Red Alert With Steve Shankyaski

For the next few days, United fans can indulge in their wildest fantasies.

We sit top of the league, and until this Sunday we will remain there unchallenged. When we were level on points last week, Liverpool fans were complaining we were calling ourselves ‘Joint First Place’, so you’ve got be careful what you wish for as rival fans.

After a solid second half performance at Burnley, who are notorious for a solid defence, set pieces, and accurate route-one style football, we managed to knock Liverpool off their perch. It was an interesting game, a few heart-stopping moments when Burnley punted the ball into the box and we struggled to get it away, but I felt nothing but confidence in the second half that we would get the goals needed to win.

Pogba, who finally was the star of the show – and rightly Man of the Match – bagged the only goal of the game, a superb volley from 25 yards. In the first half, Ole had Pogba sat fairly deep and acting as a creative defensive midfielder – if you’ve ever heard of such a thing – his role was to sit just above the defensive line and work the ball accurately forward from there. He stuck to the manager's wishes and executed his role perfectly, but in the second half was where he shone.

Bruno was struggling in the game, so Pogba took his opportunity to show Burnley what he’s all about. He ran at players, held the ball, distributed perfectly and finally bagged that volley that won us the match. Whatever the reason, we need him to maintain this level of football. Rashford had a fairly quiet game and couldn’t get to grips with his right wing role at all, but his perfect pass to Pogba was what set up the goal so that was enough before he was brought off for Greenwood.

VAR had to work overtime in this match though. At one point there was a shout for a double red in two ends of the pitch simultaneously, which took around seven minutes to return a verdict of ‘yellow’, and Maguire’s superb header into the back of the net was almost heartbreaking to see such a difficult angle of goal disallowed. I also thought that Bailly’s pace complimented Maguire’s physical stature in their Centre-Back roles, like a tugboat and an Oil Tanker. He was able to cover and track where and when Maguire had been beaten. 

So now we’re in a position where we’re top of the league and the squad, as I mentioned last week, has fantastic camaraderie. They look buoyant in each others company. After a difficult game against Man City in the Carabou Cup last week, we responded perfectly today. Do I think United could win the league? Yes, I do. Mostly because it’s the 2020-21 season and all the other top teams are showing inconsistency and struggling with empty stadiums, COVID-19 recoveries and anything else that inhibits a clear mind on the pitch.

United have had all that, and managed to wriggle through and still win while they were playing under-par. Let’s say that Pogba has found his highest form and can hold onto it until the end of the season, then we have a work-class midfielder already on the team sheet. We’ve seen now that a second pacy centre-back compliments Maguire, so maybe we’ll see more of Bailly than Lindelof over the next few weeks. Rather than conjecture though, the biggest indicator of how we could fare in the season will come this weekend against Liverpool at Anfield.

Liverpool have had their wings clipped twice this season, with no fans allowed in the stadium, and no Virgil Van Dijk. They’ve cut teams to pieces one week, and lost 7-2 the next. If we can all be firing on the day, with Bruno and Pogba competing against each other for Man of the Match, and Rashford looking comfortable in his position and desperate to get into the box, we should hopefully turn them over. In reality though, a game hyped up like this usually ends a low scoring draw.