Manchester United are winning games by playing badly and that's frightening

No matter if United get better sooner or later, they've won five games on the bounce, and by playing this badly and winning, this team are building a fear factor again.

Having a flat-mate who's a Southampton fan, I felt for him.

United had no right to win that game. They shouldn't have, and they wouldn't have last season.

As I went on Twitter during the game, the David Moyes argument creeped up once more:

"If Moyes was in charge, he'd be slated for this performance, blah blah blah."

That's not the point. The way United play in the first half of the season isn't important, it's winning.

That's what Moyes wasn't doing.

In a game such as against Southampton under Moyes, United would play badly, and draw or most of the time, lose.

Under Louis van Gaal, the players seem to have the confidence and determination that they'll win a game, no matter how bad or bleak the situation looks.

Forget the last five games, this was obvious in the Manchester City defeat when they had 10 men, and they still took their rivals all the way, leaving themselves disappointed they didn't at least get a draw.

It also doesn't need to be emphasised how much of an impact injuries have had on United's season.

With players such as Di Maria, Blind, Jones and Rafael all out, imagine when they're back!

If United can stay in touch of Manchester City and Chelsea after Christmas and cement their third place, there's no reason why can't push on in January and fight for the title.

Regardless if they add a few faces, (not saying it's necessarily needed), this team is good enough to compete at the top, especially with the rest of the Premier League being... below average so far this season.

However, despite United's winning form being such a plus by playing badly, they must urgently start playing well.

They play a Liverpool side on Sunday who've just been knocked out of the Champions League, and although they have injuries, they always raise their game against United.

Grinding out this result won't work at Old Trafford.

Go all out or go home, because this isn't going to be like a pub match, as Gary Neville claims, I expect it to be a high intensity match with Liverpool returning back to form, whether United will match them... well we'll have to see.