Manchester United halted their two-game losing run with a 3-0 victory over 10-man Southampton at St Mary's, with Matthijs de Ligt, Marcus Rashford and Alejandro Garnacho on target. (More Football News)
💞United emerged from the first international break of 2024-25 14th in the Premier League table following defeats to Brighton and Liverpool, but they got back to winning ways after surviving an early scare on the south coast.
🌠Making his first Premier League start, Tyler Dibling won a penalty for Southampton in the first half, but Andre Onana kept out Cameron Archer's tame kick and the momentum shifted from there.
💞De Ligt headed in his first United goal just two minutes later, then an excellent Rashford strike, curled into the bottom-right corner from the edge of the box, gave them breathing room.
🐼Garnacho came off the bench to add to Southampton's woes in the second half, with Jack Stephens' wild lunge on the Argentine resulting in him being shown a straight red card with 11 minutes to play.
♔Garnacho then got himself on the scoresheet six minutes into stoppage time, lashing into the roof of the net after Diogo Dalot found him with a cutback from the byline.
Data Debrief: Rashford back in form
𒆙Rashford's dip in form in 2023-24 was a major contributing factor in United finishing a lowly eighth in the Premier League, the forward netting just seven league goals after plundering 17 the previous campaign.
𒈔However, he showed supreme confidence for his 41st-minute strike, which gave United a two-goal cushion at a crucial moment.
𓃲That effort ended a run of 12 games for United without a goal for Rashford, who had only previously endured two longer droughts for the club – 17-match runs that ended in January 2017 and August 2022.
🎃Three of Rashford's last four Premier League goals have come from outside the penalty area, and since the start of 2022-23, only Eberechi Eze (eight), Phil Foden (seven) and Kevin De Bruyne (six) have scored more such goals in the competition than his five.
