Van Gaal set sight on overtaking Manchester City

VAN Gaal’s Manchester United strengthened their Champions League aspirations with a 3-1 victory over Aston Villa at Old Trafford on Saturday.

The win moved United ahead of their ‘noisy neighbours’ into third position and they will stay there if City lose at Crystal Palace on Monday.

The most significant impact of Saturday’s result related to Liverpool, however.

Three weeks ago Liverpool were two points behind United but they now lie eight points adrift after damaging back-to-back defeats at Old Trafford and at Arsenal, where they lost 4-1 on Saturday lunchtime.

With United on such good form, Van Gaal is optimistic about not only qualifying for the Champions League, but finishing as high as second or third in the standings.

“We can look up in the table. The next match is for the second position or the third, I think,” the United boss told MUTV.

“It is still a rat race but we have given a blow to Liverpool, they lost again and so did Southampton so it’s a big gap, but we have to play against the top three (around us).”

As Van Gaal points out, United have to play Chelsea, Arsenal and City in their final seven games.

A few weeks ago, when United were grinding out results with unimaginative and quite often dull football, those fixtures would have been viewed with fear.