Manchester United Erik ten Hag has addressed reports that Marcus Rashford spent an evening in a nightclub in Belfast in the build-up to the Red Devils‘ fourth-round FA Cup clash against Newport County.
The England international was omitted from the Manchester United matchday squad after missing training on Friday, with the Dutch manager insisting he would deal with the matter after United’s hard-fought 4-2 victory away to the League Two side.
“It’s an internal matter,” Ten Hag said repeatedly ahead of the fixture.
After going 2-0 up, Newport struck back to level before goals from Antony and Rasmus Hojlund earned the Premier League side a place in the fifth round. But talk after the game once again centred around Rashford.
“He reported ill,” Ten Hag said. “The rest is an internal matter. I deal with it, we will deal with it.”
Rashford has already had to apologise to Ten Hag this season after he was spotted out having a birthday party just hours after United’s 3-0 defeat to local rivals Manchester City.
“It is unacceptable,” Ten Hag said at the time. “I told him, he apologised and that is it.”
Part of Ten Hag’s remit when he arrived at Old Trafford was to instil a better culture at the club and he received praise for his strict approach in the early part of his tenure but his time at the Premier League giants hasn’t been without incident.
As well as issues with Rashford, there was the public falling out with winger Jadon Sancho.
Sancho arrived from Borussia Dortmund during the Ole Gunner Solskjaer reign but returned on loan to the German club earlier this month after being frozen out of the squad due to a disciplinary issue that remained unresolved.
Ten Hag said an apology would have ended the stand-off but Sancho refused after writing in a now-deleted social media post that he was being made a “scapegoat”.
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