Manchester United could find their next Marcus Rashford this month
If ever Man United needed a striker solution from within it is this February, nine years on from a teenage Marcus Rashford coming to their rescue.
Caroline McAteer is the experienced PR specialist who manages a handful of Manchester United players and she could manage her own United five-a-side team.
Cristiano Ronaldo, Jadon Sancho, Raphael Varane, Marcus Rashford and Mason Mount’s public relations are all handled by Ms McAteer. So gone, gone, gone, gone and gone (from matchday squads).
Ronaldo admitted he had “no respect” for United manager Erik ten Hag. Sancho publicly accused Ten Hag of saying something “completely untrue”. Varane was released after United ignored the one-year option in his contract. Rashford was very publicly dropped by successive permanent managers.
Mount sent his best to Lisandro Martinez on Instagram this week. “All here for you brother,” his post read. Call it gallows humour, but maybe that is because Mount is often in the physio’s room. Mount has played in 33 games out of a possible 89 for United.
Since the winter transfer window closed, United have whittled their squad down to 25 players, the minimum and advisable amount. Yet it has shrunk further.
Two of those players are Mount and Luke Shaw, physio room bedfellows. One is third-choice goalkeeper Tom Heaton, who has not played in two years. Martinez is out until next season.
Then there are players at the back of the queue. Casemiro has played 20 minutes this calendar year and his cameo in Bucharest last week was his first appearance in a month. United have specialist and auxiliary centre halves to cover for Martinez and Casemiro is eighth in line.
Ruben Amorim does not fancy either of the two strikers United forked out £108.5million for and they make up half of his attacking department. The irony of Rashford’s daily drive through the M6 toll is there is a high probability a new Rashford will emerge.
The stars aligned for Rashford in February 2016. Wayne Rooney was out injured, James Wilson, an academy-bred striker who scored twice on his senior debut, was out on loan at Brighton and the more limited Ashley Fletcher was on loan at Barnsley.
Three days before United hosted Midtjylland in the Europa League, they dismissed Shrewsbury Town in the FA Cup fifth round. Will Keane came on, hit the post and in doing so tore his groin. Then, on the night of the Midtjylland match, Anthony Martial pulled up in the warm up.
Five strikers cleared the way for Rashford’s chance and he took it with four goals in two games within 72 hours. The current United attack is more depleted than it was back then.
Next week’s FA Youth Cup fifth round tie against Chelsea will be staged at Leigh Sports Village, rather than at Old Trafford. Every Youth Cup home draw during United’s triumphant run in 2022 was held at their stadium.
Leigh does not have a train station and the tram line does not venture that far in Greater Manchester. The first team will not have played at Old Trafford in five days and will not play there again for another two weeks.
Unsurprisingly, it has been suggested the Ineos cost-cutters have deemed it too expensive for Old Trafford to open its gates for the academy’s biggest game of the season. It would not be the first time Sir Jim Ratcliffe and his cabal have been out of touch with the football club they have invested in.
United and Chelsea are the most successful clubs in the competition and United prevailed in the teams’ last meeting at Leigh in December 2018, ending Chelsea’s five-year monopoly of the Youth Cup. The enthralling 4-3 victory was decided by the 17-year-old scorer of a hat-trick, Mason Greenwood.
