UK Edition
Real Salt Lake 1 Man Utd 2: Romelu Lukaku nets first goal for United but night soured by Antonio Valencia red card and Juan Mata injury
There was good and bad news for Jose Mourinho in Manchester United’s second outing on their pre-season tour of the US.
Romelu Lukaku got on the scoresheet for the first time as a United player with the kind of composed finish Jose Mourinho will hope becomes the norm in the Premier League next season. A polished performance from Henrikh Mkhitaryan, who set up Lukaku’s winning goal after earlier drawing United level against Real Salt Lake, also brought some cheer for the United manager.
But Mourinho was less happy about a poor challenge from Sebastian Saucedo on Juan Mata that forced the Spaniard off only 14 minutes after coming on as a half-time substitute and even less impressed when Antonio Valencia was harshly sent off soon after with Saucedo given a taste of his own medicine.
Valencia caught the Salt Lake midfielder with a heavy challenge from behind. The United right back initially looked to have escaped censure for a foul that warranted a booking when, in fact, referee Allen Chapman had sidled up to Mourinho and explained that, if the manager was not going to substitute Valencia, he would send him off. And after a long delay Chapman did just that. If nothing else, it was a novel kind of refereeing. “The delay was because the referee asked me to change the player and I didn’t because I didn’t agree it was a red card,” Mourinho said.
Mata suffered a slight twist of the ankle and is expected to be out for around a week, which would rule him out of the derby against Manchester City in Houston in the early hours on Friday and the game against Real Madrid in Santa Clara on Sunday.
"Mata has a big ankle but I hope nothing important,” Mourinho said. “A few days, a week probably.” Mata was clearly unhappy with the challenge at the time after Saucedo appeared to rake his studs down his ankle but does not think it is serious. “I’m all right, it’s just a slight twist,” he said.
At least it was a happier run out for Lukaku. The Belgium striker’s United debut against LA Galaxy on Sunday had been something of a damp squib but he looked sharper here. Eyebrows will be raised at the size of the fee United paid Everton, with an initial £75 million outlay potentially rising to £90 million, but that will represent value for money if Lukaku can display this sort of predatory instinct in front of goal on a regular basis next term.
“I think it’s just nice for him, not important for me,” Mourinho said. “Before he scored the goal I told him [during a break in play] that ‘I love everything you do on the pitch. Don’t be worried about scoring or not scoring’. He gets behind people, works and presses well. I like everything he does. It’s easy to feel it because he was my player four years ago but his evolution has been great. He’s now a top striker. The goal is just a detail, not important.”
A storm encompassing winds of 60 miles per hour in the lead up to kick-off briefly looked like it might threaten the game only to narrowly avoid the Rio Tinto Stadium and pass almost as quickly as it came. United soon found themselves under a different kind of onslaught, though, as Real Salt Lake took the game to their opponents and wasted little time exploiting some decidedly slack defending that left Jose Mourinho looking bemused on the touchline.
Mourinho had played three at the back against the Galaxy but he reverted to a more familiar back four here and United looked worse for it. Mike Petke, the Salt Lake coach, had stuck to his pre-match plan to change his entire starting XI every half an hour and no one will have been happier to see the back of Joao Plata, Luis Silva and Jefferson Savarino than Phil Jones, who cut a particularly chaotic figure in central defence alongside Victor Lindelof.
United had pulled a goal back through Mkhitaryan by the time Petke made all those changes but Mourinho’s men had deservedly been behind. There had been several warnings before the hosts scored. Timothy Fosu-Mensah, by far the best of the back four, made an excellent last ditch clearance to cut out Silva’s cross before Savarino could get on the end of it and goalkeeper Joel Pereira needed two bites at the cherry to smother a shot from Plata.
Next it was Jesse Lingard’s turn to make a vital late interception after Plata had ghosted into the penalty area and threatened to score. United’s luck finally ran out in the 24th minute when Salt Lake sliced through their brittle core. Savarino showed strength and balance to muscle his way past Daley Blind and Lingard, even if the United pairing should have done better between themselves, before slipping a pass into the path of Silva. Jones looked like he would win the ball but was brushed out of the way far too easily before Silva poked a tidy left foot shot past Pereira.
Aside from one fine cross from Fosu-Mensah that Lukaku could not get on the end of, United had offered little going forward up to that point, plodding and rather one-dimensional. But after a shaky start, they finally began to gather some momentum and scored courtesy of a quick-silver move. Paul Pogba found Lukaku lurking central 25 yards out. Lukaku spotted Lingard making a dart for it and slipped the ball into him. Lingard, in turn, found Mkhitaryan on the edge of the penalty area and the Armenian swivelled before firing a fine left foot shot into the bottom corner.
With all the changes, Salt Lake lost some of their momentum and seven minutes before the interval United took the lead. Lingard swept the ball out to Mkhitaryan, who by now was beginning to find time and space, and he drilled over a cross to the waiting Lukaku, who showed the kind of cool head that persuaded Mourinho to sign him. Cutting inside his marker and then goalkeeper Nick Rimando, the goal opened up for Lukaku and he steered the ball calmly past the man on the line.
Forced to play the final 22 minutes with 10 men, United ran out of steam. Marouane Fellaini might have done better with a header from an excellent Marcus Rashford cross before Luke Mullholland shot wide from an inviting position for the MLS side.
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