United not as strong without Rooney – Hughes

Louis van Gaal moved a step nearer to the Manchester United exit door when his side suffered a fourth consecutive defeat, 2-0 at Stoke, indicating he intends to speak to the club’s executive vice-chairman, Ed Woodward, and hinting he may be ready to offer his resignation.

Memphis Depay’s diving backward header allowed Bojan Krkic to put Stoke in front, and Marko Arnautovic powered in a second goal from outside the penalty area.

“You will have to wait and see, but I think so”, he said.

The United manager then admitted in his post-match press conference that he could quit the club, and Bosnich insists the Dutchman’s body language highlights his current mindset.

Midfielder Bastian Schweinsteiger returns after serving the third instalment of his three-game ban for violent conduct against West Ham United’s Winston Reid earlier this month.

“I try to do everything but every match the pressure shall be higher and higher and we have to solve that problem”.

“It is more hard because I am also part of the four matches that we have lost so people are looking at me. That is also something I don’t have to say”. Throughout the match, the home fans of Stoke City repeatedly chanted “You’re getting sacked in the morning”, meaning that Van Gaal will get fired in the morning.

Following the game, Hughes divulged that Stoke’s coaching staff are regularly telling Arnautovic – who has scored six times in the Premier League this season – to pull the trigger more often and make the most of his talent to strike the ball at a great force.

According to the latest media reports and unverified rumours on Twitter, Manchester United manager Louis Van Gaal has been asked to resign by the Manchester United board.

“You can say we can quickly get over this defeat by playing against Chelsea but in the time in between, you have to recover because the players have given everything”, Van Gaal told MUTV.

Van Gaal said the pressure following a winless run that has now extended to seven games had affected his side.

“I said at half-time we had nothing to lose and we coped better after that”. He doesn’t have much experience managing at the top level, but nor did Pep Guardiola when he took over a very good Barcelona team who’d won the European Cup two years previously.

“My thoughts are that we don’t dare to play football in the first half and then we gave a very bad goal away”, he added. “I do my utmost to find solutions to cope with the pressure, but at the end my players have to do that by themselves, and I help them”.