1. Defence

Naturally, with Romero and VDV back, all eyes were on the Back Four from the start, closely observing the two of them to make sure every component was in perfect operating order. But the first half’s events, in particular, turned the focus away from the central two and towards their right, where Pedro Porro repeatedly—and not for the first time this season—achieved the amazing feat of somehow looking outnumbered in one-on-one situations.

AANP is up late into the night worrying about this situation where our back four are defending narrowly and giving the opposition’s left wingers as much room as they want. It is understood that Ange-ball typically demands Porro to hover well forward of the centre backs when we are in possession; hence, he is typically a few yards out of position when we lose the ball and counterattack. When one realises that their opponents have caught on, they usually try to push someone forward into the open spot while writing the words “Make hay” on their notebook.

So, I guess we’ll simply have to accept that we’ll be a little exposed there unless we secretly send a twelfth player out in the right-back area and bite the bullet to some extent. Still, though. It would seem reasonable to throw a reinforcement or two in Porro’s direction after the other attacker is assessing him. To everyone’s credit, Romero handled this appropriately in the second half, clearly seeing it as urgent to toddle over and provide some background muscle to Porro’s interactions with Rashford or whoever.

But the harm was already done. Actually, twice. Rashford’s eyes glowed in the first half, and any opposition forward with a trick or two in his box seemed to have a 50/50 chance of beating Porro and dealing some harm. A solitary Porro was undoubtedly a lamb taking a few frightened gulps, even though it wasn’t quite a lamb to the abattoir.

Mightily frustrating that was too, because for those counter-attacks concentrated down on their left or our right, I didn’t think United had anything about them. To clear up any confusion, Porro’s delivery occasionally makes the gullible bystander utterly ecstatic; thus, this is in no way a request for harsh punishment against the good-natured young bean.

Returning to VDV and Romero, their simple presence helped to calm an AANP who had been acting a little tense these past few months. Romero had a few chances to terminate a United effort that was gaining traction with a well-timed and powerful size nine, but he missed them. It was nice to see VDV back, as they demonstrated that they still knew how to transition quickly from trot to sprint.

Nevertheless, neither was infallible. If Romero had a complaint, it would be about whether he could have done more to stop the opening goal. He also, predictably, seized the chance to kill a United player about halfway through. Regarding VDV, he appeared to be obsessed with dribbling past a United striker just outside our own area during a moment in the first half. He vanished into a small space and needed a passing Bentancur to dust him off.

However, overall, the two played excellent defence and occasionally showed great ball control, not the least of which was Romero’s brilliant pass to Skipp through the middle, which started our second goal. Good

2. The Midfield

The AANP was somewhat unaware of how light we were in the middle of the pitch, but when the cast list was revealed and names like “Hojbjerg” and “Skipp” were written next to “Bentancur,” the colour faded from their faces.

The initial exchanges brought a momentary break to the sinking of spirits, but were soon replaced by a somewhat astonished eyebrow lift as I attempted to process the realisation that young Skipp appeared to be the most forward-thinking member of the group. I guess someone had to do it, and Skipp is nothing if not cooperative.

His performance was quite typical of Skipp, and I felt it was best captured by his part in our second goal. He was so full of energy when he received Romero’s pass and took off over halfway, but he almost ruined the whole thing by sending his own pass to the wrong side of Werner.

To his credit, Skipp did, at the close of the first half, lob one of the season’s most exquisite passes, perfectly blasting a first-time volley from right of centre out towards the left flank, for an appreciative companion to gallop onto without slowing down. With a toast to that one, AANP However, this kind of exceptional occasion belonged more to the category of “exception” than “normal.”

Naturally, Bentancur purred through it all, as one might anticipate. I felt it was a very good description of him when I saw the guy on TV call him “knitting things together.”

 

And he accomplished his goal in a really stunning way. Fool that I am, I was already throwing my hands up in the air, furious at what I considered to be a blown chance, when he chose to take a second forward touch in the United six-yard box instead of taking a quick shot. I ought to have been more aware. Bentancur demonstrated his complete mastery over the situation by sharply lashing the object into the net’s ceiling with his third stroke.

Hojbjerg, the third member of the midfield trio, typically scores somewhere in the middle of “Good” and “Needs Improvement.” He got off to a really good start, in my opinion, and as a result, AANP had one of his better days. He appeared to use the ball wisely enough, helped as anyone would be by Bentancur’s presence beside him. However, in the later phases, I felt he somewhat lost sight of the exercise’s goal and started scattering misplaced passes and other miscellaneous objects all over the pitch.

 

Aside from the individual performances, there was a noticeable lack of creativity in the midfield. However, I suppose that when you take a perfectly good team and remove the three main suspects in the Making Things Happen From The Centre department, you should be prepared for some clever passing and perplexing plays.

 

3. Werner

There was a persistent feeling that, in terms of final third quality, the well was a touch dry, even if there was some lovely fluid passing from the rear-guard mob to the attacking mob, giving the idea that our heroes were the better team overall.

Young Johnson has been putting in a lot of effort over the past several months, but he always ends up making a complete mess of the work, and today he made sure that everyone knew how he felt about this habit. Though it’s fair to say that he has contributed in recent weeks with a number of crucial passes that have resulted in goals, as well as a few paintbrush strokes from the woodwork,

Similarly, Senor Gil is not the kind of huevo from whom one should anticipate a high calibre of final product. Not for want of trying, of course, but the more one watches Gil and Johnson’s attempted crosses miss their mark, the more one checks the Asian Cup fixture list.

Werner stepped out of this strange mixture. In fact, he accomplished almost everything that was expected of him, both in terms of accomplishments and shortcomings. He immediately showed that he was the kind of person who would gladly rush to shut down a rival if doing so would result in a stage or two later, in a transfer of possession later on.

We occasionally caught a glimpse of the pace at which he claims to be able to run 100 metres in 11 seconds—a statistic that really astounded me. His shots, predictably enough, panned in every direction but the net, which delivered exactly what was promised.

Still, he ran a clean race, laying a good foundation for Bentancur’s shot and overall giving off the impression that he knew the course well. He followed his guy when it was right, went outside, cut a hole in the wall, or just allowed common sense to prevail and delegated the work to a neighbouring buddy. All of this makes perfect sense, and as his fitness improves and he has a better understanding of Ange-ball, one would anticipate

In the past, a point at Old Trafford would definitely lead to some heartfelt handshakes, but this one will leave AANP looking grumpy as hell for the remainder of the night. Our team performed somewhat better in the first half and much better in the second, so mathematically speaking, we should have won by about 1.5 goals. There have been two omissions, and I refuse to accept any counterarguments.

 

Nevertheless, the players should be applauded for this one rather than criticised because there were players who were absent, players who were back, and players who made their debuts. We also lost twice (away from home). I can imagine that the feeling of choice deep within the halls of power is.