Ethan Laird joined up with Manchester United’s first-team as they prepared for Thursday’s evening’s crucial game away to Aston Villa.
The Reds trained at their Carrington base on Wednesday morning, and will travel to Villa Park full of confidence as they look to extend their unbeaten run in all competitions to 17 games.
Laird, 18, was pictured alongside teammates Mason Greenwood and Eric Bailly and will be hoping to impress Ole Gunnar Solskjaer with his enthusiasm on his return.
The young right-back made an impressive first-team debut away to Astana in the Europa League in November; Laird was one of United’s better performers in their defeat in Kazakhstan.
He also made an appearance from the bench in the Europa League group stage victory over AZ Alkmaar at Old Trafford.
Realistically, it will be very difficult for Laird to break into the first-team before the end of the season, unless United are extremely unfortunate with injuries.
Aaron Wan-Bissaka has made the right-back position his own since his arrival last summer, and Diogo Dalot has been providing cover for the young Englishman.
But Solskjaer does have the opportunity to hand highly-rated Laird a start in the Europa League round of 16 second-leg against LASK when the Europa League returns in August, a tie United are 5-0 up in.
See the photos of Laird back in training below, courtesy of Manchester United:
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