Manchester United come second after lucky winner Rashford sinks Wolves | premier league

Marcus Rashford’s deflected strike against downtime secured Manchester United a relentless victory against Wolves and assured Ole Gunnar Solskjær.‘The men start 2021 second in the Premier League.

The meeting was the fourth meeting of those teams in 2020 and looked set to end with the sharing of a third scoreless draw as the busy festive schedule took its toll. But United dug deep and knocked out a late winner in an empty Old Trafford, with Rashford capping a year to remember – on and off the pitch – sealing a 1-0 triumph to death.

A sign of Solskjær’s confidence in his squad, there have been six changes from the Boxing Day draw at Leicester – the most eye-catching being Edinson Cavani’s preference for No.9 over Anthony Martial.

For Wolves, after a draw with Tottenham there have been four changes from Nuno Espírito Santo, including Ki – Jana Hoever, the 18-year-old defender who made his Premier League debut.

United’s hopes of extending their unbeaten streak through victory looked bright judging by the fluid interaction from the kick-off. Here Paul Pogba, Bruno Fernandes, Mason Greenwood and Alex Telles all passed and moved with intention near Rui Patricio’s goal. Rashford then launched into two innings which brought him into a shooting position, but none of the subsequent attempts troubled Patricio.

Wolves then had a turn taking the contest at United. Adama Traoré, operating in attack alongside Pedro Neto, burned the home side’s midfielder and returned a pass to the latter, who unloaded and David de Gea saved. Then Vitinha got the better of Pogba and tested No.1 again, this effort as easy as the previous one to tackle.

Still, these were sure signs of increased Wolves pressure when a confusion between De Gea and Eric Bailly allowed Traore to bring the ball back from the left to Ruben Neves: this time the shot was fierce and the United No.1 pushed him back. with both fists.

This was all about Solskjær enough that he made a rare foray into the technical zone where he lingered, urging his team to take the ball and stay there. It worked for a while. The problem, however, was a laziness to the attacks that were heavy and not much else. An illustration was found in a scoreless pass from Greenwood from the right which failed to find Cavani and a rear wheel from Rashford who passed Alex Telles on the opposite flank.

United better was a dart from Rashford to the starting line which presaged Telles cross skimming Cavani’s header with Patricio’s goal gaping. Here’s a flash of the pace missing from much of the home team’s buildup. This meant the Wolves were able to easily move behind the ball and thwart their opponent, so it was instructive that when Patricio saved his line from an effort from Fernandes it came from a pacy Greenwood ball.

By the break the Wolves had been reduced to the odd counterattack, because when Neto won a free kick he got caught. Now De Gea was making his money, with quicksilver reflexes to fend off Saiss’s attempt.

After a Fernandes ball over Rashford came to nothing, Neto missed a golden opportunity to play Traore: every moment summed up half-time.

For the second half, Luke Shaw replaced Telles as United left-back and his opening action was to stand on a dead ball that Fernandes hit from the left, with Wolves relaxing that out of the way.

If Solskjær had briefed his men in the meantime to sharpen their act, the sight of Pogba’s awkward touch halfway would have appalled. And if there was a noticeable increase in vocal intensity – with both teams contributing here with shouts of encouragement – the quality was still below par. Hoping to improve Wolves’ caliber, Espirito Santo brought in Daniel Podence for Vitinha, but it was United who made the majority of the hiss and puff.

When Fernandes fails to trigger United often suffer and it proves. The Portuguese were having a rare night in which the movies, laps, passes and runs were sinking and Solskjær therefore called Martial. Greenwood was taken out for the Frenchman, but as United created a lack of chances, Rashford and Cavani could have been hooked as well. The game continued in a United dominance pattern and nothing else.

Now came the penalty claim rejected by VAR. It came after an arrival from Cavani in a corner was marked for offside – before Bailly’s header hit Coady’s hand, but he escaped.