Manchester United slipped to their seventh defeat of the season at Chelsea and former great Gary Neville is calling for new signings to help the beleaguered squad.
Despite starting the game brilliantly, United were ultimately outclassed by a below-par Chelsea side losing 3-1, and without the injured Robin van Persie and Wayne Rooney lacked any cutting edge.
Neville, who made 602 appearances for the Red Devils, believes United have a good group of players who are in need of inspiration from fresh faces.
“You always rely on the quality of the development teams to come through, but there are a group of players out there who need help,” Neville told SkySports.
“You saw the effect of Ozil at Arsenal, those players, that manager, they need fresh blood and they know that.
“It’s a squad that needs an impetus and when you sign players at a squad it brings a new lease of life to everybody – that’s what it needs to me, not a rebuild.”
After their bright start, United were unlucky to fall behind after 17 minutes to a deflected Samuel Eto’o strike.
Eto’o would bag two more either side of half time to complete his hat trick and leave United facing another crushing defeat under David Moyes.
A goal from Javier Hernandez on 78 minutes threatened to spark a fightback but that never materialised as Chelsea held on for the win.
United skipper Nemanja Vidic was sent off in injury time and will miss the next three games through suspension.
Once again United looked severely lacking in attacking quality which will increase calls from supporters for Moyes to delve into the January transfer market.
Neville believes there is a desire from the manager to make signings but that the players may not be available.
“They’re not travelling all over Europe because they don’t want to sign players, they need to sign players,” Neville said.
“I think if they could go and sign four top players for huge money in the next week I think they would go and do it straight away.
“The problem is getting them.”
Moyes, while admitting he wants new players, insisted that results would not force him to panic buy in this window.
“The club know exactly what we want to do and the type of players we want to bring to the club and a lot aren’t available in this window,” the manager said.
Image courtesy of SkySports via YouTube, with thanks
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