Manchester United 2-0 Chelsea: Highlights and recap

Manchester United beat Chelsea 2-0 in the Premier League on Sunday, April 16. Here are all the highlights from the match.

Jose Mourinho raised a lot of eyebrows with his team selection ahead of Manchester United’s match against Chelsea at Old Trafford on Sunday. The United boss dropped Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Henrikh Mkhitaryan to the bench, going with Marcus Rashford up front and Ashley Young, wearing the captain’s arm band, on the left.

The strategy paid off almost immediately, as the Red Devils took the lead in the eighth minute. Ander Herrera, tasked with man-marking Chelsea’s Eden Hazard, intercepted the ball (with his hand, possibly deliberately), before playing an excellent pass to Rashford, who finished well past Asmir Begovic.

There wasn’t much more by way of goalmouth action after that, with United successfully stifling the Blues for the remainder of the half. Diego Costa was involved in a series of altercations with United’s center-backs, Eric Bailly and Marcos Rojo, and could perhaps have been more severely punished on several occasions. As it was, he finished the half with only a yellow card.

United got off to an even better start to the second half, when Herrera’s 49th minute shot took a huge deflection of Kurt Zouma to beat Begovic in the Chelsea goal.

United were, understandably, happy to protect their two-goal lead after that, and they did so excellently. Antonio Conte’s side didn’t manage a single shot on target all match. This was as bad as the league leaders have looked since they switched to three at the back in September, and they face a much more difficult task now to hold off second-place Tottenham for the title.

Next: Champions League quarterfinal power rankings

Highlights

Chelsea are still top of the table, but their lead over Spurs has been cut to four points. United, meanwhile, stay fifth, four points behind Manchester City and six behind Liverpool, having played fewer matches than both.