Van Gaal: English Clubs Can Qualify

Manchester United manager Louis van Gaal believes the four English clubs can all progress from the UEFA Champions League group stage - although the boss admits the physicality of the Barclays Premier League might affect performance in Europe’s premier competition.

The Reds suffered a disappointing 2-1 loss at PSV Eindhoven in the opening Group B match earlier this month and hope to bounce back by defeating Wolfsburg at Old Trafford on Wednesday.

It was well documented that City also lost their first pool match to Italian side Juventus at the Etihad Stadium before Arsenal were surprisingly beaten 2-1 by Dinamo Zagreb, with Chelsea being the only English side to triumph on matchday one following their 4-0 home win over Maccabi Tel Aviv.

Speaking ahead of Wednesday’s big game against the Bundesliga club, Wolfsburg, van Gaal assessed why the famed competitiveness of the Premier League could prove to be disadvantageous in Europe and also explained why squad rotation is perhaps the key to success.

“The Premier League is a very difficult league,” he said. “To beat your opponent every week is not easy, it is always a struggle and a battle. Then you have to play again mid-week in the Champions League and that is the difference between all the clubs in Europe. It is not predictable to say four teams in the Premier League shall overcome this group stage round, no, it is not like that. But I have to say that we have the teams to do it and we have the quality to do it.

“The difficulty is that all these players are in a rat race and that takes a lot out of the players, which is why you have to rotate and that is what I am doing now because I have to protect my players. I am unlucky because I have only one position that is not doubled and that is the position from Luke Shaw, but I had a double because I had Blind and I had Rojo. But now who is injured? Rojo!

“Rojo has not played so much. He has trained for three or four weeks very hard, then he played for Argentina for 70 minutes, 50 minutes against Swansea City and then 70 minutes in the last match at Southampton. It was a very good building up but he is injured; that is unlucky. We can solve the problem with other players but not a specialist like Shaw. Blind is not the specialist. Rojo is more of a specialist because he plays that position for Argentina, which is why he played the last time there. The left full-back position demands more of the capacity of a player.

“I say we have to play Sunday-Tuesday, Sunday-Wednesday, so between the matches we cannot recover all of the tiredness. Then we have to play against a European squad who is willing to give everything against us. They don't have a rat race in their competition and that is the difference.”

Wolfsburg arguably lost their best player, Kevin De Bruyne, when he was sold to Manchester City in the summer but the German club spent big on his replacement by signing Julian Draxler from Schalke on transfer deadline day. Van Gaal knows the player well and acknowledges his ability.

“He was a very young talent when I was there [in Germany, managing Bayern], so I know him,” the Reds boss said. “He has to go on a long road like [Anthony] Martial, although it could be a little bit shorter because he has been playing longer on that level. He is a very good player.”

Like many football fans, van Gaal was also impressed when Bayern Munich striker Robert Lewandowski scored five goals in nine minutes during a 5-1 win over Wolfsburg in midweek.

“Of course I saw, but I see also the first half and Wolfsburg were very strong. It is unbelievable that it happens in nine minutes. I have seen it when I was at Barcelona and we play Valencia and we lost 3-4 having been leading 3-0, but that was in 15 minutes. A little bit less than the five in nine minutes!”