‘Disappointing’ \u2013 Granit Xhaka and Dan Ballard send message to Sunderland fans after Manchester United defeat<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Sunderland Trio Thank Fans After 2\u20130 Loss to Manchester United<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Sunderland captain Granit Xhaka, defender Omar Alderete, and centre-back Dan Ballard have expressed gratitude to fans after their 2\u20130 Premier League defeat against Manchester United at Old Trafford.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Despite the loss \u2014 only their second of the season \u2014 the players took to social media to thank the travelling supporters, who once again filled the away section.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Xhaka, who captained the side and played on after an early head collision with Alderete, posted:
“A disappointing afternoon, but we\u2019ll keep fighting. Thank you all for your amazing support!”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Ballard, who entered the game in the first half as part of a tactical change, wrote:
“We go again after the break,” tagging the club\u2019s official account.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Alderete also addressed fans, writing:
“It wasn\u2019t the match we were expecting! We competed, but it didn\u2019t go our way. We\u2019ll work to correct our mistakes. See you in the next one.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Goals from Mason Mount and Benjamin \u0160e\u0161ko secured the win for United in the first half, as R\u00e9gis Le Bris\u2019 Sunderland side struggled to break through.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\ud83d\udde3\ufe0f Amorim on United\u2019s Win: \u201cA Step in the Right Direction\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Manchester United manager Ruben Amorim praised his team’s composure and defensive effort in what he called a \u201cstep in the right direction\u201d after a difficult start to the season.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“We didn\u2019t play well for the full 90, but we were focused,” Amorim said. “The clean sheet is very important. We managed the game well in the second half and killed their momentum.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He also commended goalkeeper Senne Lammens for a solid performance, noting the team\u2019s overall focus helped him succeed against a possession-heavy Sunderland side.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Amorim highlighted Amad Diallo\u2019s return to the starting XI as \u201cmassive\u201d and acknowledged that the upcoming international break could stall momentum.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cMy biggest frustration,\u201d he added, \u201cis not seeing the same performance levels away from home. But today, even when we didn\u2019t play well, we didn\u2019t allow them to either \u2014 that\u2019s what top teams do across a season.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"‘Disappointing’ \u2013 Granit Xhaka and Dan Ballard send message to Sunderland fans after Manchester United defeat\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1465,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[231,227,13],"class_list":{"0":"post-1466","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-uncategorized","8":"tag-dan-ballard","9":"tag-granit-xhaka","10":"tag-sunderland"},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/legitsportnews.com.ng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/images-17-25.jpeg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/legitsportnews.com.ng\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1466","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/legitsportnews.com.ng\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/legitsportnews.com.ng\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/legitsportnews.com.ng\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/legitsportnews.com.ng\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1466"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/legitsportnews.com.ng\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1466\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1467,"href":"https:\/\/legitsportnews.com.ng\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1466\/revisions\/1467"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/legitsportnews.com.ng\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1465"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/legitsportnews.com.ng\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1466"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/legitsportnews.com.ng\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1466"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/legitsportnews.com.ng\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1466"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}