EFL Cup: United progress after difficult few days
Manchester United 5 - 2 Leicester City
Ruud van Nistelrooy began his tenure as Manchester United’s interim manager on a high, with his team cruising past Leicester to secure a spot in the Carabao Cup quarter-finals.
Just two days after stepping in following Erik ten Hag's dismissal, Van Nistelrooy’s call for an exciting performance was more than delivered by his players.
Casemiro got the party started with a stunning long-range strike and went on to score again before half-time. After an initial header rattled off both posts, the Brazilian reacted quickly to slot the ball in from eight yards out.
Alejandro Garnacho contributed his fifth goal of the season, and captain Bruno Fernandes had a bit of luck with his free-kick, which deflected off Leicester’s James Justin and into the net.
Defensively, United weren’t flawless. Some familiar issues allowed Bilal El Khannouss and Conor Coady to pull goals back for Leicester before the break. Coady’s finish, a first-time strike, came after the ball deflected off Diogo Dalot and sat up perfectly for him.
Under the watchful eyes of Sir Alex Ferguson, returning to Old Trafford for the first time since being relieved of his ambassadorial role, and United’s decision-makers, who are considering Sporting’s Ruben Amorim as Ten Hag’s permanent successor, the team maintained control.
Fernandes rounded things off in the 59th minute, capitalising on a poor backpass from Caleb Okoli to make it five.
Match highlights
You can watch the best moments from the match in the video below. The footage is from the EFL YouTube account.
The view from the terraces
We caught up with Liam after the match who gave us a good insight into the mood from the iconic Old Trafford terraces.
Ultimately, this was a very successful night for us. The types of chances that we were missing against West Ham and Fenerbache were being put away against Leicester. You'd say that this wasn't the players upping the game for the manager but perhaps playing with more freedom after a difficult few weeks.
In the wider context of things, who knows what will happen next? It was just nice to live the ground with a smile on my face. Roll on the weekend.
