Erik ten Hag needs to accept Manchester United have a bigger problem than he admits

Erik ten Hag insisted that Manchester United would be able to cope without Casemiro, but the truth is that they barely have. If not for Fulham's chaotic implosion last time out, they would have been dumped out of the FA Cup, and would have had very few complaints about it either.

It is only natural that any side would miss a player of such quality, but it was truly alarming the extent to which United were largely outplayed at home against a mid-table team.

Even though they won, Fulham midfielder Joao Palhinha was named Man of the Match after dominating the midfield for much of the game before being let down by his teammates.

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Ahead of the game, Ten Hag eased concerns about missing the suspended Brazilian, insisting that his side already had a track record of playing without him and winning.

"We had many more games without Casemiro," he insisted at a press conference. "We did really well without Casemiro against Arsenal, Leeds and also at the start of the season, but I want to have Casemiro available, He has a huge impact on our game.

"We also won many games without Casemiro, so he is not available so we have to do with many players."

In the five games Casemiro has missed since he joined the club, United have won three, drawn one, and lost one.

There is certainly an argument to be made that they have managed to cope without him to an extent, but a lot of that is revisionism and looks beyond the troubling trend of their performances.

The win over Fulham came with the obvious caveat that the visiting team hit self-destruct after dominating for 70 minutes, while the win over Leicester was also made to look like a comfortable win, when in fact the visitors