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Aah, Premier League football, how much we have missed you!
Why the FA decided to start the league on a Friday with a one-off match instead of going for the crowds with a Saturday start is beyond me, but it is just as well that they did. The first game of the season saw Manchester United settle for a 2-1 win at home against Leicester City.
A little rugged from the WC, both teams did not field the best XI they would have liked, tacking on a few rotation players. It took Paul Pogba - who was also chosen to lead the team this time around, a mere 70 seconds to open the scoring with a penalty.
As the game looked to be heading to a 1-0 end, Luke Shaw scored his first senior goal for the side, with a finish any forward would have been proud of. And the drama got turned up after Jamie Vardy (who else?) snatched one back, but last year's runners upheld on to get their first 3 points of the campaign.
As always, there were a few individual battles that went a long way in deciding the final outcome of the game. Here's a look at 3 of them:
#3 Demarai Gray vs Matteo Darmian
Oh yeah, Darmian still plays for Manchester United.
With Mahrez now at Manchester City and Vardy rested for the game, it was up to Demarai Gray to shoulder the burden of attacks, and shoulder the burden he did. After a string of hopeful performances in the friendlies, Gray was a pocket of energy causing all sorts of problems to the United backline.
It was Darmian Gray who was tasked with marking the forward, and the lack of the Italian's game time was exceedingly visible in the first 30 minutes of the game. As the game went on, however, he found his footing and got the confidence to move forwards as Valencia does - effectively neutralising Gray's dominance over him.
It was a more even battle in the second half, as Gray also decided to put in a defensive work rate with Chillwell bombing forward as and when required. The stats were evenly split as well, with Gray's 5 dribbles matched by Darmian's 5 tackles; Gray might have run circles around Darmian at the start of the game, but they ended with more or less the same credentials at the end of the day.
#2 Paul Pogba vs Harry Maguire
Remember when the United fans were not sure if Pogba was good enough to play for them during the middle of last season? One World Cup later, it is surreal to see just how much the burlesque French midfielder has grown.
In the absence of Romelu Lukaku (rested owing to the WC activity), it was Pogba's turn to play the role of the tall target man who could hold up the ball. That was not all Pogba did, just as any good midfielder wouldn't. Pogba shifted in and out of the Regista role, from defending corners to taking penalties to moving into the spaces created by Rashford's rocket-fueled boots.
Harry Maguire, fresh from his heroics in Russia, might have matched Lukaku jump for jump, but against the superior pace of Rashford combined with Pogba's accurate balls over the top, the centre back did not have the most comfortable of nights.
He adapted to it by reducing his innate nature to go forward on his own, and it almost worked until Shaw's run caught everyone by surprise at the end.
The worrying thing about Pogba tonight was his petulant whining and screaming at the referee when things did not go his way, his exaggerated flailing of the arms will certainly not win him any fans. As of now, maybe it is the exhaustion but it is an issue that Mourinho will have to look into.
#1 Alexis Sanchez vs himself
Whatever happened to the Alexis Sanchez who had the world at his feet when playing for Arsenal? His winter move to Manchester last winter did not yield the expected results, and it was chalked down to not sufficient exposure to the diagonally opposite philosophies of Mourinho from that of Arsene Wenger.
Now, one summer of complete rest on account of Chile not qualifying to play in Russia, and a whole preseason with the team later, not much seemed to have changed. It took 75 minutes for Sanchez to produce his first good pass of the night - a chance Lukaku failed to convert, and he followed it up with a ball over the top to Mata sometime later, but that was it.
Until then, it was Sanchez screwing up things for himself, and for the team, in the process. He slowed down attacks that should have flowed down the wings; he stopped unnecessarily and squared the ball off to unsuspecting teammates; he tried one-twos with teammates who had long since moved on; it was the Sanchez United fans had gotten used to, and sadly so.
Manchester United have Martial waiting on the bench, and when Lukaku returns, so will Rashford. Sanchez cannot afford to spend too long a time getting his head in, and neither can Mourinho. The sooner things get sorted down the left, the better.
