Four goals, three points, move on. If only it were that straightforward for Erik ten Hag and Manchester United. It suited Ten Hag to reduce another complicated 90 minutes for his team to a simple abstraction and allow Bruno Fernandes to dominate the headlines.
Two more goals, one spectacular made it seven in the last six league games for Fernandes, who was once again United’s outstanding performer. He needed to be. United were behind twice to a Sheffield United team adrift at the foot of the Premier League and bound for the Championship.
With nine minutes of normal time remaining the scores were level, United exposing new technical director Jason Wilcox on his first matchday experience at Old Trafford to early indicators of the problems he was hired to solve, including the position of manager.
Ten Hag is effectively reapplying for his job. And he knows it. The clipped defiance he revealed in response to criticisms of the FA Cup semi-final victory over Coventry underpinned his pre and post-match behaviours here, starting with a bizarre show of bonding with the Stretford End, emerging from the tunnel and walking 20 paces towards the goal whilst clapping his hands above his head. The bemused crowd wondered if this was some kind of farewell gesture, but returned the favour nonetheless.
Afterwards he put a positive spin on a performance that was again chaotic if hugely entertaining for the neutral. United are supposed to entertain their own fanbase not the opposition, who sang with glee about how “s**t” United must be losing to a team that has won only three times all season.
Listening to Ten Hag’s analysis you would have thought United had put away Real Madrid in a Champions League semi-final rather than a team all-but relegated in a contest of little significance. “Sheffield United also collected points lately, against good teams like Chelsea, for instance, and there are no easy games. We were losing but we are resilient,” he said in the manner of a double-glazing salesman trying desperately not to discount his product.
“You see it again, the team spirit in the dressing room. We can deal with setbacks and just increase the tempo, make it difficult for our opponents, create more chances and keep calm. Have you seen some panic? No, not at all. The team was very composed and very stable. We played very well, kept making connections and looking for switches, creating chances throughout the game.”
Up in the directors box Sir Dave Brailsford was eating up the style points offered by Wilcox, who had an awful lot to distil, and little of it positive with United trailing on the hour. The other United can have scarcely done less to lead a game. The first goal was a gift from Andre Onana, the second from the entire back four, who had yet to check-in mentally after the break and offered Ben Brereton Diaz the freedom of the box to score.
This was a repeat of the Coventry unravelling without the benefit of a three-goal lead. United looked little like the coherent team described by Ten Hag in the brochure. Rather they resembled a rudderless rabble that plays with all the togetherness of a start-up squad cobbled together from a newspaper ad. Whilst Sheffield were stealing from his table, Ten Hag stood inert with his hands in his pockets, the fluorescent light reflecting unkindly off his bald head.
As ever Ten Hag’s fabricated vision was betrayed by the performance of his signature signing. Few do exaggerated disappointment with the conviction of Antony. If he went forward with the same application he might be a player. A slap of the thigh, a grimace, double shows of angst as the ball flies high and wide.
His shameful cameo against Coventry on Sunday was reason enough to sit him for this encounter. After a first half of nil attacking threat, of endless turning towards his own goal and passing backwards, it seemed only the bloody mindedness of an obdurate coach was keeping the cup-eared warrior on the pitch. Even Ten Hag gave up in the end, hooking Antony with less than 10 minutes of the second half played.
United were spared by their talismanic captain. Fernandes brought United level for the second time from the spot, smacked in a beauty to put them ahead, then picked the pass that sent Rasmus Hojlund into raptures following his first goal in two months.
Next up at Old Trafford on Saturday are Burnley, who also put four past Sheffield United last week, followed by a trip to reborn Crystal Palace, who followed up their win at Liverpool a fortnight ago by thumping West Ham and easing past Newcastle.
Ten Hag is selling himself and his team anew with a zeal that demonstrates how precarious his position is. If Wilcox is as good as Ineos believe, he will recognise a sales pitch for what it is, for the truth is always told on the grass.