Online Reporter
AFTER a summer of feverish activity in the transfer market, it seems nothing has changed very much at all.
Manchester United still can’t score goals − and they still concede stupid ones.
Arsenal still aren’t much fun to watch but are still good at set-pieces and still pretty effective at grinding out results.
Mikel Arteta’s perennial runners-up prevailed thanks to a shocking error from Altay Bayindir, who flapped at a corner, allowing Riccardo Calafiori to nudge an early, decisive, header over the line.
Yet United were the better team by a country mile, save for those two recurring themes − the scoring and conceding of goals.
If only football matches weren’t decided by such trivialities, then Ruben Amorim’s men wouldn’t keep getting beaten so often.
United’s new boys Bryan Mbeumo and Matheus Cunha were seriously impressive on debut, while Arsenal’s Viktor Gyokoreres and Martin Zubimendi were way off the pace.
Benjamin Sesko arrived as a second-half sub but he didn’t have a sniff at goal.
There was very little that was impressive about Arsenal except for simply reading off the names of their substitutes.
Arteta now has a seriously deep squad which will serve him well this season.
For United, though, the performance was heartening; the result depressingly familiar.
It was an opening-weekend clash between the Premier League’s nearly men and its nowhere-near men − Sun.
