FIVE ASIDES Premier League: United 3, Spurs 2
Ronaldo, bloody hell. We can probably agree that he’s back in form. United’s expected goals in this game were fairly pitiful – between 0.79 and 1.1, depending on which source you consulted. Yet Cristiano Ronaldo scored three on his own and could have had a couple more. Of United’s ten shots, eight came from him. He became the first man ever to give United the lead three times in the same Premier League match. He even scored with a header: next, he’ll be wanting to take the free kicks again. As Ralf Rangnick said, he also produced a proper all-round performance – bar the pressing, which, as Rangnick didn’t say, was non-existent as usual. On balance, he can probably be forgiven.
Why did Ronaldo suddenly improve, after two months of uncharacteristic mediocrity? There may have been a few reasons. First, because he was facing Spurs, his long-time bunnies: most of the time fame is the spur for him, but Spurs seem to be a spur too. Second, because he was fired up after getting some flak for fleeing to Portugal last weekend rather than watching United being dismantled by City – and, perhaps, after finding that Rangnick wasn’t planning to start him in that game (remember how Michael Carrick dropped him at Chelsea, prompting a reaction that brought two goals from Ronaldo against Arsenal). Third, because he wanted to impress Tom Brady, who was in the directors’ box. Perhaps United can arrange to have a legend from another sport at every home game now - a GOAT rota. And fourth, because Bruno Fernandes was missing. Ronaldo kept dropping deep, into what is normally Fernandes’ territory, and it was from there that he blasted the first goal. Sometimes when he goes hunting for the ball, he looks lost or needy. Here he looked like something he has seldom been since he returned: an integral part of the team.
United have now had five league meetings with their rivals for fourth place and won the lot. Two against Spurs, two against West Ham, one against Arsenal: five games, 15 points. It almost makes up for their feeble return against the top three (four games, one point, three humblings). You could argue that it’s even more important – picking up six points in six-pointers. Against Spurs, United were the lesser team for long stretches of both halves, rather than the usual one, but they didn’t concede many clear chances. When Spurs did score it was only with United’s help – handing them a penalty and an own goal. As ever, United were more secure at the back with Raphael Varane on the field. It was also a relief to see Diogo Dalot, with his no-nonsense confidence, return in place of Aaron Wan-Bissaka, whose recall had been baffling. The next question is surely whether to drop Harry Maguire.
Football is so much easier if you have someone playing in two positions at once. For Spurs on a good day, it’s Harry Kane, their No 9 and No 10. For Chelsea most days, it’s Ngolo Kante, both a defensive midfielder and an attacking one. For United yesterday, it was Fred, who was everywhere. If he wasn’t assisting Ronaldo’s screamer with a classy flick, he was scrapping on the edge of his own box to deny Heung-Min Son, or making United’s attacks more fluid with quick one-twos (a case of playing in two positions in the same move). He was helped by lining up alongside Nemanja Matic, who may be slower than Scott McTominay but is also calmer. And both were helped by the new coach, Chris Armas. Being American, he’s allegedly been called Ted Lasso by some of the players. But it was Arnas who spotted Matic struggling to keep up with the quicksilver Son and yelled at him to swap sides with Fred. The thing about Ted Lasso is that he turns out to be quite good at his job.
Jadon Sancho, so improved lately, was mixed. One minute he was contributing to the penalty by allowing Dejan Kulusevski to waltz past him on the byline. The next he was keeping it beautifully simple by running onto Matic’s chip and playing a deftly weighted pass square to give Ronaldo a tap-in for his second. Marcus Rashford was mixed too, still tentative in traffic, still too easily reduced to a spectator, but showing his class early on with a glorious through ball to Paul Pogba. Rangnick says he wants to help Rashford: in that case, why does he keep sticking him on the right, when Sancho is far more used to playing there – and was bought to fill that hole?
Tim de Lisle covers sport for The Guardian and music for The Mail on Sunday. If you’re on Twitter, do follow him – and United Writing too.