It wouldn’t quite be true to say that everything was rosy at Manchester United a year ago, but they had finished second in the Premier League the previous season and had added Jadon Sancho and Raphäel Varane to the squad. The doubts around Ole Gunnar Solskjær’s management meant a serious title challenge still seemed unlikely but nobody really expected them to fall to sixth, with 16 points fewer than they had gathered the previous season.
The campaign began well enough, with a 5-1 demolition of Leeds and then four points from admittedly less-than-inspiring performances in away games at Southampton and Wolves. This seemed the familiar pattern: Solskjær’s United excelled against teams who came at them and left space for the pace of their forward line to exploit, but found it harder against teams who sat deep.
