Solskjaer praises young guns as Red Devils end winless away run
OLE GUNNAR SOLSKJAER lauded man-of-the-match Brandon Williams after the teenager helped Manchester United edge past Partizan Belgrade and end their 11-match winless run on the road.
United tasted victory away from home for the first time since March’s remarkable Champions League triumph at Paris St
Germain by digging deep on a difficult night in Serbia.
Partizan pushed to the death, backed by a raucous home support, but Anthony Martial’s first-half spot-kick proved enough.
“Of course, I’m happy now that we can just look forward to the next one,” Solskjaer said after winning on the road for the first time in 33 weeks.
“Try to build momentum. We need to win away from home in the league, but another clean sheet and that gives you a platform to win games from.”
Martial, making his first start since August, scored the matchwinning goal but Williams got the lion’s share of the praise, with the 19-year-old bursting into the box and drawing the game-defining penalty.
It was an impressive performance by the left-back, while full debutant James Garner, 18, came through his baptism of fire impressively.
“They did excellent,” Solskjaer said of the teenagers. “I thought Jimmy just grew and grew in the game, became better and better.
“And, for me, Brandon was man of the match. He’s been fantastic the few games he’s played. The boy has no fear, he is as brave as a lion and he got us the win.
“In games like these when we get the first goal, we need to learn when to get the second, when to get the third. I thought today we had loads of opportunities to make sure we’re in a comfortable lead but we didn’t play that pass forward.
“But Brandon has an absolutely great attitude. The boy is going to be a top, top player.”
It was a much-needed victory with United holding tight in Belgrade as Partizan laid siege on their goal.
“We defended really well, in the box especially,” Solskjaer said.
“I think we showed some grit in that respect. We could have defended better up front, we should have stopped them.
“They pushed us back, we need to get more intensity in our pressing, but, yeah, proud and kept another clean sheet.”
Solskjaer baulked at the suggestion United rode their luck and was quick to praise the home faithful, especially given the pre-match concerns that racism may mar the encounter.
“I don’t know about luck but we had to defend really well,” the Norwegian added. “I thought their team was really good second half, lots of courage, send men forward, create loads of opponents. We defended well.
“The crowd was unbelievable. I think the crowd should be very proud of their team and the team should be very proud of their crowd because it was an excellent atmosphere.
“You know what we talked about before the game... wow, the fans were great.”
Partizan counterpart Savo Milosevic was rightly proud of his side.
“First of all, congratulations to Manchester United for the victory,” the former Aston Villa striker said. And even more of a congratulations to our players for everything that they have shown in the 90 minutes.
“I think that it is not an easy task to be equal or even better opponent than Manchester United for the better part of the game and I think they did so and were fantastic.”
DUHAN VAN DER MERWE’S primary focus this weekend is to help Edinburgh to their third Guinness PRO14 win of the season, when they take on Scarlets at Murrayfield tomorrow evening, but he will be setting his alarm to make sure he is up bright and early the following morning to watch his native South Africa take on Wales in the Rugby World Cup semi-finals.
And with a number of South African players plying their trade at Edinburgh, van der Merwe will have plenty of company to watch the game.
“Aye, I believe so,” he said in answer to the question of whether South Africa will get their hands on the Webb Ellis Cup.
“England won’t beat New
Zealand, so we are going to have to. A few of us will definitely get together and watch the World Cup semi on Sunday, we’re looking forward to it.”
Edinburgh have made a solid start to the season, winning their first two PRO14 matches before losing to Leinster in their last outing.
But Van der Merwe is adamant that he and his team-mates have put their defeat to the Irish champions behind them and are focused on getting back to winning ways when Scarlets visit Murrayfield.
“I think we have been playing really well,” he said. “Our new system and game plan has been working well, we have a great backline and we have to give those boys some time on the ball to show what they are about.
“It was unlucky against Leinster, we didn’t all perform very well, but that is in the past now and we have to forget about it and focus on the Scarlets.”
This is Van der Merwe’s third season at Edinburgh and the winger was thrilled to hear head coach Richard Cockerill say he was going to encourage his team to play a more expansive brand of rugby.
“It was nice to hear that from the coaches because it is not always nice chasing kicks, but we have so many good players on the wings now like Eroni Sau so it will be good to see them when they get space and the ball in their hands,” he said.
“You always have to adapt because you have to attack where the space is. Some teams attack that space with kicks and some pass it, look at Japan, their wingers have been on fire.”
Edinburgh have had to deal with the challenge of having players missing due to international duty, with their imminent return a significant boost to Van der Merwe and the rest of the squad.
The South African has enjoyed watching his fellow winger, Darcy Graham, make his World Cup debut, and he has noticed a number of similarities between the Scot and Springbok Cheslin Kolbe.
“Darcy came on the scene last year and since then he has been amazing. He is so small, boys struggle to tackle him, and he is so young still, as is Blair Kinghorn so they are very good players,” he said.
“Darcy is small like [Kolbe] and people can’t tackle Darcy because he is so quick and has great feet. Even when you do tackle him he is hard to stop because he has good strength.”