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Score: Manchester United 2-0 Huddersfield Town
Goalscorers: Romelu Lukaku 54' (Juan Mata cross), Alexis Sanchez 68' P (Penalty won by Sanchez himself)
Manchester United dominated and eventually dispatched Huddersfield Town on a poignant night when a minute's silence was impeccably observed for the victims of the Munich tragedy of '58.
Here then are the five main talking points from Old Trafford:
#5 Romelu Lukaku needed that goal
Barring that Tottenham game - where almost every single man in red was below par - Romelu Lukaku has had a good run of performances, and although the goals refused to come as freely as they did in the beginning of the season he's put in some great shifts, running the channels, holding play up well and bringing everyone into the game.
Against the Terriers, it was all reversed. His overall play barely rose above decent - but he scored the kind of goal that can rejuvenate any striker... running onto a superb Juan Mata pass and tucking in a neat volley from close range.
Lukaku needed that goal - and if he can marry the overall performances he is capable of to this efficiency in front of goal - United will end up laughing at the critics that have already decried the signing of the Belgian.
P.S. He has 19 goals in all competitions - it's not like he's not scoring at all. But this one, an opener to break a tight defence, was important.
#4 VAR will lessen the burden on the referees
Take a moment, and watch this video -
For those who can't watch it, it's Terence Kongolo using Scott McTominay like one of those mannequin/models NFL linebackers use to practice their tackles and lunges on. This happened inside the Huddersfield box and smack bang in front of the referee.
What, then, does Mr. Stuart Atwell do? He calls play off so that McTominay can get himself checked by the medical staff, then asks Huddersfield to punt it back to United... how that was not a penalty, or a red card or a yellow card...
In the last United game, Tottenham were denied a stonewall penalty when Valencia plowed through Son - and if we are to drag up contentious penalty decisions across the Premier League, the list would go on and on.
The bottom line is - forget arguments based on sentimentality and bias when we can use technology to lessen the burden on the most under-pressure individual in football, please let's.
#3 Jose Mourinho sends Paul Pogba a message
The fact that Paul Pogba is the best footballer in Manchester United is beyond dispute - as stated on numerous occasions he is often the man that can mean the difference between United being a proper title challenger and United oscillating between a regular top-6 team and mediocrity.
But after a visibly heated argument and a rather humiliating substitution at the hour mark during that Spurs game, Mourinho rested his star man, his most expensive signing ever, to play 21-year-old Scott McTominay - at the club since the age of 9.
McTominay, of course, lacked the sheer quality of Pogba, and his positional discipline and the fight he showed would have pleased Mourinho, but it wasn't about the Scot's performance, was it?
The Portuguese has sent a strong, not-subtle-in-the-least message to Pogba - "I'm the boss, and you better not forget it".
The fact that Pogba came on and played some lovely football in the half-hour or so he got on the pitch would have pleased Mourinho no end.
#2 Huddersfield need to show more ambition, or they will go down
Rarely have Premier League sides looked as toothless as Huddersfield have during this five-game losing streak they have embarked upon. Against Liverpool, at home, they set up with ten outfielders inside their own half so it was probably unreasonable to expect anything else when they travelled to Old Trafford.
But having troubled United, and indeed beaten them, at home when they played some more adventurous counter-attacking football, would it have been the worse thing in the world for them to go ahead and try it? Especially against a United side that had just been battered by Spurs' high press?
They certainly have the personnel to attempt this, and it was amiss of them not test Marcos Rojo's aerial prowess against Laurent Depoitre, a test that Victor Lindelof so miserably failed earlier in the season.
Too often has David Wagner set his Terriers up with the intention of coming out with a 0-0 draw and too often has it backfired for the German-American to not realise that if he continues with this, the only way is down.
#1 Alexis Sanchez targetted, but emerges stronger
Alexis Sanchez has lost possession of the ball more times against Huddersfield (32) than any other Man United player has in a single Premier League game this season.
Now most people looking at the stat will take it at face value - and simply lambast the Chilean for his "selfish" and "inconsistent" ways. What that stat doesn't reveal though is just how much urgency Alexis Sanchez has injected into the team - most, if not all these dispossessions happened when Sanchez was trying to move the ball forward, the antithesis of the Louis van Gaal 'era'... a time period that still has its impact seen in the safety-first approach of a vast majority of United's passing.
Yes, Sanchez will lose the ball a lot but he will at least be trying to do something meaningful with it. When Mourinho finds a way to play Sanchez, Martial, and Pogba together - United will be a much more threatening unit.
Sanchez, meanwhile, had a good home debut - hacked at all day long by the Terriers, he simply got on with it again and again, and while a scuffed penalty + rebound is hardly the most auspicious of Old Trafford starts, he won't mind it one jot.
