Manchester United drove into training on Tuesday morning feeling they strain as they looked to get back on track after a run of three straight defeats.
Wayne Rooney, Marouane Fellaini, Daley Blind and Michael Carrick arrived at the AON training complex in Carrington as United prepared for the EFL Cup trip to Northampton on Wednesday.
After a disappointing run that has seen them fall six points behind Manchester City, Jose Mourinho will be looking to find reasons for United’s loss of form.
Is it a case of tactical systems, players not performing, or simply the fact that with four new signings his team need time to knit together?
Or perhaps they just aren’t running enough.
According to a league table of the distance covered by every Premier League side, United are the laziest side in the division, running less far than every other side.
In fact, over the last five games United’s squad have covered exactly 55 kilometres less than rivals Liverpool – enough for them to get to Anfield from Old Trafford.
PREMIER LEAGUE DISTANCE TABLE
Team Distance (km)
1 Liverpool 581.6
2 Manchester City 570.7
3 Tottenham 565.9
4 Burnley 563.9
5 West Brom 562.9
6 Arsenal 556.4
7 Middlesbrough 554.6
8 Bournemouth 549.4
9 Southampton 545.1
10 Leicester 544.8
11 Swansea 543.2
12 Everton 541.2
13 West Ham 539.5
14 Chelsea 539.4
15 Watford 539.1
16 Stoke 536.4
17 Hull 536.3
18 Crystal Palace 533.9
19 Sunderland 526.7
20 Manchester United 526.6
Jurgen Klopp’s men have run the furthest in the league, a remarkable 11km more than the next best, Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City, with Tottenham in third.
Premier League new-boys Burnley are next up, just 2km behind Spurs, with Tony Pulis’ West Brom, who beat West Ham 4-2 last weekend with only 30 per cent of possession, in fifth.
It’s not all about running stats though. Everton have had a brilliant start to life under Ronald Koeman, and are second in the table, but have only run the 12th furthest, while Chelsea, in fifth, are 40km short of Liverpool’s distance and are down in 14th.
However, David Moyes will not be pleased to see that his Sunderland outfit, who are yet to win and surely need to be showing every sign of great effort to get out of a relegation scrap yet again, are 19th in both the league table and the running stats.
Hull, who have played the same starting XI in each of their five games so far, also seem to be showing signs of struggling to keep up the pace, languishing in 17th – but they have still covered almost 10km more than United.
It comes as Mourinho admits his players are feeling the pressure of their losing streak.
Speaking in The Mirror he said: ‘At 10.30 in the morning, we have a training session and we have to be there. They have to work.
‘They have to show themselves with a certain kind of attitude towards negative moments.
‘I show them, as an example, Ashley Young who was, in my opinion phenomenal with his attitude, positivity and determination.
‘We need positive people to give us a positive feeling because next time these boys are going onto a football pitch they are going to feel, obviously as normal human beings, the weight of the defeats.’
Source: Daily Mail