Manchester United produced an outstanding display to defeat Liverpool and give manager Erik ten Hag his first Premier League victory at a thunderous Old Trafford.

Ten Hag took the bold decision to drop captain Harry Maguire and Cristiano Ronaldo and was rewarded with a performance that lifted the mood of crisis around Manchester United and leave Liverpool still searching for a first win of the season.

Jadon Sancho showed superb control and composure to deservedly put United in front after 16 minutes before Marcus Rashford raced clear to beat Alisson from substitute Anthony Martial's pass eight minutes after the interval.

Mo Salah set up a tense finish when he scrambled in a header with nine minutes left but United survived to give Ten Hag just the sort of triumph he needs to make his mark at Old Trafford.

Man Utd rise to the occasion

Manchester United were at their lowest ebb after a 4-0 humiliation at Brentford followed an opening day home defeat by Brighton.

And while thousands protested against the ownership of the Glazers before kick-off and the chants continued throughout the game, United's fans rallied behind a performance of fierce intensity and commitment that left Liverpool bullied for long periods.

New £60m signing Casemiro was paraded in front of the Stretford End before kick-off and how he must have relished the magnificent atmosphere inside Old Trafford as United turned the misery of their abject first two league performances on its head.


Liverpool won 5-0 here last season and 4-0 at Anfield but United mustered more energy and aggression in the first 10 minutes here than in both of those embarrassing performances.

Ten Hag employed pace to take advantage of Liverpool's high defensive line and they should have been ahead even before Sancho opened the scoring, Anthony Elanga hitting the post after racing clear.

United contested every challenge with a fired up Lisandro Martinez setting the tone early on with a robust challenge on Mohamed Salah.

Rashford's form has been indifferent in recent times but his confidence will surely soar after the composed manner in which he scored what eventually proved to be the winner.

And this was a landmark night for Ten Hag, who knew his decision to leave out Maguire and Ronaldo would have brought scrutiny had United lost.

Instead, he enjoyed the sort of night that he will hope gets his Old Trafford reign up and running.

Mediocre Liverpool fall short

Liverpool's disappointing start to the season continued as they found themselves over-run from the kick-off by an inspired Manchester United.

Jurgen Klopp's side have injury problems and Darwin Nunez's moment of madness that resulted in a red card against Crystal Palace deprived Liverpool of the height in attack that might have exploited Martinez's lack of stature but they got exactly what they deserved here - nothing.

Klopp's decision to omit Fabinho was mystifying, even more so when James Milner and Jordan Henderson were left off the pace as United rattled into challenges and contested every ball with a fierce competitive edge.

Liverpool were also vulnerable at the back, with Virgil van Dijk's poor start to the season continuing, especially with a passive piece of defending for Sancho's goal.

Klopp will not be panicking and Liverpool have too much quality to struggle for long but two points from their first three league games is a bitterly disappointing return and it is hard to make a case that they deserved anything more.

Very Superb Win by Manchester United.

Big performances from many last night.
Dalot showed he can defend, Martinez showed height isn't everything,
Varane was a Rolls Royce and Malacia looking like the buy of the season. BF

Manchester was outstanding no doubt but they still need to improve. Congratulations to them.

Football is not mathematics. Manchester United that could not defeat Brighton and Brendford but defeated Liverpool.

kolafolabi:
Football is not mathematics. Manchester United that could not defeat Brighton and Brendford but defeated Liverpool.

True that Mr Kola.
That is football for you.
That is why the bookmakers will always make profit and also the reason only the brave punters will always will the BIG money.

Soccer is unpredictable mehn!

its nice seeing united play their best football after a long while its beautiful seeing rashford, sancho n martial rising to d occasionally in big game wen it matters most even without cr7
this same squad finished 2nd last 2 seasons, dey spoiled everything n brought in cr7 n suffered its worst season
I urge Erik to discard cr7 n rebuild wt dt younger n vibrant attack i saw against reds yesterday if he wants to succeed..

kolafolabi:
Football is not mathematics. Manchester United that could not defeat Brighton and Brendford but defeated Liverpool.

thats the beauty of football, d unpredictability makes it uni cf

post=115976128:
Very Superb Win by Manchester United.

Big performances from many last night.
Dalot showed he can defend, Martinez showed height isn't everything,
Varane was a Rolls Royce and Malacia looking like the buy of the season. BF

its just one match..relax with d hype, dey really tried BT need to keep it up

paulolee:
its nice seeing united play their best football after a long while its beautiful seeing rashford, sancho n martial rising to d occasionally in big game wen it matters most even without cr7
this same squad finished 2nd last 2 seasons, dey spoiled everything n brought in cr7 n suffered its worst season
I urge Erik to discard cr7 n rebuild wt dt younger n vibrant attack i saw against reds yesterday if he wants to succeed..

Ir foolishness holds no bounds ... so now Manchester has arrived...because they beat a Liverpool that is winless this season.... its now confirmed that u know nothing about football... the only way Manchester can survive is by playing defensive football and then rely on counter...thats what they relied on when the finished 2nd...but that format is difficult for midclass teams cos they wud hv to be the team with possession thereby conceding like they hv been doing... united cant play possession football, that hs been their weakness for ages now.... yh they improved cos players like shaw , fred , maguire were benched and it made the defense solid ... but teams like bayern, city , Madrid will dismantle them cos they are used to playing teams that sit back ... Manchester are not yet comfortable with possession..... dont forget they did this same thing against Chelsea last season .... throw away Bruno....and get a KDB type, get another winger ... Ronaldo being dropped had nothing to do with their victory... Afterall he scored a hattrick against conte's spurs last season in a 3.2 win

Kingcalls:


