Rashford Was Unplayable Against West Ham – Henry

Pablo Zabaleta must have felt a lot older than his 32 years. The veteran Argentine will not have been the only West Ham player who was causing referee Martin Atkinson to blow his whistle but his team-mates were at least spared the task of trying to hack Marcus Rashford down throughout the game. Zabaleta, on the other hand, never got a breather.

One former player who knows a whole lot about cutting in at pace from the left and wreaking havoc against defences is Thierry Henry, and from his position in the pundit’s chair on Sunday, the former Arsenal striker’s appraisal of Rashford’s performance at Old Trafford on Sunday was pretty unequivocal.
“This man was, for me, in the second half unplayable,” Henry said.

Rashford again proved he can be the X-factor the manager desperately requires if he is to lead United to a 21st championship.

The trio were stationed behind Lukaku in a 4-2-3-1 but if all want to be chosen consistently they will have to register more than the 15 goals they returned between them in the last league campaign. Inside a stadium louder than it has been in recent times, United hogged the ball and moved it menacingly on occasion during the opening half. This allowed Mata to move behind for a chance that was blocked, but when in a second time he did not hit the ball instantly. At this juncture United could be accused of a lack of directness in the last third. This has been a complaint about the post-Sir Alex Ferguson teams and when they did finally register it was via some quick thinking.

Rashford relayed the ball to Lukaku and he followed Tuesday’s Uefa Super Cup consolation in the 2-1 loss to Real Madrid by crashing a shot in off Joe Hart’s right-hand post to make it 1-0.

Rashford’s pace gives United’s frontline a crucial dimension and he continued to light up the side when they roved forward. Mourinho’s recognition of this may have prompted him to allow the 19-year-old to flit across positions. After the opener Rashford switched from left to right to create problems along that wing. Then, he hung around next to Lukaku to make it a dedicated two-man strikeforce. By the close of the first half he was back on the left and could wander off surely to hear a contented half-time word from his manager.

The question now was could United go on and convince they could be prolific goalscorers this season. In just seven of their 19 league outings here last season they scored two or more. This again points to the fault of the attackers, plus Jesse Lingard, Martial (on the bench on Sunday) and even Pogba, whose return of five was underwhelming for a footballer of his talent. In that 2-1 loss to Real, Mourinho referred to a late chance Rashford spurned that would have taken the game into extra time.

Almost as soon as Martin Atkinson blew for the second half Rashford missed a near-identical opportunity.

The teenager raced clear but missed badly to the left of Hart.

It is, of course, very early days for the Lukaku-Rashford pairing and for this United side, whose next test is at Swansea on Saturday. Yet the early signs are there that this could be a year to remember for United. As Mourinho said: “After many years of Premier League experience, I keep my feet on the ground. But fans have reasons to be optimistic because we are.”