Player ratings from Manchester United’s 1-1 in the first leg of their Europa League round of 16 tie against Real Sociedad.
Andre Onana – 5
Made a save at the end but otherwise wasn’t tasked with much. At this point we’re just thankful there wasn’t a calamitous error.
Diogo Dalot – 2
I’m trying to think of a bright spot so I could say well other than the brainless decision to not square that ball for Hojlund… but I can’t think of one. He was involved in the buildup to the goal but he still made that far more of an adventure than it should have been.
Leny Yoro – 7
Kept things tidy at the back.
Matthijs de Ligt – 7
Tidy defending. Almost had a calamitous slip but did very well to make the play.
Noussair Mazraoui – 7
Look the back line kept things tidy today! Not much else to it. They weren’t exactly being put under tons of pressure.
Patrick Dorgu – 4
Got up and down the pitch very well but his passing was wasteful. The commentator on the world feed had just about had it with him.
Casemiro – 5
Offers more on the ball than Ugarte does but struggled to turn that into anything impactful. Defended decently well considering United were asking him to cover tons of space again.
Bruno Fernandes – 8
United’s only midfielder that can really do things on the ball. Unfortunately when he’s playing that role it means United lack their creative attacking midfielder.
Alejandro Garnacho – 5
Becoming the typical Garnacho game. Had a few shots from good positions but was very wasteful. Kept his head down and missed some obvious passes. The one time he decided to look up and pass he bagged an assist, his first goal involvement since… the last Europa League game.
Joshua Zirkzee – 7
Has done a good job settling in after a completely normal bedding in period of a few months. His technical ability is superb but still not sure if the number 10 position suits him. He just doesn’t have much creativity besides playing those nice balls off to runners. Either we won’t know what his true value could be until United surround him with some teammates who are actually useful.
Rasmus Hojlund – 4
Look, we all saw the play. You have every right to go into the dressing room and bash Dalot’s head in but besides that play, what else did you do? According to Fotmob he created the most chances in the match so you get some points for that.
Subs
Christian Eriksen – N/A
In a team begging for technical ability and creativity it continues to be a mystery why he’s not getting more minutes.
Victor Lindelof & Toby Collyer – N/A
Came on in the final minutes. No impact.
Manager
Ruben Amorim (not Erik ten Hag) – 5
Picked roughly the only starting XI he could based on the players available. Perhaps Christian Eriksen should have come on earlier as United were clearly getting tired but looking at the bench, what else more could he do? We all want to see some of the kids get action but if they’re not ready, throwing them into this mess will only harm them. A draw away from home in Europe isn’t bad, even if it should have been more.
Performance wise – Real Sociedad are averaging 10.2 shots per game in La Liga. Only three Premier League sides create fewer chances per match: Ipswich Town, Leicester City, and Southampton. La Real have scored 23 in 26 La Liga matches this season. Only one Premier League club have scored fewer (Southampton). This is a relegation level attack and United have won six of the seven matches they’ve played against the three relegation sides this year.
This performance was right in line with what we’ve seen in those matches. Not quite enough in the attack, but hardly anything to worry about going the other way. The only risk to United was going to be something weird happening or something dumb happening and United managed to find that (as they so often do). The Reds are still favorites to go through.
