Really great result yesterday for Manchester United even if oddly the performance was slightly down on what they have been so far this season.
The red cards changed the game and while I’m happy with the result, I do wonder how the game might have played out if both teams kept all 11 players on the pitch. I didn’t think the Ref did a good job at all, giving out yellow cards for some soft challenges that probably only merited a talking to. While other more cynical challenges went without a booking. The weather didn’t help and I think some of the Chelsea players were obviously aggrieved and you saw that in some of their challenges.
However, at this point in the season all we need is wins under our belt, we need them more than we need good performances.
As for the players, MdL has been a player who I think has flown under the radar during his United career so far and as such is underrated by a lot of our fans. This season he has been imperious, strong in the tackle and in the air, tactically intelligent with him stepping up into midfield at times during games, and his passing range has been very underrated.
Bruno also continues to step up and take those game winning moments, even if he is still not adapted to playing deeper. I’m a little disappointed not to have seen him return to playing further forward while Cunha and Mount have been out. I think the City game would have gone very differently if he had been moved forward with one of Ugarte or Mainoo coming in in the deeper role. But I also understand why the manager persists with playing him deeper so that he can learn to fully adapt to that role if that is to be his role in the team moving forward.
Bayindir I thought was solid and is maybe starting to grow into the role. Maybe he just needed backing to build his confidence. I still don’t see him as the long term option, but he has shown that he can perform well enough, let’s hope he does so consistently.
Sesko you can see that he is starting to get his role a bit better, I thought his flick on for Mbeumo that lead to Sanchez being sent off is exactly why he can be so useful in this team. He still needs to find his feet in the league and I’m sure once he gets his first goal he’ll start to improve in front of goal. We still haven’t been able to see the managers preferred front three start a game together and build those relationships and link up play. This was also a hard game for any striker once Chelsea went down to 10 men and decided to go super defensive with a back 5 with a midfield three in front of them. Very little space for any striker in that situation.
Finally, while I fully understand the thought process behind bringing on the more defensively capable Ugarte once Casemiro was sent off, I was frustrated to not see Mainoo given the nod. I get that Ugarte offers more defensive coverage, but he is also not very positionally disciplined, which when playing alongside Bruno who is also not positionally disciplined did lead to more space opening up in midfield, especially on the transition. I think Mainoo would have been able to offer more control of a game that was threatening to become very disjointed, and potentially very transitional.
Either way we got the result, so I can’t complain too much. Let’s hope we can pick up wins against Brentford and Sunderland and suddenly we will be in a much better position. Onwards and upwards.