On Sunday 28th November, we saw Manchester draw 1-1 against Chelsea at Stamford Bridge. Here are five things we learnt.
2 points dropped
Most of us, myself included, went into this game with very low expectations. And if you asked most United fans before kick-off, I’m sure they’d have happily taken a draw. But the way that it all happened just felt that bit more disappointing. The fact that we did pretty well in keeping them out of the goals in the first half. And the way that we got our opening goal was brilliant. The pressing of both Rashford and Sancho was fantastic. Of course, it always hurts more when you draw after scoring first. But when their goal comes from the softest of soft penalties, it just rubs salt in the wound. But as I said, in the grand scheme of things coming away from Stamford Bridge with one point isn’t the worst thing in the world.
Stamford Bridge Success
A stat that has been circulating after this game is that Man United are now 12 away games in London undefeated. Before anyone says it, Watford does not count as London. But more so than that United have turned Stamford Bridge into something of pretty happy hunting ground. United are undefeated in our last 6 visits to Stamford Bridge. While these kinds of stats don’t tend to tell us a great deal. What it does say is that United can still get results against the big teams. And after the month or so we’ve had, that is something that’s nice to be reminded of.
Rangnick Preview
With the appointment of Ralf Rangnick as interim manager now officially confirmed by the club speculation has amped up on whether he had influence on the games we have seen under Carrick. The way that we set up against Chelsea could be very similar to how we try and play under Rangnick. The industrious midfield, the high-energy and the pressing. All of these are trademarks of Rangnick’s style. We might not see this exact formation and there might be tweaks to the personnel. But in terms of an overall spirit of the performance I think this could be very similar to what we have to look forward to under our new German manager.
Conundrum Ronaldo
Leading on from the last point slightly, there has been speculation about whether or not Ronaldo will “work” under this new style that Rangnick will most likely bring. Last night, on SkySports, Roy Keane and Jamie Carragher had something of a debate about whether or not it was a mistake to buy Ronaldo. I’m not going to go into exactly what each of them said, but both of them raised some interesting points. I definitely don’t think it was a mistake to buy Ronaldo. If a player of that nature becomes available, you buy them, it is as simple as that. It definitely wasn’t planned, but you simply cannot miss out on an opportunity like that.
Carrick, obviously, came under some scrutiny for his decision to not start Ronaldo. Ordinarily, you’d think that scrutiny would be deserved. Why would you not start arguably the greatest player of all time in such a big game? But he might have had a point. When Rashford and Sancho were our front two we played quite well. There was a period of time after Sancho scored, when you thought the momentum was just slightly swinging in our favour. But when Ronaldo came on it didn’t really seem to blend quite as well. I’m not saying that you shouldn’t bring Cristiano Ronaldo on, that would be lunacy. But, there is definitely an issue here. Hopefully, Rangnick can be the man that comes in and figures out how to fit Ronaldo into this team and get everyone playing their best football.
Bruno Slump
Yesterday Bruno Fernandes did not put in a good performance. He looked sloppy, he gave the ball away a lot and was just not at the races at all. Obviously, that is something that you cannot afford in such a big game. But the worst thing is that those same things can be said of quite a few of Bruno’s recent performances. We all know how good he can be and has been for United in the past. But in this period where we’ve seen United be really poor. Bruno has not been the one to try and drag us through. If anything we have seen some of the worst performances in a United shirt from Bruno in this time. And it gets to the point where you have to question whether it’s the right call to start him in these big games.
Again this is something that hopefully, Rangnick can come in, assess the situation for himself and work out what the best plan will be for United going forward. Because we can’t be doing the same thing and expect different results. Yes, we’ve seen improvements in the last two matches under Carrick. And we’ve seen things that we generally didn’t tend to see under Ole. But there are definitely still some of those same issues present. And hopefully, Rangnick can come in and try and fix them and get United back on track.