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With Erik ten Hag’s position as Man United manager already back under threat after a poor start to the season, taking three points from Southampton tomorrow morning is a must.
It is probably not to Ten Hag’s advantage that the Saints have lost all three of their opening Premier League games this season, away to Brentford and Newcastle and at home to Nottingham Forest.
This makes the game look even more of a “should win” even though the long trip to the south coast is often tricky for northern clubs.
Home and away, United have only beaten their south coast opponents once in the last four outings, when Bruno Fernandes scored the only goal in Ten Hag’s fourth match in charge.
You have to go back to 2021 to find a game when the two sides were separated by more than a single goal, and that was the famous 9-0 thrashing at Old Trafford, when the away side were reduced to 10 men for much of the game and nine toward the end.
The Red Devils equalled a Premier League record in that match as one of only two sides to have seven different goalscorers in the same game (with one being an own goal).
Of the seven scorers, only Bruno Fernandes and Marcus Rashford remain at the club, with the likes of Aaron Wan-Bissaka, Edinson Cavani, Dan James, Anthony Martial (who scored two) and Scott McTominay all having moved on.
The record was later beaten by Newcastle when they had eight different scorers against Sheffield United last season.
The United squad as a whole has in fact changed drastically since that match three and a half years ago. Also gone are David de Gea, Fred, Mason Greenwood, Dean Henderson, Eric Bailly, Alex Telles, Brandon Williams, Paul Pogba, Nemanja Matic and Donny van de Beek, leaving only five of the 20 still at the club.
The fixture marks a return to St Marys for director of football Jason Wilcox, who was poached from the Saints in April. He is likely to be greeted with some barracking from the Southampton faithful.
Luke Shaw, however, will not be facing his former club as he continues his seemingly endless recovery from injury.
One player who could be taking the knee at 12:30pm tomorrow is Manuel Ugarte, who is set to make his debut for United following a £42 million move from Paris Saint-Germain. Fans will be curious to see how he performs in the Premier League and whether he is able to help United steady a very rocky ship.
Two other new signings, Matthijs de Ligt and Joshua Zirkzee, will also be under the microscope after miserable performances for the Netherlands (De Ligt) and against Liverpool (Zirkzee).
The referee for the game will be Stuart Attwell.
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