Ole exclusive: How we've prepared for Burnley

Ole Gunnar Solskjaer was delighted with Manchester United’s blistering comeback against Newcastle United on Boxing Day, but the Reds will have had only 48 hours to recover when our next test begins at Burnley.

In an exclusive interview with the club’s media after the Boxing Day win, the manager spoke about our trip to Turf Moor and the challenges it will pose.

Scroll down to learn what the squad have been doing during the short amount of time between the two fixtures, and how we're planning to cope with the aggressive physical threat usually delivered by Sean Dyche’s combative Burnley outfit…

Can you just give us an idea of what happens in 48 hours? What does the squad do?
“There’s not a lot you can do. Obviously there’s just one day in between. Hopefully the boys sleep well after the game against Newcastle, then we’ve just got a day at the training ground with loads of treatment, massage, recovery, rehab. Then on Saturday we’ll start thinking about Burnley; we’ve got a day there together. We’re going to stay together, have some meetings. You can’t go on the training pitch.”

You said before the Newcastle game that you sort of had a team in mind for Burnley. Is that how you have to do it, when you’re having to play a game so soon afterwards?
“Yeah, you don’t really know what’s going to happen. If there are injuries, if there are players having to play more, or if you manage to rest them. We were lucky to be three-one and four-one up against Newcastle, so we could play the game out without really straining ourselves, so we should be ready for the game, even if they’ve played 90 minutes. But it’s not fair really on professional footballers to just have just one day in between. I don’t think it is. But it’s a show of character and our boys have loads of that.”

And you probably need that at Burnley… you know what you’re going to get, don’t you?
“Definitely, yeah. It’s going to be what it says on the tin, and we know what we’re up against. We’ve prepared for that; we’ve already started watching the videos and of course we’ve had loads of games lately. But now the boys will be facing different opposition. The front men, Barnes and Wood, [are] top centre-forwards as a pairing. [There will be] loads of crosses so we’ve got to defend the box but also make sure that we win the second ball [so we can] attack ourselves.”

He keeps doing it, doesn’t he, Sean Dyche? Every year…
“It’s fantastic what they’ve done and it's with less resources than many, so he’s doing a great job, Sean.”