Erik ten Hag claims his Manchester United stars are suffering from ‘overload’

Erik ten Hag has warned that his players are suffering from an ‘overload’ of work this season as he confirmed that Antony, Scott McTominay and Anthony Martial and are set to miss the next two games against Leeds and Barcelona.

The three players have joined long-term casualties Christian Eriksen and Donny van de Beek on the injury list. Ten Hag was also without Aaron Wan-Bissaka through illness against Leeds at Old Trafford in midweek while Casemiro started a three-match domestic ban.

As United prepare to meet their rivals again at Elland Road on Sunday before flying to Spain for the first leg of a Europa League playoff against Barca, Ten Hag gave a bleak update on the availability of Martial, Antony and McTominay.

‘We have some days, obviously, but I don’t expect it and until now I don’t see any new problems coming up,’ he said about the trip to Leeds. And Barca? ‘I think same answer. I can’t say for 100 per cent but I don’t expect it.’

Although the injuries to Eriksen and Van de Beek were the result of tackles, and Martial has hardly featured due to a succession of knocks, Ten Hag is concerned that United’s other fitness problems have been caused by a bloated fixture list made worse by a mid-season World Cup which knocked six weeks out of the domestic calendar.

Antony will miss matches against Leeds and Barcelona after suffering an injury

Erik ten Hag has concerns the intense fixture list is overloading the Manchester United squad

United, who are still challenging in four competitions, face eight games in February and have already had to re-arrange their home match against Brentford after reaching the Carabao Cup final.

More changes will have to be made if they beat Barca to reach the Europa League last 16, and Ten Hag’s side are also through to the FA Cup fifth round.

‘Definitely, it’s a tough season,’ he added. ‘With the World Cup in between there’s a lot of load – overload – on the players, that’s quite clear. That process is already longer term coming on, that the load on the players is too much.

‘Christian Eriksen, you can’t put that under that reason. Martial, you can’t put that under that reason. It’s really individual, how we can see it and how we find reasons why things happen. But also, if you play top football, you go across limits and injuries will come up. That’s also a normal issue, I would say.’

The situation forced Ten Hag into a reshuffle against Leeds and it seemed to impact United as they fell two goals behind before fighting back for a 2-2 draw.

Alejandro Garnacho replaced Antony with Marcus Rashford switching to the right wing. Diogo Dalot came in for Wan-Bissaka at right-back, while new loan signing Marcel Sabitzer made his full debut in place of Casemiro.

‘It’s not easy,’ said Ten Hag. ‘You have to replace some players, so the routines are not there, it’s obvious.

‘So we had the combination on the right last week, that worked really well with Aaron and Antony, and now it was a new combination (Dalot and Rashford).

‘In the holding midfield position, we had to bring another player (Sabitzer) in there. Christian Eriksen falls away so the whole midfield construction is new and that takes time to get in the routines again. It takes games and that was obvious.’