Manchester United captain Wayne Rooney has admitted that the club's focus must now be on winning the Europa League after their top-four hopes were dealt another blow on Saturday.
Louis van Gaal's men suffered a surprise 2-1 defeat at Sunderland in the day's early kickoff to leave them six points adrift of fourth-placed Manchester City, who have a game in hand.
"I don't know how it will work out, but it will be difficult to get into the top four now," Rooney told Sky Sports News after the match.
"It might be that the Europa League is the way to get into the Champions League. We didn't want to be in the Europa League. But now we'll have to try to win it and start again on Thursday in that competition.
"It's a sad day for us. It was disappointing in terms of losing three points, but somehow we have to try to move on."
United, who are the bookmakers' second favourites to win the Europa League behind Borussia Dortmund, travel to Danish side FC Midtjylland for the first leg of their round-of-32 encounter this Thursday.
Neil Wilkes
