Aston Villa 0, Manchester United 0
Manchester United battled their way to a goalless draw at Aston Villa at the end of a difficult week for manager Erik Ten Hag.
Embed from Getty ImagesA 3-0 humbling at the hands of Tottenham last weekend was followed by a 3-3 rollercoaster draw at Porto on Thursday before the Reds travelled to Villa Park and fought to keep a fourth Premier League clean sheet of the season.
This time Andre Onana was protected by veteran central defensive pairing Harry Maguire and Jonny Evans as Ten Hag dropped first choice pair Mathijs De Ligt and Lisandro Martinez after poor performances in the Europa League – although Maguire had to come off on the stroke of half time due to injury.
In fact Ten Hag had over £335m worth of talent – purchased under his watch – on the bench as he went with an unusual line-up which included Marcus Rashford – who at least tested Villa keeper Emi Martinez twice before having to be withdrawn for fear of drawing a second yellow card.
Captain Bruno Fernandes, who was sent off in both of United’s last two games, went closest for United with a free kick that came back of the Villa crossbar while Antony came off the richly appointed Reds bench to draw a good save from Martinez.
Antony had been sharing the bench with the likes of Altay Bayindir, Casemiro, Lisandro Martinez, Manuel Ugarte, Joshua Zirkzee, and Mathijs De Ligt – all players signed under Ten Hag – with only Amad Diallo and Victor Lindelof not Ten Hag signings.
Andre Onana, who went top of the Premier League golden gloves tally with his fourth clean sheet of the season, tipped away a powerful shot from Youri Tielemens as Villa went on to look the better side in the second half although both sides were wary of slipping up after very tiring games in Europe but for different reasons.
The result leaves the Reds in lower mid-table – with 8 points from 7 games with 5 goals scored their worst start to the Premier League since last season when Ten Hag presided over a run of 9 points from 7 games.
And a defeat followed by two very different draws may only be delaying the inevitable if results don’t improve with Ineos looking on ever closer.