Kristoffer Ajer’s equaliser in the 99th minute saved a thrilling 1-1 draw for Brentford, denying Manchester United an undeserved victory.
Mason Mount believed he had won it for United against the run of play in the 96th minute with his first goal for the team, but three minutes later, Ajer’s 31st shot of the game gave Brentford their first goal. Up until the very end, United was awful.
Brentford will be wondering how they missed so many opportunities to score a goal before United did. They had four shots on goal, but Andre Onana made a fantastic double save to keep it out of the net. And that was only the very beginning.
After being thoroughly outplayed by a team that is only five points above the relegation zone and has not won in their previous seven games, United is now eight points outside of fifth place following victories for Aston Villa and Tottenham. Despite taking 31 shots, Brentford was unable to win.
Manchester United manager Erik ten Hag:
“If you are winning you shouldn’t give it away. We are a strong side and strong in certain situations and we have to get it over the line. That bit is disappointing.
“We made certain mistakes. We should act differently in a different occasion. The equaliser was absolutely unnecessary. Maybe we didn’t deserve it, I thought Brentford wanted more in the whole course of the game.
“In the final third, we were not secure. We were slow. Second balls, defending, we were not good. They were more aggressive. They had more energy and it should be the other way around.
“I’m experienced, even when we don’t play well, we win the game. It was almost. That’s what disappointing the most.
“I know always after international break, there will always be this, the players are out of the rhythm, they are in different situations. When we don’t play so good, we have to win. We almost won.
“We have many senior players, we should all stand up and take responsibility for this.
“From January on, we are very consistent with our performances.
“We will keep fighting, it could be a good point in the end. ”
Brentford manager Thomas Frank to:
“There should only be one winner in that game, it can only be us. We went 1-0 down after 96 minutes and you’re thinking football is brutal, I almost lost faith in the football gods. At least he gave us a little bit back.
“What a performance, honestly what a performance. We are facing Man Utd, a fully strength Manchester United. Our first-choice defence out, our No 6 is out and we completely dominated the game.
“We are a team with a tricky run and we played unbelievable. We went 1-0 down on 96 minutes and then came back on 99 minutes? These players deserve so much credit, they are an unbelievable group to work with.
“Someone told me we had 31 shots, the most we ever had in a Premier League game? How we didn’t win that was unbelievable.
“There are so many fantastic characters in this team, people standing up when we need them. People coming in and roles, it was fantastic.
“That [the finishing] is disappointing but it dropped for the right players you wanted to drop for. Unfortunately that’s football.
“It’s football, I’m very happy with the performance. It’s actually what we’ve been seeing for a quite a long period, but this was the perfect performance. We have to keep going and go again on Wednesday.”
Brentford’s Ivan Toney:
“I feel like it’s points dropped. When you see the stats, we don’t know how we’ve not scored more than one goal.
“The chance I’ve missed, we’ve hit the woodwork four times, all the opportunities but it means nothing when you draw the game.
“[On his ruled out strike] The gaffer is always saying to me ‘make sure you’re not being a lazy striker, stay onside completely and then you give yourself half a chance’ but I switched off for half a second and it’s a tight call.
“We just weren’t clinical enough in front of goal. We’re disappointed in there.”
On Wednesday night, Brentford plays host to Brighton, and on Saturday, they travel to Aston Villa.
On Thursday, Manchester United will visit Chelsea in west London for another date. The focus then shifts to Sunday’s heavyweight match at Old Trafford against Liverpool.
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