Juan Mata: I felt like giving this up during Man Utd's drought

JUAN MATA has revealed he felt like giving up on his popular blog during Manchester United's poor run of results.

 

Juan Mata says Manchester United are ready to embrace 2016 after a difficult year

 

Mata writes a regular Monday post on his personal blog in which he analyses and comments on the previous weekend.

The Spaniard remains a key player at Old Trafford and has started their last eight outings - including Saturday's victory over Swansea that ended an eight-game winless run.

And Mata said that during United's win drought he considered giving up on writing.

 

"I want to start the first post of the year by wishing you a happy 2016 and saying thanks to all for reading this blog every Monday, no matter what the score in the latest game is," Mata wrote.

"I have been posting week after week (with the exception of the summer holidays) for four years and I keep seeing this as a good habit, although there were weeks when I didn’t feel like writing, and I know that the wound of a bad result can’t be healed just with words.

"At last I can write a post feeling that we’ve done our duty during the weekend. I was looking forward to it.

"Luckily, I feel that we have started 2016 with energy and that our negative streak (much longer than it should be) has been left behind."

 

Anthony Martial opened the scoring against Swansea on Saturday before Wayne Rooney secured the points after Gylfi Sigurdsson had equalised.

The result moved United up to fifth in the Premier League, three points off fourth-place Tottenham, heading into their FA Cup third-round clash with Sheffield United.

"Many of you have asked about how we felt as the games went by and the team didn’t win," Mata added.

 

"I have to say that our only thought was to work well day after day, stay focused and try to revert this situation.

"In our last game of 2015, against Chelsea [0-0], I think everybody saw what I’m talking about. There was dynamism, courage and energy although we couldn’t win.

"Finally, we did it on Saturday against Swansea. You could see how tough it was, but I think we deserved the three points.

"I hope this is going to be the start of a good run of results. It depends on us.

"They were a difficult opponent with good players who have made things tough for us in the last few seasons, but this time we were able to win so we start 2016 in the best possible way."