Roy Keane and Gary Neville had differing levels of sympathy when it came to analysing Manchester United's derby defeat to Manchester City on Wednesday night.
Two second half goals from Bernardo Silva and Leroy Sane proved enough to put City one step closer to defending their title as they returned to the top of the Premier League table.
For United the defeat was their seventh in nine games and Keane, exasperated in his body language sat in the Sky Sports studio, pulled no punches in his assessment.
Gary Neville and Roy Keane didn't see eye to eye as tensions rose after the Manchester derby
The former United team-mates had differing opinions when it came to effort levels of the side
Neville took some pride from United's quick start but found himself quickly shot down by former team-mate Keane who was in no mood to let United's current stars off the hook.
'City in the first half an hour was as sloppy as I've seen them,' Neville said. 'They set such high standards, it's about precision, quality of passes. United played a decent game. That's as good as United have got.
But Keane, furious with the lack of desire shown by United against their city rivals, interjected.
Keane's body language included him rolling his eyes as Neville tried to defend some players
Luke Shaw did not do enough in Keane's opinion to prevent Bernardo Silva opening the scoring
'They've had one shot on target Gary, one shot on target at home.'
'That's that team!' Neville fired back. 'What we saw there tonight between United and City was the gulf in class between the two teams.
'I think that's everything United have got. I don't think I looked at any player on that pitch and thought they could've given more. That's what they are. De Gea to be fair, he's not normally like this.'
Neville was the most forgiving of United on the four-man panel assembled by Sky for the crucial derby game with Keane and Graeme Souness not passing up the opportunity to dig out United.
In no mood to bite his tongue, the outspoken Keane fired back at Neville moments after the initial assessments when the former United full-back said Ole Gunnar Solskjaer's players 'gave their all' to prevent conceding the two goals.
'You're saying they gave it their all,' Keane said, his annoyance at his colleague's comments becoming increasingly obvious in his tone of voice when conversation turned to Brazilian midfielder Fred.
'That's cheating, what's (Fred) done is cheating, letting the guy run off him.'
Much of Keane's criticisms were levelled at Brazilian midfielder Fred for his role in second goal
Neville continued to stick to his points as he argued that Fred does commit to his challenges
Neville refused to bow down to Keane's verdict and continued to persist with his sentiments that both Fred and Luke Shaw could not have given more over
