A goal for Jesse Lingard and lots of praise for Anthony Martial as Manchester United see off Real Madrid after a penalty shoot-out of many more misses than hits.
Here are the notes from Sunday’s single pre-season match.
Manchester United 1 Real Madrid 1 (United win 2-1 on penalties)
A decent goal, an almost comedic penalty shoot-out, Ronald McDonald…Manchester United’s friendly with Real Madrid had a little bit of everything, not all of it good.
The best came from Jesse Lingard, who put the Red Devils ahead on the stroke of half-time after brilliant work by Anthony Martial.
Lingard now has a goal and three assists from a pre-season programme in which he has been consistently favoured by Jose Mourinho.
Against Madrid, he played as part of an attacking trio in a 4-3-3 formation, but he has also been employed as a wing-back as the United manager clearly seems to want to feature the 24-year-old heavily in his various plans.
Should he remained favoured once the season starts, the 6.0-priced midfielder could yet attract considerably more than the 0.8% of Fantasy Premier League managers currently with him in their squads.
The same cannot be said for new signing Victor Lindelof (5.5). The centre-half had a torrid time of it after coming on at half-time for Eric Bailly, and his struggles peaked when he gave away the penalty that led to Madrid’s equaliser.
The Swede is not looking comfortable in a United shirt, although Mourinho has yet to play him alongside Bailly – the presumed ideal partnership that has persuaded 16.1% of FPL managers to plump for Lindelof over the proven but pricier Ivorian.
The teams were led out onto the pitch by Ronald McDonald; a farcical start to a match that finished in similar fashion, with just three of ten penalties scored in a penalty shoot-out that even a burger-loving clown would have improved.
By then, Mourihno had more serious issues to chew on, particularly the precious few second-half minutes Ander Herrera managed before going off injured.
The United boss remained relatively upbeat about it post-match.
”I just feel sorry for one more injury which I hope is not important. For Ander to come off after 10 minutes, it has to be painful. But sometimes painful doesn’t mean there is a real problem, so let’s wait.”
And Mourinho was full of praise for Martial, an 8.0-priced midfielder in FPL who has not always enjoyed the public backing of his manager.
”Obviously we want more consistency in his talent. I think today was positive for him, that is why I left him for 90 minutes on the pitch. He was enjoying it, he was trying new things, and it is important in these friendly matches to try new things, which he did. That is important for his confidence. I can say that he is training better than before, he is working harder than before, his ambition is to try to bring his talent in a consistent way.”
United’s eye-catching early schedule – home matches with West Ham, Leicester City, Everton and Crystal Palace and trips to Swansea City, Stoke City and Southampton – almost demand our FPL investment.
Their summer remains hectic, with three more friendlies and then a UEFA Super Cup date with Madrid still to come, but should give us further pointers as to Mourinho’s early-season intentions.
At present, the stock of both Lingard and Martial is in the ascent, while our confidence in Lindelof has suffered a knock.
Manchester United XI: Romero (De Gea 46); Fosu-Mensah (Blind 46), Bailly (Lindelof 46), Jones (Smalling 46), Darmian (Valencia 78); Carrick (Herrera 46 (McTominay 51)), Fellaini, Pereira (Pogba 46); Lingard (Mkhitaryan 46), Martial, Rashford (Lukaku 46).
Keep up to date with all the summer action with our Pre-Season Guide available here.
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