Rashford set for Europa start after impressing Mourinho

Rashford, who already has a winning goal at Hull and an England U21 hat-trick to his name this season, is yet to start under Mourinho but was sent on at half-time on Saturday with United 2-1 behind against a dominant Manchester City side.

Claudio Bravo claims he felt “comfortable” during his Manchester City debut, despite a succession of erratic decisions from the Chile worldwide putting a 2-1 derby win at Manchester United in jeopardy. Everything around the game – the derby, the big game, Man United-Man City, the focus, the attention – some of the guys felt it.

With United trailing at the break, Jose Mourinho introduced Rashford to add some thrust to his attack, and a lively showing was nearly rewarded with an equaliser – Rashford beating Claudio Bravo with a low strike, but seeing his effort disallowed following a deflection off an offside Ibrahimovic.

‘We have suffered the first defeat of the season and, after the initial disappointment, I think there is no time for mourning, ‘ he wrote in his weekly blog.

“He (Iheanacho) is our striker and I trust him”.

Ibrahimovic’s reply settled United and it sprang from an error from Bravo, who dropped Rooney’s free kick while being impeded by his own defender John Stones.

Mkhitaryan looked still off the pace after a rib problem and Lingard, also back after injury, was poor while United’s in-form lightning rod Marcus Rashford was left on the bench until the second half to inject some desperately needed pace and fire. Jose Mourinho will be delighted with how they played in the second half.

“It’s obvious that is a penalty and red card to Bravo”, he said.

“It feels very good”, he told Sky Sports.

“The way we train and the way we play has given me a lot of confidence”.

City claimed that Bailly should have collected two bookings and a red card for persistent fouling, and that Fellaini escaped sanction for a stray elbow that knocked out one of Aleksandar Kolarov’s teeth. But when we win with that, we win many, many things. I love when goalkeepers attack the ball.

“What Claudio Bravo did was one of the best performances I’ve ever seen”.

City outplayed their cross-town rivals for large periods of the game and a host of United players looked out of their depth and overawed by the occasions.