Erik ten Hag has told his Manchester United stars to toughen up if they want to survive in the Premier League.
Ten Hag has lost countless players to injuries this season, sabotaging his hopes of winning trophies and securing Champions League qualification. The Dutchman has been forced to cope with 50 separate injuries throughout the current campaign.
Even this week Ten Hag lost defenders Lisandro Martinez and Victor Lindelof to muscle strains that will sideline the duo for at least a month. Those currently on the treatment table include Luke Shaw, Martinez, Lindelof, Tyrell Malacia, Anthony Martial and Altay Bayindir.
Ten Hag has been accused of training his squad too hard. But he has rejected the claims, insisting his players need to be super fit to cope with the demands of English football.
He said: "No, we don't train too hard. We need to be fit. With the standards in this league, you need to be fit, otherwise you can't match the standards required of you in a game. We don't train too hard.
"We have good departments, we have good people around with a lot of knowledge. Based on data we make our decisions. You need very robust players. That is the requirement, when you go into Christmas with many injuries and then you have to bring them back.
"But when they are free from injury, they are not match-fit. They're not straight back into the form that also needs a couple of games, before you get back into the rhythm."
Ten Hag wants his players to follow the example of captain Bruno Fernandes. The Portuguese international has not missed a game through injury this season, and has played through the pain barrier at times to help the cause.
Ten Hag reckons an overloaded calendar is hot helping the situation and he added: "I think we have more players who are very robust like Bruno is, but that is the type of player you need.
"I know that it still has an effect, the huge amount of games we had in the last 18 months The players get overloaded and can't bring the performances anymore. We're already over the point where we demand what we want from our top players.
"You saw last weekend, Manchester City were playing without Kyle Walker, without John Stones. The levels were dropping without them.
"There was a different team to what we faced. The levels for teams will keep dropping if you keep going in this process, where we are overloading in the international competition.
"We have national teams (international breaks) five times a year - you give the players away and you don’t have any impact. With some national teams, we have a very good connection and we manage the programmes, but there are also others that do what they want."
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