have recorded three consecutive draws. Manchester United will look to finally return to winning ways when they travel to Leicester City on Sunday afternoon.

When speaking in the pre-match press conference, Manchester United boss Skinner acknowledged the fact that Leicester City keep things tight defensively. He said that his side have to be brave if they are to get a long-awaited win.

“They don’t concede many, their games have been really tight,” Skinner said. “You’ve got to stop their counters because they’re very effective with those but actually, you’ve got to be brave.

“We spoken about it; we’ve got to be brave with the ball, we’ve got to be braver because that’s who we are. We’ve got to attack, be brave because there are limited spaces, you’ve got to be quick and we’ve got to be good with the ball. If we do that, we can cause every team problems. We’ve just got to get back to that.

“It naturally happens when you’ve got different players coming in and out, you just have to take a while to click. Defensively, we’ve shown fantastic qualities but actually, as a group, we want to attack more. We are in a position now to try that; we will have to do that because it’s what we want and what our fans want. We have to make sure we get back to that.”

Manchester United are six points off the league summit and Skinner says that it’s important that his side rediscover their winning form, although the competition in the league is ever-increasing.

He said “Of course, it is [important] but what we are seeing is the league changing in-front of our eyes. You can see a big shift in investment and we are seeing the league get closer. Statistically, it’s getting closer, money spent is getting closer, so I’m not really surprised because every team is getting better but the reality is that we can control some of that.

“We are really honest as staff and players, we want to be more attacking. Our attacking stats have dipped but we’ve structured ourselves a little bit differently.

“We have to get back to who we are, we have to evolve and try different things, we have to attack, that’s Manchester United and we understand that.

“Defensively, we’ve been fantastic; we’ve had five clean sheets in seven games, so we know that’s a good part. The league is getting better and we’ve seen that week-on-week but we have to get back to winning ways and that’s something that we will have a real focus on.”

It would take an almighty effort for Manchester United to haul themselves into the title race but Skinner says that the club’s ambitions remain unchanged.

He said “The ambition never changes. We know where we are as a team, we know the journey that we’re on, we know the timeframes in which we want to achieve but you can’t dismiss the fact that you want to win every game. We have to put everything into winning every game. We have dropped short on a couple of performances which I think is our indicator and we need to get back to that attacking style.

“I never give up on anything, everything is mathematic. We are trying to win cups and trying to win the league. How realistic that is, only the end of the season will tell us that but what we will do every day is fight hard to make sure that our performances are better and that we are trying to win games, that’s all we can focus on.”

Manchester United’s Barclays Women’s Super League fixture at Leicester City kicks-off at 3pm on Sunday afternoon.