Pogba munches Turkish delight
WAYNE Rooney passed up the chance to move closer to Sir Bobby Charlton’s club scoring record at Old Trafford last night – as Paul Pogba found the perfect answer to his critics.
Rooney handed the responsibility for two first-half penalties to Pogba and then Anthony Martial as Manchester United recorded their joint biggest win so far under Jose Mourinho, the other being a victory over Leicester with the same scoreline.
But Rooney, restored to the starting XI after four games on the bench, did play a part in United’s two other goals – scored by Pogba and Jesse Lingard – in a comfortable victory that took them top of their Europa League group.
Had Rooney – a regular spotkick taker in the past – taken and scored the penalties he would have been just one behind Charlton’s 249-record.
Whether his performance was enough to convince Mourinho to keep him in the side remains to be seen but the easy win stretched United’s unbeaten run in all competitions to six games and put them in good heart for Sunday’s trip to Chelsea.
Seeing Rooney recapture some form certainly gave Sam Allardyce cause for a rueful smile as he attended his first game since being sacked as England boss last month. He sat next to Sir Alex Ferguson in the directors’ box. Both men would also have enjoyed Pogba’s stylish display, although the world’s most expensive player knows he needs to do it in bigger games than this to justify United’s £89.5m outlay.
Former United striker Robin van Persie received a warm ovation for his 30-goal contribution to the club’s last Premier League title triumph in 2013.
United made few early inroads and it was 13 minutes before there was a meaningful attempt on goal and then Pogba’s effort was headed away by Martin Skrtl. Having looked relatively composed for the first half an hour, the Turks shot themselves in the foot by giving away two penalties in the space of three minutes.
First, Simon Kjaer bundled Juan Mata over as he controlled Michael Carrick’s long pass and Pogba stepped up to send Volkan Demirel the wrong way. Then Anthony Martial was pushed over by Sener Ozbayrakli as he raced onto Mata’s pass.
Despite Pogba having converted the first, and the crowd rooting for Rooney to take it, Martial picked up the ball and sent his shot into the same bottom corner as his France compatriot. David de Gea kept United’s two-goal lead intact when he used his legs to block Josef de Souza’s shot after Carrick had lost possession. But on the stroke of half-time Pogba effectively made the game safe.
Kjaer gave the ball away to Rooney who fed Lingard. He played the ball back for Pogba to fire home a first-time shot from 25 yards.
With the game sewn up, Mourinho took the opportunity to give key defender Chris Smalling a breather ahead of the trip to Stamford Bridge and send on Marcos Rojo as Eric Bailly’s centre-back partner. Fenerbahce’s welltravelled boss Dick Advocaat also made a change, taking off the unfortunate Kjaer – who had made the mistakes that led to two of United’s first half goals – and sending on striker Emmanuel Emenike.
But it made little difference to proceedings with United adding their fourth within two minutes of the restart with a move that underlined their growing confidence.
Pogba started it by shrugging off the attentions of two opponents to play a pass to Rooney on the edge of the area and his neat first-time lay-off saw Lingard take a touch before rifling home a right-foot shot from the edge of the area.
Striker Robin van Persie marked his return to Old Trafford with a late consolation goal for Fenerbahce from close range.