Manchester United have kickstarted their 2023/2024 campaign with a 1-0 win over Wolverhampton Wanderers.
The Red Devils were lucky to come out on top, to be honest, as Wolves certainly left it all on the pitch in the sides’ season opener.
An unlikely scorer sealed the three points for United in the form of Raphael Varane, who headed home to break the deadlock in the 76th minute. Aaron Wan-Bissaka provided the assist.
There was also late VAR controversy when Andre Onana clashed with Sasa Kalajdzic while claiming a Wolves cross in his penalty area. Play was stopped but the referee opted against checking the pitchside monitor, and you could almost hear the home fans in the stadium breathe a collective sigh of relief.
VAR drama strikes early
Aside from the incident, the Cameroonian oversaw a scintillating debut and was perhaps even United’s Man of the Match. Save after save ensured a clean sheet on his first competitive outing – hopefully, the first of many.
All in all, the Reds looked a little rusty but got the job done in the end. Take the win and look ahead to Tottenham Hotspur next Saturday in the first away trip of the term.
Well, that was painful. Getting rather tired of eking out 1-0 wins – sweating on the final whistle. And to think I toyed with the idea of our being top after tonight.
I must want my head examined.
ETH is ole mark 2, he was hired to implement a high pressing, high possession game yet 400m later we have nothing of the sort. getting outplayed by so many teams, and fluking games by one goal.
he was lucky last season, this season with chelsea and liverpool back and newcastle (who have a genuinely modern manager and one that implemented his style within months) will easily finish above united.
he will be gone by the end of the season and united will need a new rebuild -cant stress it enough, just how important a sporting director will be for the club – ETH is basically everything – and it won’t turn out well.
also as a last, a possession focused manager wouldn’t have bruno as his captain, and he wouldn’t have ok’d a crazy contract (almost what de bruyne earns) for marcus rashford either – neither of these players gets close to an arteta/guardola side.
Midfield needs some tweaks to get the best out of Mount. Cunha went through them like butter far too many times – but I’ve every faith in EtH. AWB’s attacking play looks to be improving, which is a big plus. A bit of the new manager ‘bounce’ for Wolves? Perhaps. It’ll be interesting to see how they do in their next few games. 3 points in the bag for the reds – right now, that’s what counts. Better start than last season 🙂
One of the big concerns mentioned on this site going into the first game was how we would play in the final third and once again we were very poor . We are clueless in how to give good service to the number nine and unless this improves markedly we are in for a long hard season