Manchester United vacated the middle to rediscover attacking fluency

How Manchester United rediscovered attacking fluency by vacating the middle of their forward line.

Romelu Lukaku’s return to the starting XI was supposed to give Manchester United a natural center-forward for their Premier League game at home to Fulham on Saturday.

Ironically, United put four past the Cottagers because of how long Lukaku spent out of central areas at Old Trafford.

For the first time in a long time United were fluent and fluid in attack. Both qualities came from how Lukaku vacated the middle.

United’s number 9 peeling off into the channels pulled Fulham’s back four out of shape. It also left space for runners from deep.

With nobody to mark in the middle, Fulham center-backs regularly chased Lukaku and fellow striker Marcus Rashford onto the flanks. United quickly filled the empty middle with midfield runners.

The combination helped create the Red Devils’ second goal. It came from Lukaku and Rashford doubling up in the inside left channel.

Lukaku had dropped out of the middle and drifted wide. As he went wider, Rashford responded by drifting infield. Lukaku found him with a deft pass and the England international pulled back for Juan Mata to finish from close range.

The move was a slick and enterprising one that owed everything to how fluidly United’s key attackers rotated positions in the final third.

It was also fitting Mata got the goal after he’d fill the central area Lukaku had vacated. Like fellow attacking midfielder Jesse Lingard, Mata thrived thanks to the space afforded him to run through the middle and beyond the front:

Mata and Lingard frequently got into the number 9 position against a set of bewildered Fulham defenders who didn’t know whether to stick or twist when it came to tracking Lukaku’s movement.

The pattern continued in the passage of play leading to United’s third goal. Ander Herrera swept a ball out to Lukaku on the left, with the striker rolling it inside to Rashford.

Despite having Mata and Lingard both in central positions in the box, Rashford took the shot on. His effort was deflected out for a corner.

The disjointed shape of Fulham’s back four when Rashford took his shot was telling. Both center-backs had moved out of the middle, with Alfie Mawson stalking Lukaku, while Denis Odoi tracked Rashford.

It meant Fulham lacked the pace and power in central areas to deal with the runs of Lingard and Mata.

For good measure United flipped the script from the resulting corner. Lingard and Mata combined out wide, with the latter eventually teeing up Lukaku for a tap in.

Fluid rotations between their front four had helped the Red Devils turn on the style:

It was hardly surprising a United side with a 3-0 lead at the break lacked the same level of intensity and incisiveness during the second half. Even so, the ploy to vacate the middle stayed the same.

One of United’s better moves after the restart saw Lukaku drop off the penalty spot to leave room for both Mata and Herrera to attack the middle. Rashford, playing on the inside left and obviously keen to score, again overlooked runners in favor of a shot.

While his effort was tame and saved, the fluent way United altered their shape up top had once again left Fulham clueless and motionless in defense.

Rashford eventually got the goal he craved when he cut in from the left to curl in a shot from outside the box. He was afforded another shooting chance because a run through the middle from Herrera took a marker away who might otherwise have closed Rashford down.

Lukaku had made space for Herrera’s dart into the box with another typically intelligent wander toward the left.

United ended the day having shown a swagger and flair in attack too often missing during Jose Mourinho’s tenure. Of course, it’s easy to dismiss this particular goal show as merely the result of playing a Fulham side bottom of the table thanks to a generous defense that had already conceded 36 goals before the start of play on Saturday.

Mourinho will be aware his side likely won’t replicate the same fluency next time out against leaders Liverpool, who boast the meanest defense in England’s top flight.

Credit where it’s due, though, United have found a blueprint for getting the best out of the undoubted plethora of attacking options at Mourinho’s disposal.

It’s all about indulging Lukaku’s habit of vacating the middle and overloading channels, while trusting midfield runners as intelligent as Mata, Lingard and Herrera to fill the central void.