The injury to Paul Pogba was seen as being an early watershed in Manchester United’s season. Up until that point, he had been the driving force behind the Old Trafford side’s impressive start to the campaign, finally fulfilling the potential that convinced Jose Mourinho he was worth £89 million the season before. But with the Frenchman’s hamstring injury, picked up just 19 minutes into the Champions League win over Basel, United’s good start could have crumbled away.
It hasn’t, though. In fact, Manchester United appear to have only gotten stronger, winning all five of their matches since then, scoring four goals in one match on four separate occasions. Mourinho’s team are the real deal this season. Along with Manchester City, they will challenge at the top of the Premier League table for the title, with the two sides currently tied on 19 points each.
This isn’t meant to belittle the contribution of Pogba. The Frenchman is arguably still Manchester United’s most important player, giving them something different in the centre of the pitch when he plays. Pogba has silenced his critics before suffering an injury, and he will continue to do so when he returns to action later in the month.
But the way United have managed to maintain their form without Pogba, and without a number of other figures, demonstrates how Mourinho’s outfit are now all about the system over the players. The Portuguese coach has constructed a model that means various squad members are drilled and trained in how to perform each role. When one is pulled out, due to injury or other factors, another comes in to do just as good a job.
Look at Maroaune Fellaini. Not so long ago, the Belgian was the most maligned player in the Premier League, used as a depiction of Manchester United’s fall since the age of Sir Alex Ferguson. Now, however, Fellaini has become a crucial member of Mourinho’s team, scoring four times in just eight appearances this season.
Ander Herrera is another who has entered the fray in light of injuries, underlining why so many believed him to be Manchester United’s Player of the Year last season. Ashley Young’s Old Trafford career looked as good as over just a few months ago, coming close to making the move to China, but now finds him back in the side, with Mourinho rotating the winger-turned-full-back in and out of the fold.
Perhaps the starkest demonstration of Manchester United’s reliance on the system can be found in the final third. The Old Trafford outfit have been in free scoring form so far this season, netting 21 times in just seven Premier League outings. There’s a certain conviction to the way they now attack, with the summer signing of Romelu Lukaku giving them a more bullish frontman to play off.
But it’s not all down to Lukaku. The likes of Henrikh Mkhitaryan, Juan Mata, Jesse Lingard and most notably, Anthony Martial and Marcus Rashford have all stepped up too. Fitting all those players into the one frontline, though, is a challenge, and so Mourinho has rotated. No fluency has been lost with that rotation.
Regardless of who is playing, Manchester United have played in the same way this season. That is testament to the training of the players by Mourinho. That is the mark of a side that, each to a man, knows what they are doing. So while United might boast one of the most individually brilliant squads in the game, they are about much more than that. They have shown that over the early part of the season.
