Crystal Palace shocks Manchester United with 2-1 victory

Manchester United dominated, but Crystal Palace finished where the Red Devils couldn’t.

Over the last five seasons, Manchester United has finished in the top four just once. It’s a far cry from the historically dominant seasons its fans are used to, which is why the 4-0 season opening victory over Chelsea gave Red Devils fans hope. Hope that their team would finish better than 6th this season. Hope that they would be relevant. Hope that they would contend for the championship.

The win over Chelsea was a fantastic start, but then there was the draw against the Wolves. It wasn’t a loss, so fans were still hopeful. Until Saturday, when United got its first loss of the season. Had the loss been to Liverpool or Manchester City, this discussion would be completely different. But they lost to Crystal Palace, which finished middle of the pack last season and isn’t known for being a powerhouse.

Still, United’s biggest problem isn’t that they lost, it’s how they lost. They dominated the field with 71 percent of the possession. Crystal Palace scored first on a counter-attack, the first time they had been on Manchester’s side of the field in the game and they put one in the net. For the whole game, they had five shots, three of which were on target. And they made two of them. Man U had 22 shots, one of which went in. See where the problems are?

There is one part of the game that sums up United’s night, and it lasted all of a few seconds. In the second half, Marcus Rashford took a penalty kick after Scott McTominay was taken down in the box. There is some debate as to why Paul Pogba didn’t take the kick, but that’s a discussion for another time. Rashford missed the goal, instead hitting the goal post and the ball was cleared by Palace. That one shot pretty much wraps up how United’s day went. Only one person was able to find the net, and that was Daniel James in the 89th minute:

Unfortunately, it wasn’t enough to give United the point as Palace put in another three minutes into injury time.

So the Red Devils complete the trifecta with a 1-1-1 record three games into the season.

On top of that, Luke Shaw and Anthony Martial both sustained injuries during the match. Shaw would be subbed out in the first half, but Martial would play the game in its entirety, although he did limp through the final few minutes.

While the Devils have no one to blame for the loss but themselves, credit also goes to Palace for putting together a winning match. They may not have dominated, but they controlled the one part of the game that counts: the scoreboard.

Manchester United faces Southampton next Saturday at 7:30 a.m., and Crystal Palace plays Colchester this Tuesday at 2:45 p.m. in a Football League Cup game.