Onana reveals he was eager to play villain during Man Utd's penalty shootout

Andre Onana revealed he was eager to provoke Coventry City’s players during the penalty shootout to give Manchester United a crucial advantage after knowing his yellow card during the match had been ‘cancelled’.

Onana was booked for what referee Robert Jones deemed time wasting during the 120 minutes that preceded a dramatic shootout, won 4-2 by United after misses from Callum O’Hare and Ben Sheaf for Coventry.

The Cameroonian was later booked during the shootout, similar to Aston Villa’s Emiliano Martinez during their Europa Conference League win over Lille on Thursday, and the United goalkeeper said he was emboldened to play the villain when he was made ‘aware of the rules’.

‘Before the penalties I knew that my first yellow card had been cancelled so I was aware of the rules,’ he said, with a grin on his face.

‘I had to make some provocation to some players and to use my tricks to win the game, so I’m happy for that.’

While Onana was able to crack a smile at his penalty shootout antics, which paid off as they had days earlier in France for Martinez, he was much more serious when asked how this game got away from United when they cruised to a 3-0 lead.

‘We have a big responsibility,’ he said.

‘Me, I start with myself, like I always say we are here to take all the bullets, you know? When things are not going good I will point fingers to big players, you know? Me, Bruno [Fernandes], Harry [Maguire], we have a big responsibility, of course.

‘Everything was under control and in the end we gave goals away. It’s more [on] us than other people.’

He added: ‘It’s a mixed feeling, of course. The most important thing is the victory, that we won.

‘It’s a difficult situation because we had the game under control and with some individual