It was Fernandes

One man made the difference on a day that was a microcosm of the past year

SEVEN ASIDES
Premier League
United 2, Palace 1

United began this game as if determined to prove that they can play badly even under a good manager. The first half-hour was like most of last season – perplexing and depressing. Leny Yoro switched off at a routine corner, after coping with many tougher situations at Everton. Diogo Dalot forgot how to pass, Casemiro went missing in midfield, Harry Maguire was passing sideways, nobody was making runs, Benjamin Sesko might as well have stayed on the bench. I was right at the top of the Ferguson stand, where the chants soon gave way to groans.

But then something changed. Sad as it was to see Luke Shaw back in his old role as the guy who goes off, it did help when Noussair Mazraoui came on, with his tidy touches and tireless running. Maybe he also brought instructions, because United found their way and started fizzing first-time passes around. The last hour was like this season – fitful at first, then formidable.

One man grabbed the game by the baton. It was Bruno Fernandes who laid on United’s two big chances in the last ten minutes of the first half, a header apiece for Sesko (easily saved) and Casemiro (unexpectedly off-target). It was Fernandes who, seeing that United hadn’t been getting in behind, played the perpendicular ball that sent Matheus Cunha through to win a debatable penalty. It was Fernandes who coped with a long wait, faced his old penalty-practice pal Dean Henderson, and coolly sent him the wrong way. United were level and the fans in the gods were singing again.

It was Fernandes who played another perpendicular pass that eventually led to a hoof out of the Palace box. It was Fernandes who then retrieved the ball himself and clipped in the cross that gave Sesko his customary goal. It was Fernandes who played six kep passes in the match, twice as many as the next man (Bryan Mbeumo). It was Fernandes who was conducting the orchestra, as so often. It was Fernandes who, as the Match of the Day analysts showed, was also acting as a player-coach – pointing, shouting, coaxing Sesko to make the near-post runs that don’t seem to come naturally to him.

And so United are third. It’s the first time that has happened in nearly three years, since Marcus Rashford was knocking in the goals under Erik ten Hag (including the winner in a 2-1 win over Palace, following a Fernandes penalty). The question now is: can they stay there? The Opta prediction machine says no. It reckons they will win only 15 more points from ten games, which seems strange given that, under Michael Carrick, they already have 19 points from seven, including the trip to Arsenal and the Manchester derby. Opta must be expecting something like this: a draw at Newcastle on Wednesday, a win over Villa, a draw at Bournemouth, a win over Leeds, a defeat at Chelsea, draws at home to Brentford and Liverpool and away at Sunderland, a win over Forest and a draw at Brighton, to make P10 W3 D6 L1. Either that or one more win (say Brentford) and four defeats (say two in the north-east and one on the south coast).

Those 15 points would almost certainly be enough to see them into the Champions League, which is the main thing. But it would be a flat ending to Carrick’s barnstorming interim stint. United surely have it in them to turn two of those six draws into wins, collect 19 points and finish on 70. They will have to be sharper in attack, with Cunha taking fewer airy long shots (the one by Amad, with his weaker foot, drew a better save from Henderson than either of Cunha’s efforts, which amounted to only 0.05 xG). They will have to be more compact in midfield, as they were in Carrick’s first four games. They will have to be more switched-on in defence. And they will have to come back hungry, not rusty, after the three-week lull between Bournemouth and Leeds.

Up in the stand, I had a pair of contrasting neighbours. On the left, an angry young man who expressed joy only when United scored and when he showed me the bottle of beer he’d smuggled in. Maybe he was having a hard time at home or work. On the right, an older man who murmured the odd shrewd comment. When the penalty came along, he reached the same verdict as the VAR, about three minutes faster. We got talking then and carried on at the end of the game. He’s called Francis and he’s been going to Old Trafford ‘since this was the old North Stand, with the cantilever’. He was there yesterday on a chaperone’s ticket, because his granddaughter was one of the ball kids. ‘But she’s 14 now,’ he said with a wry smile, ‘and it’s beginning to interfere with her social life.’ Francis and Scarlett, this one’s for you.

Tim de Lisle is the editor of United Writing and a sportswriter for The Guardian. He’s been supporting United since the days when they lost 2-1 at home to a Palace team managed by Steve Coppell.