Manchester United manager Ole Gunnar Solskjaer's happiness at making it through to the FA Cup fourth round was tinged by disappointment at his much-changed side's display against Watford.

Whitehaven's Dean Henderson was one of just a few players who retained their starting spot after a galling loss to rivals Manchester City in Wednesday's Carabao Cup semi-final.

Scott McTominay's early header secured a 1-0 win against Sky Bet Championship opposition in Saturday evening's third-round encounter.

United flew out of the blocks at an empty Old Trafford but dropped off markedly, with the nine players brought into the side leading to a lack of fluency and unconvincing display.

"Very happy to get through," Solskjaer said. "We started very brightly.

"I expected it to be other way round - that we needed 15-20 minutes to get going and find our rhythm.

"But after a very good start we lost our shape, we lost too many balls.

"We lost it easily. It was like we started making difficult decisions to try and complicate things and maybe show the manager that 'I want to play in the next game'.

"I know they're good players so they didn't have to do that, but we're through. That's the main thing."

Donny Van De Beek, Brandon Williams and Jesse Lingard were among the alterations, with Henderson and McTominay the only players retaining a starting spot from the City loss.

The latter proved the difference on Saturday evening, when leading United out as captain for the first time.

"He's got great character, good attitude," Solskjaer said of academy graduate McTominay. "He comes in every day, does the right things, lives his life properly, wants to be the best he can be and he's not afraid to be vocal.

"He always, always goes out there to give his best. Never shirks a tackle. Nothing.

"He's got everything a leader has to have, so I just wanted to test him today how he reacted because he always done that anyway.

"But I gave him the armband to see if there was any change in him but luckily there wasn't."