Man United's Shaw defends Ten Hag's discipline: Players can't do 'whatever they like' anymore

Posted Sunday, January 01, 2023 by ESPN

Luke Shaw said Erik ten Hag has stopped Manchester United players from "doing whatever they want" after the manager dropped striker Marcus Rashford for the 1-0 win at Wolves for oversleeping and being late to a team meeting.

Rashford was named as a substitute at Molineux, with Ten Hag citing "internal discipline" as his reason for leaving the England forward out of his starting lineup. The 25-year-old subsequently scored the only goal of the game after coming off the bench at the start of the second half.

Ten Hag has already shown a determination to instill discipline at Old Trafford this season by dropping both Cristiano Ronaldo and Alejandro Garnacho from the first team. Ronaldo has since left the club, with United cancelling his contract ahead of his move to Saudi Arabian team Al-Nassr.

After previous United bosses Ole Gunnar Solskjaer and Ralf Rangnick were criticised last season for failing to control the dressing-room, United left-back Shaw said that Ten Hag has restored discipline at the club.

"At a top club like this, it has to be like that," Shaw told BT Sport. "I think that people can't do whatever they want and maybe that's been part of the problem in the past with people getting away with silly little things.

"The manager takes all of that into consideration. Like you've seen today, if you're not keeping the standards high then you won't play."

Ten Hag defended his decision to drop Rashford and said he only introduced him as a substitute at half-time because of United's failure to score.

"Everyone has to match the standards and the rules," Ten Hag said. "There have to be consequences otherwise you can't be successful. I think he [Rashford] gave the right answer.

"I was not satisfied with the performances in [the] first half, we didn't take chances. We had to be more clinical, we know Rashy can score a goal and that's what he did."

Rashford returned from the World Cup having scored three goals for England and, with the player now having scored three times in three games for United, Shaw said his teammate is thriving again.

"I think he's in a really good way at the moment," Shaw added. "He's extremely confident, very positive, very happy and it's nice to see it.

"Everyone knows the quality that he's got. He's world class and he could be one of the best in the world if he keeps going and hopefully he does do that."