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Rob Dawson, Correspondent
Erik ten Hag admitted he had “mixed feelings” after Manchester United threw away a two-goal lead against Wolves but still won 4-3 thanks to Kobbie Mainoo‘s stoppage-time winner.
Mainoo scored in the 97th minute at Molineux to win a chaotic game, just two minutes after Pedro Neto thought he had snatched a point for Wolves by making it 3-3.
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United dominated the first half and should have been out of sight before Wolves’ comeback, leading Ten Hag to say afterwards he would take away both positives and negatives.
“I have mixed feelings,” said Ten Hag.
“One side, very pleased. Of course it’s a massive win and I think for a neutral fan, a spectator of this game, it was great to see.
“But as a manager, when you see you dominate a game for an hour, you should go 3-0 or 4-0 by the hour, and then the way we concede the goals we should manage that better on the pitch. This can’t happen.”
Mainoo was United’s hero after the 18-year-old midfielder jinked his way into the penalty area to score his first Premier League goal.
Marcus Rashford also found the net after being restored to the team following his punishment for visiting a Belfast nightclub last week before telling the club he was too ill to train.
“You see the spirit of the team and the resilience and especially in Kobbie Mainoo, that is great to see,” said Ten Hag.
“We have the right character, the spirit in the dressing room is very good when you can show this. I think the whole team played very good, Rashy as well.”
However, for all the praise heaped on Mainoo and Rashford, Ten Hag also branded his team “naive” after they went 2-0 and 3-1 up before being pegged back to 3-3.
“We should have managed the game better,” said Ten Hag.
“We have to hammer out these mistakes, they can’t happen. We had some more stages in the games in the season as well. What is asked is leadership and it can’t be that this happening that you concede such goals. That is one story.
“I said I have mixed feelings about this and I am very happy with the team performance and some individual performances from our side.”