Manchester United reach last 32 after Anthony Martial strikes against Partizan

Ole Gunnar Solskjær wants to see Manchester United playing on the front foot and creating chances and they qualified for the knockout stages of the Europa League by doing just that.

The second of two wins against Partizan Belgrade was achieved through the composed finishing of Mason Greenwood, Anthony Martial and Marcus Rashford, though with just a little more composure United could have doubled the margin of victory. As it was, they scored two first-half goals for the first time in almost a year, kept the crowd entertained with some lively attacking football and back at the top of their group can now afford to be more relaxed about the games that remain against Astana and Alkmaar.

“I was very happy with the way our three strikers played,” Solskjær said. “All the goals were high class and we could have had a few more. That is exactly how we want to play, even if Partizan gave us a bit more space than we are used to in the Premier League. We wanted to qualify as early as possible. We didn’t fancy making that long journey to Kazakhstan worrying that we had to get a win.”

United should have scored even earlier than they did but when an Aaron Wan-Bissaka cross came through to Rashford at the far post he put his shot wide from the edge of the six-yard area with the whole goal at which to aim. When Rashford had another excellent opportunity a couple of minutes later, after Juan Mata’s cutback set up a shot from close range, he found Vladimir Stojkovic alert to the danger, the goalkeeper leaving his line early to smother the effort.

Rashford has just reached his half century of goals for United at the precocious age of 22, and on another day he might have had three more inside the first 15 minutes. His third opportunity came courtesy of another searching cross from Wan-Bissaka, one that again found him in space in the Partizan area but demanded a volley. Rashford lined up his target and took his time but still ended up blazing over the bar with the most difficult of his three chances.

Undeterred, Rashford could at least claim a large share of the credit for United’s opening goal midway through the first half. It was his incisive pass that split the defence and found Greenwood in an onside position, and the teenager neatly tricked what remained of the cover to open up a shooting angle before supplying a confident finish for his second goal in three games.

That was the start Solskjær had been looking for and United obliged by scoring a quick second, the first time they have managed more than a single goal at home since the 4-0 victory against Chelsea on the opening day of the season. It was a notable individual strike by Martial, whose penalty had settled the away fixture in Belgrade.

Seizing on a half-clearance much more quickly than the ball-watching Strahinja Pavlovic, Martial burst into the area and gracefully held off two more defensive challenges before neatly poking the ball beyond Stojkovic at the last moment. It was a moment of instinctive opportunism and Martial would have been rewarded with a second goal immediately afterwards but for chipping over the bar when all the hard work seemed to have been done.

Partizan did not change their shape or their attitude on going behind – they still kept plenty of men behind the ball though, even faced with a packed defence, United kept creating chances. They could have been further ahead by the interval but Rashford saw another shot saved and Ashley Young fired narrowly over after bursting into the area from the left.

Fred opened the second half by giving Partizan a chance to get back into the game when he rejected a number of passing options in favour of giving the ball away to Umar Sadiq in the middle of the United half, though what could have been a huge embarrassment was calmly defused by Harry Maguire.

United responded by going further in front through another fine goal, Young expertly laying off Mata’s diagonal cross for Rashford to score with a rising first-time shot.

Rashford was withdrawn not too long after that, along with the influential midfield duo of Scott McTominay and Fred, as Solskjær looked to conserve energy and resources for the league game against Brighton on Sunday.

For the same reason the team who take the field in Kazakhstan later this month are likely to be extremely fresh-faced and inexperienced, though on this evidence United can rely on their youngsters to acquit themselves well in Astana.