24 February 2023 , 09:00
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Manchester United boss Erik ten Hag clearly thinks very highly of Barcelona star Frenkie de Jong and this was shown yet again by his comments surrounding Fred's performance on Thursday night.
The Red Devils spent the entirety of last summer trying to pry De Jong away from the Camp Nou to no avail, but it was evident how much admiration Ten Hag has for his former Ajax ace when United hosted Barcelona at Old Trafford. The two teams played out a 2-2 thriller in the first leg of their Europa League round-of-32 clash last week and the tie was evenly balanced ahead of the second leg.
United ran out 2-1 winners on their own patch to dump De Jong and Barcelona out of the competition, but Ten Hag's praise for Fred following the full-time whistle proves just what he thinks of the Dutch midfield maestro.
Pressed for comment on the performance of the ex-Shakhtar Donetsk ace, Ten Hag replied: "Fred? His role was to stop Frenkie de Jong, he was like a ‘mosquito’ all over him - he did it."
Assigning one of his players the task of simply trying to stop the influence of a direct opponent is a compliment to De Jong given Ten Hag clearly feels the Barcelona ace could cause havoc if not attended to.
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It is an added bonus that Fred actually went beyond what was asked of him and volleyed his side level to cancel out Robert Lewandowski's penalty and start a dramatic comeback.
Fred was arguably Man United's standout performer against Barcelona (Robbie Jay Barratt - AMA/Getty Images)HAVE YOUR SAY! Was Fred man of the match against Barcelona? Comment below
Ten Hag added: "Last week he gave a brilliant assist for Rashy (Marcus Rashford) and today he scored a goal, brilliant performance."
The Brazilian provided energy in abundance and in truth Barcelona found his relentless pressing difficult to deal with, particularly in the second half when Fred came into his own.
The United midfielder explained how Ten Hag inspired such a stellar second-half showing from his players, telling BT Sport: "He said in the first half that we didn't play like how we [normally] play.
"But in the second half we were much better, we started very well and scored early.
"We had a good talk at half-time with the coach, we changed our minds at half-time and the second half went very well."
Fred's display was so good the Old Trafford faithful couldn't help but sing his name come full-time and the midfielder addressed the chants during his post-match media duties.
"It is very good to hear my name from the fans," added the 29-year-old. "We played a good game today so we need to keep it going."