Manchester United Are Back (but don’t place any bets yet)
What an electric atmosphere a single win can create. Since a trouncing defeat at the hands of Manchester City back on September 14th, United have won 3 of their last 4 games in the Premier League.
The positive run of form started with an electric contest with Chelsea at Old Trafford which saw both sides reduced to 10 men after a straight red card in the 5th minute from the Blues’ shot-stopper Robert Sanchez followed by a second yellow from uncle Casemiro just before the stroke of halftime. Though they conceded a late goal from a corner headed in by Trevor Chalobah, the Red Devils were able to hold onto the 2 goals they had blitzed past a reduced Chelsea squad in the first half. The narrative after the game was not that of a convincing win, but yet again that Amorim’s system could only function against handicapped circumstances.
The following matchday did little to dissuade arguments that Amorim’s system wasn’t functioning properly. Manchester United sunk to a demoralizing 3-1 loss to Brentford at the Gtech stadium, with the only real bright spot being Benjamin Sesko’s first, albeit scrappy, goal for the club. Hate seems to pile more easily on the Red Devils, and the media circus had their day claiming that Amorim was out of his depth and raising concerns over his presiding over “the worst Manchester United squad in history”.
Pressure makes diamonds, and a resolute 2-0 win over Sunderland coincided with the first major change of the season to the starting 11. Senne Lammens, the Belgian prodigy with the highest save percentage in Europe last season, replaced the somewhat shaky Altay Bayindir, who had already deputized for the dubious and borderline ominous Andre Onana. Not since Fabian Barthez had a keeper been so unanimously maligned by the United faithful, and rightly so. With what seemed like more errors than clean sheets, Onana has finally found his level for Trabzonspor in the Turkish top-flight. A comedy of errors followed whenever he stepped foot onto the pitch at Old Trafford, and the brilliant move to let all-timer David de Gea leave in his stead should have been met with a termination of employment for sabotage. Jokes aside, a grave error of that sort cannot be allowed to happen on such a regular basis. For all the scrutiny that Amorim’s side has come under, it has been astounding to see the maturity from some of the United squad in the face of tirades from the media. Chiefly, the resurgence of Harry Maguire from meme to cult hero has been heartwarming.
Speaking of Slabhead the living legend, his performance against a lackluster Liverpool side was essential to Manchester United securing their 3rd out of a 4 possible wins in this period. A lightning-quick goal from the mercurial Bryan Mbuemo within the first minute of game completely deflated Liverpool’s hopes of averting a 4th successive defeat in all competitions. United’s best defender was their goalpost, with winger Cody Gakpo striking the bar a whopping 3 times throughout the intense affair, though came away from a contest with a rightly earned goal. Questions will be asked of figures like Virgil Van Dijk, who seemed to shy away from his duties shortly after injuring Mac Allister in the build up of the opener. However, the same rash judgement typically leveraged against Manchester United should not be used to paint Liverpool’s performance with one stroke of generalization. Both sides missed 5 chances total during the contest, with Liverpool edging possession and creating a superior 2.75 xG to United’s 1.34 xG. To paraphrase the enigmatic Roy Keane however, the only stat that matters is the scoreline.
We’ve seen Manchester United string together a few convincing performances in a row for the first time in a long while, and although they aren’t secure enough to count on just yet, more of these same results could see them end the season closer to European competition spots than many would have thought based on their first few weeks of the season. Continue to be cautiously optimistic about one of football’s sleeping giants who have hibernated for far too long.
