Erik ten Hag might already know his Manchester United team for Aston Villa fixture

Erik ten Hag is perfect for Manchester United because he's critical in both defeat and victory. He's ultimately never satisfied and during half-time against Tottenham on Thursday night, he would have demanded even more from his players.

That's despite his side being utterly dominant in the opening 45 minutes against Spurs and returning to the dressing room with a deserved two-goal advantage thanks to brilliantly taken goals from Jadon Sancho and Marcus Rashford.

Rashford made it 2-0 on the stroke of half-time to complete a ruthless, swift counter-attack and United would have been disappointed to have gone it at the break without that two-goal cushion, which reflected their superiority

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Although the game was thrown away after the interval, the first-half performances also received some criticism from Ten Hag in his post-match press conference. "Before [the game], I would be happy with a point," Ten Hag told journalists.

"And you see first half, although I don't think we played that brilliant, we had complete control. We had an overload in midfield, we used that very well, especially switching from right to left, we used that overload to score both goals.

"But, to be honest, before 2-0 they had a big chance to make it 1-1 and before that on our right side we conceded some counters and we were not good in positioning. Also, already before half time, we were not playing that well."

Those comments felt slightly harsh from Ten Hag. Tottenham did not look dangerous in the opening 45 minutes and they were limited to just a few sights on David de Gea between the sticks, which were eventually a regularity after Pedro Porro's goal.

United were outstanding at