How Solskjaer has managed to turn the tide at Old Trafford
United have been lifted by Fernandes and more competition for places, writes James Ducker
The sight of Bruno Fernandes putting a finger to his lips and telling Pep Guardiola to button it after a touchline exchange with the Manchester City manager towards the end of Sunday’s 2-0 derby win will only have cemented his status as the new darling of Old Trafford.
“He infected the place. Stuck his chest out, put his collar up and said, ‘Look at me’,” Sir Alex Ferguson once said of Eric Cantona’s instant impact at Manchester United.
Fernandes has an awful lot to do before he can stand comparison with the flamboyant Frenchman, but there has certainly been a Cantona-esque feel to the way the peacock Portugal midfielder has breezed into the place and galvanised all around him in that No10 role – character, leader and creative fulcrum all in one.
Old Trafford craves some fantasy and Fernandes’s gorgeous, clipped free-kick over City’s defence for Anthony Martial to volley home was another example of the X-factor the club have been missing. No other player in the Premier League has been involved in more goals (five) than Fernandes since his debut at the start of last month and yesterday he was named February’s Professional Footballers’ Association Fans’ Player of the Month.
“At times we know he’s going to lose possession, but we need those risk passes that are going to unlock defences,” Luke Shaw, the United full-back, said.
It is not just Fernandes’s creativity; the intensity with which he instigated the press against City set an example others were eager to follow and his presence has brought greater pace, precision and penetration to United’s passing. row” and plonked eight bodies behind the ball and waited for a mistake to exploit on the counterattack. But United are mixing up their play between building from the back, with quicker, slicker interchanges, and more direct raids forward. The co-ordination and intensity of their press has improved and they are closing down space faster in midfield.
Martial is how much harder he is working and how much more aggressive he has become.
He has seldom looked this committed and hungry, pressing with more urgenc y, throwing his weight around and, in one instance early on against City, producing a quite brilliant defensive header.