United need injection of confidence
If Ruud van Nistelrooy was supposed to wash the nostalgia out of the Manchester United system then perhaps that was achieved, though maybe not as intended. If Rúben Amorim was distracted from preparing Sporting for Manchester City on Tuesday, he will be more aware of a United squad bereft of confidence. United’s first 60 minutes against Chelsea saw them fumble pathetically for creativity. Not even the presence of one of the club’s greatest strikers has lifted the finishing quality in a group low on goals. Alejandro Garnacho and Marcus Rashford were both bereft of touch and instinct; substitute Joshua Zirkzee’s signing remains a mystery. There was something of Van Nistelrooy in Rasmus Højlund winning Bruno Fernandes’s penalty, and the goalscorer’s knee slide towards the tunnel at the Stretford End. But there was to be no Ferguson-era ecstatic denouement. This United don’t do them. Van Nistelrooy has two games remaining until United seek the progressive future postponed by mistakenly retaining Erik ten Hag. John Brewin
