Manchester United might have virtually secured a chance at Champions League football for next season, but it looks like they have some work left to do to finish top three. They were made to look very ordinary by Everton, who turned in arguably their best performance of the season on Sunday, in a 3-0 loss.
3 things we learned from Everton’s 3-0 win over Manchester United
Despite long spells of great play, Manchester United were undone by some brilliant Everton defending and countering.
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The Toffees were ahead just five minutes into the game on an excellent counter. James McCarthy started it with a ball out wide to Seamus Coleman, then finished it off with a run through Patrick McNair and Daley Blind, before beating David De Gea from close range.
Marouane Fellaini nearly equalized in the 7th minute, but started off a poor half with a shot over the bar when he was one-on-one with Tim Howard. Not long after that, he was shown a yellow card after two bad fouls in under a minute, and was hauled off at halftime for Radamel Falcao.
Everton went into the break up two goals, thanks to Leighton Baines and John Stones. Their corner kick goal couldn’t have been much easier, with Stones losing his marker and nodding a free header into the back of the net.
United had a very good chance to pull a goal back right at the start of the second half, when Rooney found himself with a shooting opportunity from close range, but Howard did brilliantly to rush off his line and block the shot away. Shortly after that, Everton went into full defensive bus-parking mode, and United struggled to generate chances.
The clinching goal was a bizarre one, and an awful one for United to concede. The entire United team stopped playing when Ross Barkley played a ball towards an offside Romelu Lukaku, but the Everton striker didn’t make an attempt to play the ball and stood still. The only person who realized the whistle hadn’t blown and wouldn’t was Kevin Mirallas, who had an uncontested run onto the ball and shot to seal Everton’s impressive three-goal victory.
Everton: Howard, Baines, Jagielka, Stones, Coleman, McCarthy, Barry, Barkley (Naismith 88'), Osman (Mirallas 69'), Lukaku (Kone 87'), Lennon
Goals: McCarthy (5’), Stones (35’), Mirallas (74’)
Manchester United: De Gea, Shaw, McNair, Smalling, Valencia, Young, Blind, Herrera, Mata (Di Maria 63'), Fellaini (Falcao 46'), Rooney (van Persie 88')
Goals: None.
3 things
1. James McCarthy is all the way back - Everton got off to a terrible start this season as a whole, and the biggest factor might have been McCarthy's poor form. But he's been very good over the last couple of months, looking like the player that marshaled their midfield en route to a top four challenge last season, and he had his best game of the season on Sunday. He'll be a key player for Everton again next season -- if he doesn't make them £20 million richer instead.
2. Marouane Fellaini isn't quite Superman - All good things must come to an end. It's been a great run for Fellaini as the withdrawn target man for United, but this was the poorest game he's had in the position so far, and it just happened to come on the same day that Robin van Persie came back from injury. Louis van Gaal has called the big Belgian undroppable, but he's got a serious selection dilemma after this poor performance.
3. The race to avoid the CL playoff will be fun - Arsenal, Manchester United and Manchester City will all finish top four, but who has to play their way into the group stage? They’ll all want to avoid that badly, and it probably won’t be settled until the final day.
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