United won the weekend
Thanks to Bruno Fernandes, they recorded a resounding victory while their rivals faltered
FIVE ASIDES
Premier League
United 3, Villa 1
United didn’t just win a six-pointer: they won the weekend. Chelsea lost, Villa lost obviously, Liverpool drew against Spurs of all people, and Man City drew too. So United are now three points up on Villa, five up on Liverpool, six up on Chelsea and only seven behind City. They’ve broken away from the pack to become the favourites to finish third, perhaps because all the neighbours are knackered. There’s still time to mess it up, but the bronze medal is theirs to lose. It’s a vast improvement on last season, when they finished 15th. With eight games to go, they already have 12 more points than they managed then. They’ve beaten all the other members of the top six this season, and three of those five wins (over Arsenal, City and Villa) have come under Michael Carrick. In the league table since he took over on 14 January, United are top with 22 points from nine games, one more than Arsenal have from ten.
It was a game of two halves, the first a non-event, the second action-packed. It could have gone either way – on xG, according to Sofascore, the final score was 1.07-1.02. But it came down to a battle of the middle-aged midfielders, which United won. Unai Emery gave Ross Barkley a rare start and had John McGinn fit enough to play for an hour. These decisions were vindicated as Barkley scored with a composed shot and McGinn had his moments – but United had Bruno Fernandes and Casemiro, the most lethal assister-and-scorer duo in this season’s Premier League. Casemiro gave United the lead with a perfectly timed run and a glancing header, then figured in the build-up to the other two goals, helped by Kobbie Mainoo with his tireless tidiness. Fernandes, not content with curling in the corner from which Casemiro scored, sent a beautiful through ball to Matheus Cunha to conjure the winner.
These assists took Fernandes to 16 for the season, breaking the record for United in the Premier League set by David Beckham in 1999-2000. Fernandes also reached 100 assists for the club in the six years since Ole Gunnar Solskjaer signed him. In Beckham’s day, United won league titles and had three or four top strikers to bang in the goals, whereas Fernandes has never been part of the best team in the league and has often found himself sending his scintillating passes through to Rasmus Hojlund or Joshua Zirkzee, Anthony Martial or Anthony Elanga. This was the 12th league game of the season in which he had created at least five chances. The runners-up on that list are Rayan Cherki of City and Sean Longstaff of Leeds, who have managed it in two games each. Fernandes’ creativity is off the scale: he is now, surely, one of United’s all-time greats.
Carrick got some big calls right. He brought back Amad, who was sharper and busier than he had been on his last few starts and had the only shot on target in the first half with a header that drew a good save from Emi Martinez. Carrick bravely demoted Sesko, who responded with yet another goal (helped by a deflection, but largely generated by Sesko’s pirouette, which was quicker than a politician’s U-turn). Carrick retained Cunha, whom some fans would have sacrificed so that Sesko and Amad could start together, and again it paid off as Cunha scored against Villa for the fourth time in his career. United did miss Sesko’s height in the first half, as good crosses kept going begging. But their flexible forward line stretched Villa’s back four, who are more old-school.
If Carrick left it late to bring Sesko on (75 minutes), he still got him back in the goal habit. Carrick gets some of the credit for Casemiro’s goal, as he has had Jonny Evans working with Casemiro and Fernandes on set pieces – taking an existing strength and honing it so that it gets even better. Carrick was right to show faith in Leny Yoro, who had struggled against Morgan Rogers in the reverse fixture: Yoro was more assertive here, helped by Emery’s surprising decision not to put Rogers on the left, and he disarmed Ollie Watkins with a superb sliding tackle. Carrick was probably right to bring back Diogo Dalot in place of the more defensive Noussair Mazraoui. Dalot made one crucial interception, sent in one inspired cross and got into two great positions, neither of which he could cash in on. If his finishing ever catches up with his positioning, Dalot will be a superstar. As it is, he’s a decent performer for the third-best football team in England. And that’ll do.
Tim de Lisle is the editor of United Writing and a sportswriter for The Guardian, where he live-blogged this match. He’s been supporting United since the days when they beat Villa for the 14th time in a row.