Manchester United midfielder Kobbie Mainoo has been one of the breakout stars of the season but expectations must still be tempered a little.
United fans love seeing a homegrown talent emerge from the youth ranks, going back to the famous ‘Class of 92’.
Marcus Rashford has had ups and downs this season but there is a new homegrown star emerging in midfielder Kobbie Mainoo.
The Stockport-born teenager has emerged into the United midfield this season and has blown everybody away with his composure and maturity on the ball.
Mainoo has become almost undroppable this season and has even landed his England debut, winning the Man of the Match award against Belgium.
Still only 18, Mainoo looks to be a strong shout for England’s Euro 2024 squad and his rise has been one of few bright spots in United’s season.
Mainoo is still effectively learning on the job though and Gary Neville has pointed out some problems against Liverpool…
Gary Neville on Kobbie Mainoo
United hosted Liverpool at Old Trafford on Sunday afternoon and secured a 2-2 draw.
Mainoo started alongside Casemiro in midfielder but Liverpool were able to cut through at will and United were arguably lucky to be going into half-time at only 1-0 down.
United’s entire midfield structure looked vulnerable and Mainoo was seemingly being asked to follow Liverpool midfielders around.
Bruno Fernandes was off doing his own thing further up the pitch, as he often does, and Casemiro just isn’t able to anchor the midfield on his own right now.
United’s midfield structure baffled pundit Gary Neville, who told Sky Sports (07/04, 16:05) that Mainoo’s positioning was far too high up the pitch.
Mainoo was right up on Alexis Mac Allister even when the ball was out of play, leaving Neville furious that he was ahead of the ball.
Neville’s issue was more with United’s structure rather than Mainoo himself, adding that the approach ‘defies logic’.
Neville then saw Mainoo chasing across the pitch in Liverpool’s half, urging him to protect the space next to Casemiro rather than step up so much.
Again, this looked to be instructions from Erik ten Hag rather than Mainoo taking matters into his own hands but Neville wasn’t impressed either way.
“Look where Mainoo is there, he’s ahead of the ball from a throw-in,” said Neville. “Forget McAllister, don’t be ahead of the ball! You can always get up to that one. It defies logic and it’s the basics of the game.”
“Even now, he’s chasing across the pitch – he doesn’t need to! Garnacho and Hojlund can deal with that, look at the space in behind him, that space alongside Casemiro,” he added.
Mainoo comes up with moment of quality
Mainoo may have left Neville a little concerned with how high he was pushing out of possession, but we saw him come up with a moment of quality.
Picking the ball up in a high position, Mainoo left the ball out to the left and ended up receiving it again with his back to goal.
Mainoo spun and hit a stunning strike into the top corner, almost a carbon copy of Federico Macheda’s goal against Aston Villa some 15 years ago.
Mainoo is a special talent with the ball at his feet and we saw that once again on Sunday afternoon.
Maybe his positioning out of possession can be tweaked a little, but United appear to have a talent with the potential to become a truly complete midfielder.