Luke Shaw felt Manchester United wanted it more than Manchester City in a memorable derby triumph that the left-back believes can be the catalyst to a strong end to the season.
All eyes were on Old Trafford on Sunday as the bitter rivals did battle in a top-flight match for the 150th time, and the encounter lived up to the hype.
The clash was full of controversy, skill and talking points, with United emerging victorious after Anthony Martial volleyed home from Bruno Fernandes’ clever free-kick and Scott McTominay capitalised on Ederson’s stoppage-time error in style.
The 2-0 victory was United’s third defeat of City this season and provided a welcome shot in the arm as Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s men push for a top-four finish.
“I think today was so important – not just the points, but the magnitude of the game and how big it is to everyone in this city,” United defender Shaw said.
“I think if you look at it, maybe we wanted it more. I felt like we wanted it more.
“So, very proud of the team and we need to keep focused now tomorrow, because we’re back in training and we’ve got a very big game on Thursday [at LASK in the Europa League].
“We’re still in two cup competitions and the top four is still very much alive. We’ve got to keep putting the pressure on. We’ve got to try not to focus too much on other teams.
“We know this is the Premier League, every game is tough, and I think teams will be dropping points, but we need to just focus on us, focus on our results and the confidence is so high.
“We’re shutting sort of shop and keeping clean sheets, which is a very good positive, so we need to keep going.”
Sunday saw United record the eighth clean sheet of this current 10-match unbeaten run in all competitions.
It is their longest stretch without defeat since Solskjaer’s first 11 games at the helm.
PA
