RASH CLASS AND A RASH CAS
CASEMIRO has had a stranglehold on opponents all season after his move to Manchester United. But the Brazilian went a step too far against Crystal Palace and saw straight red for throttling midfielderwill Hughes during a full-scale second-half brawl.
And that means United boss Erik ten Hag will now have to navigate three crucial league games without his brilliant midfielder – two against bitter rivals Leeds and at home to Leicester.
But despite the blow Ten Hag stood by Casemiro and the rest of his stars for defending Antony who was barged over by Jeffrey Schlupp to trigger an ugly free-for-all.
And he attackedvar official Tony Harrington for singling out Casemiro with the Dutchman clearly believing Jordan Ayew should have been red-carded too for attacking Fred in the tear-up.
“You can see this team stands for each other, there’s a good spirit in the team and they don’t accept it when one or our players could be badly injured.
“That is what they saw after what happened toantony.this team sticks together. Of course, they have to control their emotions, but it’s really difficult in that moment” said Ten Hag.
“I saw two teams fighting each other, two teams with players crossing the line and one player is picked out and sent off and for me that’s not right.
“The Palace player (Schlupp) takes a big risk by pushing Antony across the line and everyone reacted, not only Casemiro.
“There was one player (Ayew) who did even worse than Casemiro and he should have been sent off.
“Yes, Casemiro crossed the line butvar has to be consistent.”
Ten Hag discovered United couldn’t cope without his talisman when he was suspended for the recent defeat atarsenal.and that’s left United nerves jangling about how badly they’ll miss the £70million former Real Madrid star who has been a revelation since his arrival last summer.
United were comfortably leading 2-0 after an early Bruno Fernandes penalty – given for a Hughes handball – and a beautifully taken 10th league goal of the season for Marcus Rashford when the melee put a banana skin under the hosts.
With United down to 10, Palace quickly grabbed a goal back with Schlupp poking past David de Gea to spark a frantic finale.
But as Palace pushed for an equaliser United needed all the defensive resilience of star turn Lisandro Martinez to see out the danger with the Argentinian defender relishing the battle.