Like a rash
Striker has taken remarkable rise in his stride
Four touches. That was all it took for Marcus Rashford to mark his 150th Manchester United appearance with a goal in front of the adoring fans in Old Trafford’s Stretford End.
Collecting the ball from Diogo Dalot, United’s No.10 turned Brighton and Hove Albion defender Solly March, dribbling away from him before arrowing a strike into the far top corner of David Button’s goal. It was a passage of play that perfectly summed up the 21-yearold’s vast potential.
With it he scored for the fourth English Premier League game in a row, where his previous best run was scoring in two consecutive matches.
If he scores when Manchester United next play in the league, against Burnley on January 30, then he will have scored for five league games in a row.
There will be added motivation for Rashford when Sean Dyche’s team visit Old Trafford, not that the young striker ever seems to need it.
When the teams met at Turf Moor in September, Rashford was sent off for the first time in his professional career.
Netting against the Clarets will mean Rashford has reached a milestone that Harry Kane has not yet achieved in his 122 goals for Spurs and such comparisons come easily.
It was noted after the Red Devils recently defeated Kane’s Tottenham Hotspur side at Wembley, where Rashford scored the only goal of the game, that the England captain had scored just 25 times at the same age with only three of those goals in the Premier League.
Kane had not yet been capped for England but, at 21, Rashford has played 31 times and scored six goals for his country.
After that game former Spurs striker Robbie Keane, who scored 126 Premier League goals in his career, has likened the young Mancunian to Arsenal legend Thierry Henry. After the goal in his 150th game, there have been comparisons with other United players at the same age, with manager Ole Gunnar Solskjaer mentioning Cristiano Ronaldo and Wayne Rooney.
These comparisons will keep coming if he keeps putting in match-winning performances of goals and assists allied with a peerless work rate.
Until Solskjaer came into replace Jose Mourinho it was noted that he was playing better for the Three Lions than he was in a United shirt. No longer.
Next month will mark three years since Rashford made his debut in the Europa League. Circumstance forced Louis van Gaal’s hand that Tuesday night at home to Danish side Midtjylland in the Europa League.
The 18-year-old did not blink and scored two goals in a 5-1 win. He then scored two on his Premier League debut against Arsenal.
When he got his first England cap that May, he scored in that too. In typical Rashford fashion when he played in his first Champions League game, scoring after seven minutes.
While United always rated Rashford he was never meant to be blooded in the first team so early. An injury to Anthony Martial in the warm-up, Will Keane in the FA Cup the week before and the fact that the senior youth striker Ashley Fletcher was out on loan at Barnsley forced the issue and Rashford has forced himself into everyone’s plans since.
While Fletcher was scoring for the Tykes at Wembley in the League One Playoff Final, Rashford was netting on his England debut – taking just two minutes to do so.
Over the last three years he has proved he belonged there as he did at Euro 2016 and the 2018 World Cup in Russia, where England reached the semifinals. He’s won an FA Cup, a League Cup and a Europa League for his club, and now under his third manager – possibly a fourth in the summer – he will want to win the bigger prizes with United and stop them going to rivals Manchester City and Liverpool.
He scored in his first Manchester derby against City in March 2016. His goal was the difference away at the Etihad and one that made him the youngest scorer in a Manchester derby: just another record to take in his stride.
Last season Rashford netted a brace against Liverpool at Old Trafford to ensure three points and more adulation from the fans.
Born and bred
Born in Wythenshawe, a couple of trams or buses from Old Trafford, “Rashford is Manc born and bred” as the new terrace chant goes.
The striker is especially beloved by the fans because he is a local lad. There hasn’t been a player this prodigiously talented to come through the ranks – and be from the area – since Ryan Giggs in 1991.
Giggs signed for United at 14, debuted at 18 in 1991 and played at the club until he was 40.
Rashford joined the club at 7, and now 14 years later he is the starting striker. Who knows what his future holds but right now the fans will hope that he is there in another 14 years – even if Sam Allardyce has warned that his career will be over before he is 30.
After the Spurs game, teammate Juan Mata referred to Rashford as the “wonder kid” in his weekly blog.
If he keeps performing as he has done since former terrace hero Solskjaer took over in December then the wonder is how Mourinho didn’t turn to the young Mancunian earlier.
Next month will mark three years since that unforgettable introduction to the Old Trafford faithful. Under the February floodlights, Rashford will line up for United on another European night.
This time it is the Champions League against PSG in the Champions League, facing some of the biggest names in world soccer. The supporters can only hope that there are many more of those to come for both the club and its homegrown star in the making.