Rio Ferdinand tells Sir Jim Ratcliffe five areas to look at to solve Man Utd injury crisis

Manchester United's injury woes aren't getting any better, and Rio Ferdinand reckons Sir Jim Ratcliffe and his team need to dig into the data to help solve them

Manchester United legend Rio Ferdinand has given Sir Jim Ratcliffe five pointers to try and ease their injury crisis.

Erik ten Hag was without as many as 10 first-team players as his side were resoundingly beat 4-0 at Crystal Palace on Monday night. It's an issue that has blighted the Dutchman all season long, contributing to their lacklustre campaign.

The main question for United fans is why can't they seem to maintain a fully fit squad, with Ferdinand attempting to explain the potential reasons on his Vibe with FIVE podcast prior to the Palace defeat – their record 13th in a Premier League season.

He said: "I think you can say maybe a bit of training, but I just think sometimes it's bad luck as well. You've got to look at the training, the nutrition, the loads that they put through the training sessions, that's got to be looked at.

"But also sometimes it's down to bad luck as well. I would definitely be looking and analysing through data, all those areas. Nutrition, the loads through training, the amount of training, the time in training and also game time and game load.

"Is he putting too much on players through too many games? I don't know, it's difficult. That's the job of INEOS, to go in there and to check out that data and to find out because it has been a problem. We can't have this repeated next season."

The latest disappointing result did no favours for Ten Hag, who doesn't appear to have the full backing of Ratcliffe and his team. He insists he is the right man for the job, responding "absolutely" when questioned by Sky Sports post-match.

Image: Getty Images) Getty Images)

He burdened the blame for the loss, but did also contribute their issues at the back to missing seven sidelined defenders. Ten Hag added: "I will keep fighting. I prepared the team in the best way I could do. It was not good enough - by far not good enough - I have to take the responsibility for that.

"But I will find energy and I will prepare them for Sunday's game [against Arsenal ]. At the end of the day I have to do it with the players who are available. All season we have huge problems and right now this is the fourth defeat in this calendar year, which is not a lot.

"Every time we had huge problems and many times we saw it out, today we didn't. If the right players are there and available, we have a good squad, but we missed almost a whole back line and then we have problems."

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