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Manchester United vs Fulham: 08/12/18 – match preview and predicted starting XIs

Date: 08/12/2018

K/O: 15:00

Venue: Old Trafford

Referee: Lee Probert 

A Manchester United side who have won only one league game in five attempts welcome bottom of the table Fulham to Old Trafford, in the hopes of getting back to winning ways as soon as possible.

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As has been the case for quite a while now, spirits do not seem to be high wherever you look in this Manchester United setup. The fact they sit 8th in the table, behind both Everton and Bournemouth, should tell a story of its own; yet the bigger story is that United are in the pack of teams that have dramatically fallen away from the top five, where the three teams placed 6th, 7th and 8th are already eight points behind Arsenal in 5th. United managed an exciting 2-2 draw in their last game against Arsenal on Wednesday night, producing a performance that while admittedly careless and sloppy in defence, was so unusually positive in attack that you wonder why they can’t seem to dredge up that kind of mentality on a regular basis.

They still should have lost the game; if Arsenal had kept their heads for about a minute longer after they had scored their second goal of the night they definitely could have seen out the game, but droopy minds and lazy legs allowed Jesse Lingard to steal in and snatch a point. The point is satisfactory enough, considering Arsenal are unbeaten in 20 matches now, but Mourinho and United fans will be worried at the ease of which Arsenal repeatedly played the ball in behind their defence, particularly through the left side where young, underused signing Diogo Dalot had a tough night.

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The problem at the moment is that every Manchester United starting-eleven tells a host of unwanted stories; reverting to a three at the back formation against Arsenal perhaps reveals that Mourinho is running out of ideas, particularly with the recalling of the injury-prone and error-prone duo Marcos Rojo and Eric Bailly. Pogba and Lukaku failing to make the team from the start is unsurprising yet still alarming – in particular against Southampton at St. Mary’s, Paul Pogba put in a performance that truly stretched the realms of credibility in terms of personal effort. Mourinho finds himself in a place where the only player that he can truly trust to perform on a weekly basis is Anthony Martial: the exact player that Mourinho was so publicly keen on selling in the summer, a decision which he was overruled on.

Can Fulham add to Manchester United’s misery? It isn’t out of the realms of possibility at all; despite being bottom of the table, Fulham will take heart at the extraordinary fact that United are actually closer to the bottom of the table than they are to Manchester City at the top, and smaller sides have recently, and publicly, given United extremely difficult games. The Southampton game, already mentioned, was a lucky escape, where two defensive errors meant Southampton surrendered a two goal lead, while the hosting of Crystal Palace at home led to a 0-0 disaster where the lowly visitors absolutely should have won the game late on.

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Fulham visit Old Trafford after a slightly disappointing 1-1 draw with Leicester at home, a game which in their current situation was probably deemed a must-win fixture but proved to be yet another game where Ranieri’s new side could not keep the opposition out of the score-sheet. It could have been worse too; after James Maddison’s sweeping finish in the second half, the Leicester midfielder had an extremely late chance to score the winner but could not convert after following up on his own rebound.

Ranieri seems to have found his back-four immediately in his tenure at Fulham, displaying an ability to make up his mind early and firmly in a way that completely deserted Slaviša Jokanović in his time in the Premier League. Is this back four of Christie, Mawson, Odoi and Le Marchand to be the permanent ensemble tasked with saving the side from relegation? They seem to be Ranieri’s favourites so far but it has to be noted that, while their solidity overall has improved, Le Marchand in the left-back position seems repeatedly nervous in games, something which was evident consistently against Leicester. With summer signing from Bristol City, Joe Bryan, on the bench and possessing an excellent ability to overlap and assist, perhaps his first-team opportunity under the Italian will come sooner rather than later.



Team News: 

With Alexis Sanchez still out with a hamstring injury (and struggling to find his way into Mourinho’s plans anyway), it may be as you were for United against Fulham this weekend. Most of the attention will naturally be on Mourinho’s two most expensive signings, Pogba and Lukaku, who have both fallen out of favour and seem to hold the side back when they play rather than contribute as expected. The team did well without them against Arsenal and it would be a slight surprise if they were bought back into the side immediately. It will be interesting to see if the back three makes a return, a continuation from the Arsenal game, and also whether Diego Dalot can keep his place at right-back – for all of his good qualities, Ashley Young’s tenure as a full-back looks to be a dated idea and a new, fresh player in that position would be welcome.

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Claudio Ranieri deployed a rather peculiar line-up for the Leicester game, where neither André Schürrle nor Tom Cairney were used from the start. Instead there were surprise inclusions for Aboubakar Kamara on the right side and Luciano Vietto through the middle – Kamara justified his inclusion with a well-taken goal (set up excellently by Aleksander Mitrovic) but Vietto looked slightly out of place, with Tom Cairney coming close to scoring after replacing him. Perhaps we should expect such experimentation from Ranieri – he is ‘The Tinkerman’ after all – but it may also be an indication that he has not fully worked out who his best team is yet – something that will need to be rectified quickly if Fulham are to survive. With most injured players available for selection again now, it will be interesting to see what system and what personnel the Italian chooses at Old Trafford.

Predicted Starting XIs

Manchester United (3-4-1-2): De Gea; Rojo, Smalling, Bailly; Dalot, Herrera, Matic, Shaw; Lingard; Martial, Rashford.

Fulham (4-2-3-1): Rico; Christie, Odoi, Mawson, Le Marchand; Chambers, Seri; Sessegnon, Cairney, Schürrle; Mitrovic.

Prediction: Manchester United 1 Fulham 1 

Recently, Fulham have visited both Anfield and Stamford Bridge in bad form and both times they have got beaten 2-0 – and yet that does not tell the full story. Against Liverpool, Fulham were unlucky to have a goal ruled out for offside, while missing a couple of good chances as well and, what’s more, against Chelsea they nearly took advantage of some lackadaisical defending.



They are unlikely to be meek against United, who have recently been nervous and visibly shaken by the attempts of lower-placed sides, especially Crystal Palace; Fulham have plenty of evidence recently that United are there to be attacked, evidence provided by teams around their half of the table. It sounds bold to say, but Manchester United might be there for the taking in many ways, and Fulham do have the players to, in theory, give them a really good game.

Jack Hall

An MA Film Studies graduate who now writes about Fulham FC for 90MAAT and any movies that take his fancy in his spare time. Recently saw his football club, Swansea City, get relegated and people were right, the Championship is much more fun.

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