Ir foolishness holds no bounds ... so now Manchester has arrived...because they beat a Liverpool that is winless this season.... its now confirmed that u know nothing about football... the only way Manchester can survive is by playing defensive football and then rely on counter...thats what they relied on when the finished 2nd...but that format is difficult for midclass teams cos they wud hv to be the team with possession thereby conceding like they hv been doing... united cant play possession football, that hs been their weakness for ages now.... yh they improved cos players like shaw , fred , maguire were benched and it made the defense solid ... but teams like bayern, city , Madrid will dismantle them cos they are used to playing teams that sit back ... Manchester are not yet comfortable with possession..... dont forget they did this same thing against Chelsea last season .... throw away Bruno....and get a KDB type, get another winger ... Ronaldo being dropped had nothing to do with their victory... Afterall he scored a hattrick againstm conte's spurs last season in a 3.2 win

guy go sleep, d Same idiot dt blamed a Renato Sanchez for Portugal lost to Serbia bcoz he went for goal instead of passing to cr7 to score tap in
same Renato dt scored d only goal in dt Portugal lost o.
wen it concern cr7, he is always perfect n dts why all big clubs keep rejecting him.....
d gee is old n weak, very useless without goals BT una no wan accept oo wan accept am

One thing I noticed is that United play to help Ronaldo score instead of him playing to help the team.

They will do wonders under this coach if Ronaldo is not part of them.

The hunger, fighting spirit and urgency those lads showed that day wouldn't be there if Ronaldo was on the field.

They should let him go.

Lastly, if they really want to be replicating this kinda result week in week out, Maguire should be tied up to the bench and never be allowed to even so much as warm up on the touchline.

That Lisandro Martinez is going to be the next best thing since Vidick.

Coming from a Chelsea fan

paulolee:

guy go sleep, d Same idiot dt blamed a Renato Sanchez for Portugal lost to Serbia bcoz he went for goal instead of passing to cr7 to score tap in
same Renato dt scored d only goal in dt Portugal lost o.
wen it concern cr7, he is always perfect n dts why all big clubs keep rejecting him.....
d gee is old n weak, very useless without goals BT una no wan accept oo wan accept am

HATE IS THE LAST WAY BEFORE TURNING TO A WITCH .. U ARE DEFINITELY CLOSE TO THAT .... u really are not smart when it comes to football analysis... u just think hate and throw rubbish... this same Manchester will not beat a midclass compact team

internationalman:
One thing I noticed is that United play to help Ronaldo score instead of him playing to help the team.

They will do wonders under this coach if Ronaldo is not part of them.

The hunger, fighting spirit and urgency those lads showed that day wouldn't be there if Ronaldo was on the field.

They should let him go.

Lastly, if they really want to be replicating this kinda result week in week out, Maguire should be tied up to the bench and never be allowed to even so much as warm up on the touchline.

That Lisandro Martinez is going to be the next best thing since Vidick.

Coming from a Chelsea fan

Ronaldo has nothing to do with that bad play... By the time Manchester plays Southampton this weekend and I pray they dont start Ronaldo, thats when u will understand that the team still lacks .... Manchester can't break teams that are compact in defence... and will still concede goals... their 3 best opportunities came from counter attacks .... 2 turned to goals ... Ronaldo is still their only hope of winning games against compact teams... Rashford , Sancho and martial will still be useless when opposing teams try to sit back and they have no presence in the box ... Rashford, martial , Elanga and sancho are not box players and can't score with their heads ... non of them starts for their national teams ...and u think they will take u places this season

I'm even happy they won without Ronaldo so that they can let him go and play CL with another club ... even as bad as Liverpool has been this season , they had 71% of the possession....

People hating on man utd full this thread y'all were expecting man utd to be beaten like 8-0 or more, now that utd have cleared yall doubt una don turn fake analyst talking bout possessions blah blah blah, like it is all that matters ...
United will continue to cause problems this season... E sure say na pained chelshit fans dey attack us cos their hatred on man utd is something else
Arsenal is more of a threat to United than City this season, don't even mention chelshit cos despite us doing giveaway last season e reach their turn they couldn't do us anything with our worst squad we'd rather be scared of playing a league 2 club than chelshit

Kingcalls:


HATE IS THE LAST WAY BEFORE TURNING TO A WITCH .. U ARE DEFINITELY CLOSE TO THAT .... u really are not smart when it comes to football analysis... u just think hate and throw rubbish... this same Manchester will not beat a midclass compact team

bt dey won a big Liverpool, d second best in EPL last season, congratulate them n move on till dey lose to ur mid class compact team
assuming cr7 played n score hatrick, dis talk for change
hypocrites them...

paulolee:

bt dey won a big Liverpool, d second best in EPL last season, congratulate them n move on till dey lose to ur mid class compact team
assuming cr7 played n score hatrick, dis talk for change
hypocrites them...

I'm notvan emotional analyst ... a team don't good overnight... even if Ronaldo scored a hattrick, I will still say same... afterall he scored a hattrick against spurs last season ... that dint mean Manchester hD arrived...

Kingcalls:


Ronaldo has nothing to do with that bad play... By the time Manchester plays Southampton this weekend and I pray they dont start Ronaldo, thats when u will understand that the team still lacks .... Manchester can't break teams that are compact in defence... and will still concede goals... their 3 best opportunities came from counter attacks .... 2 turned to goals ... Ronaldo is still their only hope of winning games against compact teams... Rashford , Sancho and martial will still be useless when opposing teams try to sit back and they have no presence in the box ... Rashford, martial , Elanga and sancho are not box players and can't score with their heads ... non of them starts for their national teams ...and u think they will take u places this season

I'm even happy they won without Ronaldo so that they can let him go and play CL with another club ... even as bad as Liverpool has been this season , they had 71% of the possession....

Well you may be right to some extent though.