Goodison Tactics: How Everton can and will hurt Manchester United

Thu 30 September 2021 17:04, UK

Everton face Manchester United at Old Trafford on Saturday in the early kick-off in the Premier League.

A win would take them to the top of the table, but a win for the Red Devils would take them to the top of the table.

Now, Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s side possesses a lot of quality and have a world-class attacking unit with the likes of Cristiano Ronaldo, Bruno Fernandes, and Jadon Sancho, to name but a few.

So we know how the Red Devils can cause the Toffees problems, and it would be a waste of time analysing the Red Devils’ threats when we can focus on how the Toffees can cause problems.

In the six Premier League games so far, the Red Devils have conceded in every game bar one, so the Toffees can score, and given that they have scored in every league game, we would be very surprised if Benitez’s side don’t at least get a couple of goals.

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WhoScored state that one of the Red Devils’ main problems is the number of individual mistakes they make.

This first tactical breakdown doesn’t lead to a goal but really should have.

There appears to be little danger as Harry Maguire mops up a long ball forward

Maguire plays a dreadful pass back to David de Gea.

De Gea’s pass is awful and falls to Ollie Watkins.

Watkins has the whole goal to aim at but fires his shot straight at the Spaniard, and the Red Devils survive.

This should have ended up in a goal, and it would have been down to two individual errors.

First, the pass from Maguire is poor, and then de Gea’s clearance is even worse.

However, Manchester United were not so lucky in this next analysis, and Young Boys scored a late winner.

On this occasion, the ball is played into Jesse Lingard and there appears to be no danger.

Lingard tries to play the ball back to his goalkeeper and the forward senses an opportunity.

The forward excepts the gift and scores a late winner.

Now there isn’t necessarily a way to force individual mistakes like these, but these errors suggest that some players at Manchester United lose their concentration easily.

Therefore, if the Everton plays stay switched on throughout the match, they should be able to profit from these potential individual errors.

However, another way in which the Toffees can expose the Red Devils is through counter-attacks, as Newcastle United showed.

The Toon lost 4-1, but their goal was a fine counter-attack that Benitez could look to replicate.

Manchester United have too many men forward, and Harry Maguire gets caught high up the pitch leaving Raphael Varane massively exposed.

Miguel Almiron finds Allan Saint-Maximin who has Javier Manquillo on the outside. The Red Devils have no one to cover the left.

Manquillo is free in the box and fires beyond de Gea. Manchester United have men back but no one is close to the goalscorer.

So, that goal was very simple and was essentially two passes before Manquillo found the back of the net.

Now, with the likes of Demarai Gray, Abdoulaye Doucoure, and Andros Townsend, the Toffees have plenty of pace and power, which should expose this Red Devils defence.

It should be an intriguing game on Saturday, and we would be very surprised if the Toffees didn’t at least score a couple of goals because this Manchester United defence can be exposed.

In other Everton news, a key trio have been spotted back in training for the Toffees.

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