admin Ole Gunnar Solskjaer has seen plenty to maintain his eternal optimism on this upbeat Manchester United pre-season tour. The potency of Mason Greenwood and Marcus Rashford and the telepathy between right-siders Aaron Wan-Bissaka and Paul Pogba have enriched United’s three wins, enhancing the quartet’s status among supporters.
Maybe more significant than a Greenwood goal or Pogba pass was a lofted dink Wan-Bissaka received in the first-half against Inter Milan. He had about two seconds to cushion the ball on his chest and find a teammate but did and United switched from defence to attack speedily. The pass was played by David de Gea.
orget De Gea’s wretched run-in last season for a moment, the sole facet of his game that has been deemed inadequate in recent years is his unadventurous distribution. The irony is Sir Alex Ferguson and Eric Steele thought De Gea’s ball-playing at Atletico Madrid was so similar to Edwin van der Sar it convinced them to pursue the raw rookie over Manuel Neuer, now more known for his sweeping than his ‘keeping.
“I think this pre-season we’re trying to have more of the ball,” De Gea said at the Fullerton Bay hotel in Singapore on Sunday. “To keep the ball, to build from the back, to keep control of the game – things we didn’t have last season. We have to improve a lot on this.”
At the same venue, Luke Shaw sang from the same hymn sheet: “Ole is more focused on keeping the ball, playing out from the back and keeping possession. A lot of times last season we didn’t do that well enough.
“On the front foot as well with the pressing, now we know as a team what the manager wants and what his ideas are for us as players to go out and do on the pitch. It’s great because we all know what we need to do.”
“We’ve worked a lot on tactics, pressing-wise. When to go, what sort of moments. The other side of that is to keep the ball. He wants us to play out from the back, there are a couple of different rules now where you can go into the box and we have worked on that in training.”
Victor Lindelof spent part of his youth career as a midfielder and Jose Mourinho identified him as the centre half to ‘come into midfield’ two years ago. Lindelof, an introvert by nature, is becoming more extroverted in his play and embarked on bursts towards the edge of the opposition area against Leeds and Inter last week, fashioning openings for Marcus Rashford and Daniel James.
Pogba is playing more of a conductor role in a central midfield axis, leaving the running to the full-backs and front four. United should be attacking with a minimum of six players and Pogba arguably has more freedom as the seventh man, licensed to make belated bursts into the area or hang back for the loose ball.
The subtle changes to the United defence are the most critical as part of the new attacking approach. United want to supplement Lindelof with another centre-back who emerges from the backline in Harry Maguire, who enchanted the Manchester City coach Pep Guardiola with his second-half forage at the Etihad in May. That is a ringing endorsement, though Guardiola had his head turned by Fred.
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