Jose Mourinho has booked Manchester United’s place into the second round of this season’s Champions League with a game to spare following a 1-0 win over Young Boys at Old Trafford this evening.
After a frustrating and disappointing performance Marouane Fellaini turned up in stoppage time to produce a nice finish for the winner.
David de Gea had earlier made an excellent save from the visitor’s only effort on target in a game we dominated possession.
Here are how our players fared:
David de Gea 7 – Only tested once but it was a stunning save 20 minutes from time as a deflected effort from the edge of the box went past David de Gea who was able to claw it back off the line.
Antonio Valencia 7 – Comfortable in his first start in eight weeks before being taken off in the final 20 minutes for Juan Mata. Antonio Valencia didn’t offer too much going forward.
Chris Smalling 8 – Comfortable game at the back for our two centre-backs. Chris Smalling made a couple of blocks and interceptions.
Phil Jones 8 – Made two important interceptions in the opening half hour in a solid performance from Phil Jones.
Luke Shaw 7 – Got forward from left-back but didn’t put many crosses into the box. Luke Shaw was barely tested defensively.
Nemanja Matic 6 – Saw a lot of the ball and didn’t have much defensive work as we dominated possession.
Marouane Fellaini 7 – Won a number of aerial battles, created a chance for Romelu Lukaku in the second half but was a bit clumsy in the final third before finely controlling Lukaku’s flick on and finishing nicely in the corner to book our place into the second round.
Fred 6 – Looked lively in the opening half hour but faded after that.
Jesse Lingard 6 – Teamed up well with Marcus Rashford before being replaced by Paul Pogba.
Marcus Rashford 6 – Made some good runs but both his finishing and passing in the final third were poor. Marcus Rashford missed a one-on-one in the opening five minutes and later failed to pick out an unmarked Marouane Fellaini running into the penalty area. Never seriously tested David von Ballmoos despite having half a dozen efforts.
Anthony Martial 6 – Made some good runs but wasted a four on three opportunity and later couldn’t beat the last defender after being played in by Romelu Lukaku down the left. Couldn’t find the target with any of the efforts he did fire in on goal.
Substitutes
Romelu Lukaku (27 mins) N/A – Decent effort in the final half hour, creating chances for teammates but heading wide from an effort of his own. Flicked on Luke Shaw’s long ball from the halfway line to assist the winner.
Paul Pogba (27 mins) N/A – Was eager to get on the ball to get us a winner, tried driving us forward and created the odd chance.
Juan Mata (20 mins) N/A – Didn’t make an impact after being introduced in the second half.
