They have a nine-match unbeaten streak, but failed to achieve this goal

Manchester United had a complicated visit to Real Sociedad who were the team that had the first position in their group, they had achieved 15 points out of a possible 15, it was very difficult to go to visit a team that had such an important streak, they knew it would not be easy to have this visit to the Spanish team that was inspired to close a qualifying phase with a very good level of play.

It was a match where there were many injuries for both teams, with some key players missing at the last minute, and the Red Devils were without some important players such as Antony, Martial and Sancho. They couldn't go with the squad they would have liked to compete in this match, it was a lot of pressure to go to visit a complicated rival who wanted to keep that first position.

More Man Utd news:

Ten Hag doesn’t like England's most important player and bench him again

The player who Ten Hag desperately needs to find his form again, this is how he’ll do it

Now they were looking for a game that they had to win by a two goal difference, they had to show that key superiority to take the three points to each, but in addition to that they wanted to snatch the first position in the group, in that objective they could avoid the preliminary phase to the round of 16, they failed in that attempt to look for that result, what they had to achieve was to win by two goals.

They then went in search of the match with a lot of dynamism, they managed to take the lead with a goal from Garnacho, which was assisted by Cristiano Ronaldo, that goal was very important because there was a lot of time left to look for that second goal which was going to be key, Erik ten Hag tried to press with many changes of strategy, but the reduced squad could not do much, even Maguire at the end played as a striker looking for balls over the top.

Manchester United won, but did not achieve the main goal

Now they will have a very important match to play for the qualification to the round of 16, they could face very complete opponents who have a lot to worry the Red Devils, they could play against Ajax, Bayer Leverkusen, Barcelona, Sevilla, Sporting, Shakhtar, Juventus or RB Salzburg. Erik ten Hag will have to prepare his players for the crucial game they will have to play to stay in the Europa League.