Manchester United left-back Luke Shaw has spoken out the side’s eagerness to kick their domestic season off with a bang when their season gets underway against Crystal Palace on September 19.
Shaw, 25, has been with United since 2014 when he joined from south coast Southampton in a move which cost the Reds £33.75m, as per TransferMarkt.
The English defender has gone onto feature 132 times for United in a six year spell which has seen him lift the Europa League and Carabao Cup.
Shaw and his United team-mates are currently preparing for their season opener next weekend when they will host Crystal Palace at Old Trafford. United’s domestic campaign has been delayed by one week due to their participation in the latter stages of last season’s Europa League which was disrupted by the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.
In preparation for next weekend’s clash United played a pre-season warm-up friendly yesterday against Dean Smith’s Aston Villa which they went onto lose 1-0.
Speaking ahead of the Reds’ crucial clash next weekend, as quoted by ManUtd.com, Shaw spoke about yesterday’s friendly, he said: “Obviously it’s a friendly but I’m disappointed we didn’t win and we lost. I’m really disappointed, to be honest.
“We create opportunities but struggle at times to find the back of the net. As someone with the [playing] experience he has, in that sort of position, the manager is really on to the players about that in training, trying to improve that.
“But the main focus today was obviously getting minutes in the tank. It has been a very disjointed pre-season really.
“At the start of pre-season, there were only four of us training, with what’s going on at the moment, the quarantines and the internationals, so it was very difficult for us.”
Shaw will be glad to have been back in action yesterday after a nasty ankle ruled him out for the back end of last season, speaking on his own conditioning, Shaw said: “I feel really good. I worked really hard over the short time everyone had off and I’m ready to go.
“We’ve trained hard and this game was really about minutes and getting ready for next week.
“We had a lot of players out and a lot of young players, who hadn’t been training with us. They just came with us today and played well when they got the chance.
“Hopefully, the [absent players] will all get back for [training on] Monday. We’re working hard. We will be ready next week.”
Speaking about the unusual season which is still being impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic, Shaw said: “It’s a very weird feeling, especially for me. I don’t feel I’ve had much time off. I haven’t, to be honest!
“But this is life sometimes. You need to be ready, whatever happens, and it’s one of those scenarios where we have a lot of world-class players we’re looking forward to getting back [in training] on Monday.
“We’re ready for the season. We need to be strong and focused on winning trophies, not getting into the top four. A club like us should be winning trophies.”
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