Van Gaal Proud Of Goodison Win

Louis van Gaal was proud of his Manchester United players following Saturday’s impressive 3-0 win over Everton at Goodison Park, where the Reds had not won since October 2011.

The result puts United firmly back on track in the Barclays Premier League and boosts confidence ahead of the midweek trip to CSKA Moscow in the UEFA Champions League. Speaking to MUTV after the final whistle on Merseyside, van Gaal spoke positively about the performance and result…

Van Gaal on United bouncing back from defeat at Arsenal: “I am very happy with the response of my players and I am very proud of the performance. I think it was an excellent performance and maybe it is the start of many, many victories.”

On the four changes he made to the starting XI: “You need a bit of luck as a manger but we trained the strategy, we are always training the strategy, and we had a lot of meetings because I could not evaluate the game against Arsenal. I had to wait until the players had come back from the international break, so it was very intense for the players but it worked.”

On Phil Jones, Marcos Rojo, Morgan Schneiderlin and Ander Herrera: “They played very well, I have to say that, but it was not for nothing that I kept Rojo here because he was injured. He had not played 90 minutes for me this season, it was his first 90 minutes, and also for Phil Jones. These changes were also question marks before the game, I didn’t know if they could play for 90 minutes. That is also why I changed Herrera. It was a fantastic performance and I was very happy with him, but I maybe need him on Wednesday so I had to spare him, and it was the same thing with [Bastian] Schweinsteiger. I am a very happy coach because I have seen a lot of good individual players in my team. That also gives confidence for the matches against CSKA Moscow and Manchester City.”

On Jesse Lingard replacing Juan Mata at half-time: “That was tactical and I was very happy, I have congratulated him [Lingard] with a good performance in the second half. He didn’t lose any balls, one pass to Wayne Rooney maybe, but that is the only pass I can remember, and he did his defensive work very well so I am very pleased with his performance.”

On Wayne Rooney scoring against his former club: “I am not interested who is scoring the goals, the team has to score and we have scored three times as a team, and we could have scored five times I think. It is fantastic and I am very happy that he has scored his first goal against Everton since 2007. Maybe it is the start for many, many goals.”