Rio Ferdinand believes that Manchester United must improve defensively if they are to regain their Premier League title.

The Red Devils’ Boxing Day win over Newcastle saw their lead at the summit of the table extended to seven points, with local rivals Manchester City losing to Sunderland.

Although they secured all three points, United dropped behind three times to the Magpies, before Javier Hernandez’s late winner.

Sir Alex Ferguson’s men have recovered from a losing position on eight occasions in the league this term, and whilst Ferdinand maintains that it’s nice to be victorious, he feels that they must improve their defensive record:

“When you’re conceding goals at any level, you want to stop it,” he is quoted by The Mirror.

“We’ve let in far too many goals and need to change that.

“We have to make a big effort to push on from a good position. If we’re going to maintain where we are, we have to sort ourselves out.

“We seem to make sure the punters get their money’s worth when they come to the ground at the moment.”

He went praise the character shown by the team to take all three points against Newcastle:

“But it was a great show of character from the lads at the start of a really busy schedule.

“It was really important to get the win, no matter how we did it.”