Harry Maguire was disappointed with Manchester United nightmare season opener as manager Erik ten Hag lost his first Premier League game in charge.
United were beaten2-1 by Brighton in their first Premier League match of the season.
Maguire was shocked by the teams inability to give the new Dutch manager his first win at Old Trafford, especially considering their poor form last campaign.
‘Everyone knew the task,’ he said. ‘We had a bad season last season. We’ve got a new manager trying to put his philosophy on the team but when we don’t get it right we look far too open.
‘It’s great to have Lisandro Martinez at the club. We have competition for places at centre-back. We’ve not played much together and in that first period we weren’t on the same wavelength.
He added: ‘We went into the game positive, we had a good pre-season and it was the worst possible start to be 2-0 down at half-time at Old Trafford.
‘We got a goal back but we huffed and puffed a bit and it’s a bad start for us.
‘We started pretty well and on the front foot and as a team we had control. Then we conceded the first goal and that knocked us badly.
‘We need to look at not letting that first goal set us back as much as it did. It was a nightmare start to be 2-0 down at half-time.’
Unlocking Brighton’s defence in the second-half proved a real challenge for United and Maguire admitted the team needed to be more creative in fashioning goal scoring opportunities.
He said: ‘We spoke about getting the next goal [at half-time]. I think in the second half you saw good parts to our game but overall we didn’t do enough.
‘We had a lot of pressure and a lot of ball but we need to be a bit more creative and we need to improve on that.
