McTominay rapidly ascending depth chart

Opinion

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This article was published 10/03/2018 (2765 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

These have been quite the few weeks in the young life of Scott McTominay.

Since starting Manchester United’s FA Cup match at Huddersfield on Feb. 17 — a 2-0 win — the 21-year-old midfielder has man-marked Sevilla’s Ever Banega in a scoreless Champions League encounter, shadowed Chelsea’s Eden Hazard in a 2-1 triumph at Old Trafford and declared internationally for Scotland.

Later this month he’ll be part of Alex McLeish’s squad to face Costa Rica at Hampden Park, and with Scott Brown having retired from international football, he could well slot in for the Celtic veteran as a sort of like-for-like replacement.

But before then, the Lancastrian (he is eligible to represent Scotland through his grandparents) will likely be presented his most difficult professional assignment to date, and one that is surely among the most challenging in the Premier League at the moment: containing Liverpool attacker Mohamed Salah.

Perhaps the sport’s form player, Salah goes into today’s clash at Manchester United having scored in his previous five Premier League appearances. With nine goals in 10 matches this calendar year, he continues to maintain nearly a goal-per-game pace, and only twice since these same two sides battled to a 0-0 draw in mid-October has he failed to register either a goal or an assist.

That afternoon it was United midfielder Ander Herrera who was tasked with stalking the Egyptian. Incidentally, it was injuries to Herrera and Marouane Fellaini that would open a route into manager José Mourinho’s first team for McTominay, who had featured just twice as a substitute this season prior to the stalemate at Anfield.

Still, it wasn’t until December that the United youth graduate began to receive regular minutes, at first because of injuries and fixture congestion, and then because Paul Pogba, the club’s record signing, demanded to play as part of a midfield trio in a 4-3-3 formation.

Three months on, and McTominay is poised to make a fifth start on the trot and looks to be undroppable in his own right. A towering, tenacious presence in the centre of the park, he seems to relish going up against elite playmakers one-on-one. Unassuming, and by all accounts eager to have Mourinho mould him, he has also endeared himself to a manager frequently criticized for lacking patience with young players. (Exhibit A: Mourinho, while Chelsea manager, loaned then-22-year-old Salah to Fiorentina and then to Roma, the latter move subsequently becoming a permanent transfer.)

Of course, minimizing Salah’s effect on today’s Old Trafford showdown will not be an undertaking apportioned to McTominay alone. Ashley Young — United’s makeshift left-back — is a natural right-footer and, as such, will look to track the Liverpool forward’s cut-ins from the flank. And fellow United midfielder Nemanja Matic will try to limit Salah’s line of supply from Reds centre-forward Roberto Firmino.

McTominay himself will have to rebound from a rare off day at Crystal Palace earlier this week, when he was withdrawn at the half. The Red Devils were trailing 1-0 at that point, and 2-0 after 48 minutes, but roared back to win 3-2 without their No. 39 on the pitch.

Juan Mata, introduced in the 67th minute, did well to knit together some build-up play for the guests, and one of the decisions Mourinho will have to make in picking today’s team is whether to include the Spaniard, perhaps further up the pitch in a front-three alongside Alexis Sanchez and Romelu Lukaku. Defender Eric Bailly’s return from injury is also a boost for United, and the Ivorian’s positional sense will only aid their attempts to stymie the Salah-Firmino-Sadio Mane trident.

Ahead of kickoff, the narrative of this northwest derby is very much one of Liverpool’s presumed assertiveness, and what Manchester United can do to stop them — and Salah in particular.

It all sets up for McTominay to be the hero — for a young man who stood barely 51/2 feet tall three years ago — to continue developing into one of his club’s homegrown stars.

Projected Manchester United XI: De Gea; Valencia, Bailly, Smalling, Young; Matic, Pogba, McTominay; Mata, Lukaku, Sanchez.

Projected Liverpool XI: Karius; Alexander-Arnold; Matip, Van Dijk, Robertson; Oxlade-Chamberlain, Henderson, Can; Salah, Fimino, Mane.

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