On Thursday, Manchester United's match against Real Sociedad was approaching the hour mark when Erik ten Hag made his first substitutions. Real Sociedad was Manchester United's opponent.
The electronic board was raised, and it indicated that Victor Lindelof and Donny van de Beek were going to be taken off the field and replaced by Scott McTominay and Marcus Rashford. This indicated that there was going to be an interesting change in the team's strategy or formation in the near future. That was in fact the case, as Ten Hag opted to play a back three consisting of Diogo Dalot, Lisandro Martinez, and Luke Shaw. Casemiro and McTominay protected that backline as a double pivot, and Rashford was asked to play in the position that Van de Beek had previously held.
This meant that Alejandro Garnacho was playing on the left side of the field, Cristiano Ronaldo was playing in the middle of the field, Bruno Fernandes was playing on the right side of the field, and Marcus Rashford was playing in attacking midfield, in the No. 10 position that Rashford has typically occupied.
However, on this particular occasion, Ten Hag's substitutions proved to be detrimental to the team, and as a result, United were unable to score the second goal that was required in San Sebastian in order to win their Europa League group. This resulted in United failing to win their group and ultimately the competition.
In the next round of the Europa League, United could face Ajax, Barcelona, Bayer Leverkusen, Sevilla, Sporting Libson, Juventus, RB Salzburg, or Shakhtar Donetsk. Other possible opponents include Sporting Libson and Juventus. If you don't win the group, you get a potential glamour tie, but you also have two matches that could be difficult.
United's focus has shifted back to the Premier League after Ten Hag failed to achieve his first goal of the season, which was to win the group in the Europa League. On Friday morning, the players began their preparations for the match against Aston Villa by participating in a training session in San Sebastian. After the match on Thursday, United made the decision to stay in Spain for an extra night so that they could train on Friday before flying back to Manchester. They repeated the same strategy after their match against Omonia in Cyprus a month ago, and it paid off for them when they won their match against Everton at Goodison Park.
United are preparing for the match without Fernandes, which means that Ten Hag could possibly play Rashford as a No. 10 instead. This is because Fernandes received his fifth yellow card of the season last weekend, which resulted in his suspension for the match at Villa Park. Indeed, you can.
It was interesting that Ten Hag decided to replace Van de Beek with Rashford because he didn't contribute much against Real Sociedad while he was playing in that position. In the penultimate match of the Europa League group stage, the Dutchman deployed Rashford as the No. 10 position against FC Sheriff.
Rashford was recently questioned about his preferred position, and he reaffirmed his belief that playing on the left side of the field is'more natural' for him.
Rashford stated that he believes he is capable of playing both the left and middle positions. "I feel more comfortable and at ease playing on the left side. Both of those things are fun for me; I'm just trying to contribute to the team. I believe that this is the most important aspect, and fortunately, we have a lot of players on the team who are versatile enough to play in a variety of positions.
"Having [versatility] is a very important asset to have. You never know what's going to happen, so you have to be at your best to play in whatever position is needed. If we have injuries and other things like that, you never know what's going to happen.
However, Rashford did talk about his versatility, which is obviously something that Ten Hag values because he has unexpectedly experimented with playing him as an attacking midfielder over the course of the last week. The role change may have flown under the radar, but Rashford did mention that he thinks it's a strength of his.
Ten Hag could play Eriksen in that position, with Casemiro and Fred in the midfield alongside him, but it wouldn't be a complete surprise if Rashford was asked to start at No. 10 against Aston Villa, considering that the United boss has entertained the idea of playing Rashford in that position. Casemiro and Fred would be his midfield teammates.
Rashford has traditionally been at his best when playing on the left side of the field, but in Fernandes' absence, Ten Hag may ask him to play in a different position.
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