Ten Hag reveals what he told Onana and his team-mates to make a superb comeback against Aston Villa

Manchester United manager Erik ten Hag revealed what he told his players at half-time to spark their superb second-half comeback against Aston Villa.

Thanks largely to a decisive Andre Onana goal, Manchester United toppled Aston Villa 3-2 on Matchday 19. The Red Devils were 2-0 down at half-time.

First, John McGinn took advantage of a lack of dominant presence in the United defence when his free-kick cross found its way into the net.

And then just five minutes later – in the 26th minute – Leander Dendoncker managed to get the ball past André Onana, after standing unchallenged just outside the six-yard box.

But the home team found unprecedented mental capacity in the second half and managed to equalize thanks to a brace from Alejandro Garnacho before Rasmus Hojlund scored his first Premier League goal in the 82nd minute.

After this efou match, Ten Hag revealed what he had said to the team during the break, indicating that confidence had played a key role in their recovery.

“The atmosphere changed a lot from the first half to the second, but if you look at the first half, you lose because of two set-pieces, in moments when we weren’t very focused,” the Dutchman told Amazon Prime. I think in the first half we played pretty well and kept trying and trying.

At half-time, I said to the team: “Keep believing and keep doing what we did, do even more”. We had to apply more and more pressure. At 1-2, when you put the pressure on, you see what happened.

I said before the game that we were competitive with Arsenal, competitive with Liverpool, so if we play our best, we can beat anyone.

Believe that, even when you’re down to zero, it doesn’t matter. Keep going, show character, and today they showed we had the personality to do it. I think it was a very good team performance.”

Ten Hag saw several of its key players produce performances that will lead many Manchester United fans to believe they can still achieve a version of success in this campaign.

Marcus Rashford returned to the starting XI for the first time in six games and was a constant threat, Bruno Fernandes excelled and Hojlund ended his long Premier League goal drought.