Manchester United forward Marcus Rashford has allayed fears that he is carrying an injury by reporting to training on Tuesday.
The England international, who is enjoying a fine start to the new season, sparked concern after not being spotted in a package of images from training on Monday. That led to some doubts over Rashford's availability for Thursday night’s trip to face Sheriff Tiraspol.
United head to Moldova in what is their only remaining game of the month following a pair of Premier League postponements. The Red Devils were initially due to face off vs Crystal Palace at Selhurst Park last weekend, before matches were called off following the Queen’s late passing.
And it has now been confirmed that this weekend’s planned fixture against rivals Leeds United has also been postponed. Ten Hag will now have a decision to make on the strength of the squad he takes to Tiraspol, with an international break on the way.
United’s next Premier League game is scheduled to be against Manchester City, where Rashford will likely lead the line. Having endured a difficult season under Ole Gunnar Solskjaer and Ralf Rangnick, he has now shown signs that he is approaching his best under the new manager.
In just six games of the new season, Rashford has managed to find the net three times, just one fewer than the total he managed over the course of the Premier League campaign last time around. “I see a happy Marcus Rashford, I see some phases in his game that we could improve and we worked really hard the last two and a half months with him on different aspects and he likes it and he wants to transfer it to the pitch and that's what you see in this moment,” Ten Hag explained.
"It starts with happiness, he really is coming in every day, enjoys it, he's really smiling, a positive vibe and if you want to stick together a way of play and transfer different aspects of your game and are happy, you will bring more of a contribution to the team, to the performance, to the result and also to the development.”
Rashford has been given the nod by Ten Hag to start over Cristiano Ronaldo, who missed almost the entirety of pre-season amid transfer speculation. The 37-year-old did start against Real Sociedad in the Europa League opener, where the Spaniards ran out 1-0 winners at Old Trafford.
That was Ronaldo’s first and only start since the Brentford debacle, with United winning the next four which saw the Portuguese coming off the bench in each of those victories.
Ten Hag hasn’t addressed the media since prior to the game with Sociedad due to the media blackout following Her Majesty’s death last Thursday. He has therefore been unable to offer any injury updates, but their list of issues appear to be clearing up with not only Rashford arriving at training, but also Donny van de Beek and Luke Shaw doing the same.
Van de Beek has missed the last two matches through injury and his attendance for training will increase hopes he could be available for selection this week. Luke Shaw was also spotted back with the main group on Monday having suffered a minor injury during the thrashing by Brentford last month.
