Paul Scholes says Manchester United showed ‘great fighting spirit’ to come from two goals down to beat Atalanta 3-2, but believes Jurgen Klopp will have been ‘rubbing his hands together’ watching their first-half performance.
Cristiano Ronaldo scored a trademark header in the 81st minute to complete an incredible comeback in Wednesday’s Champions League thriller, with the result sending United two points clear at the top of Group F.
Marcus Rashford and Harry Maguire had earlier struck to cancel out first-half goals from Mario Pasalic and Merih Demiral on a night of high drama at Old Trafford.
The result will have eased some of the pressure on Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, with the Red Devils losing four of their previous seven games, but Scholes was left fearing for his former club ahead of their Premier League clash with Liverpool.
Asked whether it was a win worth celebrating, Scholes told BT Sport: ‘You celebrate every win don’t you? It’s just the first half really worried me.
‘As I’ve said before – and people are going to say I’m miserable and I’ll probably get slagged off by United fans – but I looked at that game thinking about Liverpool on Sunday, thinking about Manchester City, maybe it’s the wrong thing to do.
‘Because I thought United were all over the place in that first half, they were disjointed. They had the two midfield players playing on their own.’
The ex-United and England midfielder added: ‘If you do that against Manchester City or Liverpool, it would be 3-0 or 4-0 at half-time and you’d be out of the game and you’re not coming back.
‘Yeah, it’s great watching, seeing the excitement, seeing the United way, all the smiles on their faces, all the goals, all the shooting, all the attacking, it’s brilliant, I know that.
‘But that first half just stuck with me.’