ClapThere’s been a great deal of panic amongst Manchester United fans, and you could argue that’s a case of ‘rightfully so’. Alas, as reported by BBC and Manchester Evening News, the panic subsided ever so slightly over the weekend as the Red Devils were able to cruise towards a 4-0 triumph over Norwich City at Old Trafford.
Marcus Rashford opened the scoring in the first half and while the score was kept pretty tight heading into the second, there was still a level of comfort to United’s game that fans would’ve been relieved to see.
Signed, sealed, delivered
It didn’t mean much without the second goal, though, which they finally got when Rashford himself made it two from the penalty spot. Anthony Martial added a third within a matter of minutes, before youngster Mason Greenwood also got on the scoresheet with less than a quarter of an hour remaining.
Ole Gunnar Solskjaer was understandably pleased in the wake of their biggest win in quite some time.
“Very happy. We started on the front foot. When you can walk off, and I am sure the opposition are talking about Manchester United as a very hard working team, that is what I want from my team.
“In any Premier League game you have to take advantage of the pressure and domination you get. Second half was very good.
“We reacted today, we can bounce back and we are taking more than two or three steps forward before one back, because behind the scenes we know we are doing good work.”
“Fantastic effort by Marcus getting to 200 games so quickly. He got through most of the game, he is struggling a little bit so we took him off. He kept his cool. Very pleased with Marcus.”
Easy as it comes
Daniel Farke, as you can imagine, was as realistic as ever as the Canaries continue to stare into the abyss of a potential immediate return to the Championship.
“When you are 3-0 down against probably the best counter-attacking side in the league, it is then difficult to win the game so today we have to accept the better side won.
“We gave the first goal away, sloppy in our defending, but you are still in the game. We had a good spell before half-time with Todd Cantwell and a great save by the goalkeeper.
“I was pleased with the reaction at 4-0. We had to stick together in the last 20 minutes. We are disappointed but we also know a game at Old Trafford is not a season-defining game for us.
“We are definitely in the worst position (in the league) but we are competitive. This is what can happen at this level. We are realistic.”
United will continue to go after a spot in the top four whereas Norwich understand that they need to pick up points imminently, otherwise there’s a very strong chance that they’ll be heading straight back down into the second tier with a whimper as opposed to with a bit of fight.
