And here’s Daniel Taylor’s match report from Old Trafford.
Full time: Manchester United 4-0 West Ham United
Peep peep! That was a very confident statement of intent from United. Matic was good, Lukaku scored twice, and there were patches when United played with devastating speed in attack. Most importantly, they scored four goals, something they managed only once in the league in the previous two seasons. It would be wrong to jump to conclusions, so that’s what everyone will do, but United were good today, particularly when the game opened up in the second half. Thanks for your company, I’ll leave you with this from Matt Dony: “Welcome back, Joe Hart.”
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GOAL! Manchester United 4-0 West Ham (Pogba 90)
Paul Pogba completes a very good day’s work with an excellent goal. Martial ushered him forward with a simple little pass into space, and Pogba marched onto it before opening his body to curl the ball under the diving Hart from 20 yards.
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88 min Mkhitaryan, who has had a quiet game yet created two goals, is replaced by Jesse Lingard.
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GOAL! Manchester United 3-0 West Ham (Martial 87)
This is a nice goal. Mkhitaryan slips a superb first-time pass through the defence for Martial, who takes it in his stride and sidefoots crisply under Hart.
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86 min Pogba comes infield from the left, plays a square pass to Lukaku and keeps running. Lukaku dinks a nice return pass over the top which Pogba takes on the chest before swishing a half-volley that is crucially blocked by Zabaleta.
85 min Matic plays a give-and-go with Martial before overhitting a through pass to Lukaku, who had made another terrific angled run behind the defence. That was a fairly straightforward pass for Matic.
82 min Another West Ham change: Aaron Cresswell replaces Masuaku.
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81 min This game is over. United know it, West Ham know it. Even educated fleas know it.
79 min Another Manchester United substitution: Anthony Martial for Marcus Rashford, who had a good game in his newish role on the left wing and made the first goal.
78 min A cross from the left falls nicely for Arnautovic, in space to the right of the box. He controls the ball on his thigh but then blasts a half-volley into orbit.
77 min “I do like Mkhitaryan,” says Matt Dony. “Very much ‘one that got away’ for Liverpool. Still, at least he got his wish and joined a ‘big team’. (7, 4, 5, 6...)”
With banter like that, it’s on!
76 min A like-for-like substitution from United: Juan Mata is replaced by Marouane Fellaini. Mata was his useful busy, skilful self.
75 min Lukaku finds himself in space 25 yards out, draws back his left foot ... and batters the ball into orbit.
73 min Rashford wins a corner with another eye-catching turn of speed down the left. Blind makes a mess of it.
72 min How do you think Henrik, son of Hamlet, will get on this year, after a patchy first season?” sniffs David Wall. “Can he be, or not be, at the level he achieved at Dortmund again consistently?”
It would be so much better if he regularly played No10, but you can’t really do that with Pogba in the side, not in the tougher games when Mourinho will want the protection of Matic and Herrera. He’ll be fine though; he’s class.
71 min United’s full-back almost combine for a great goal. Valencia rampages down the right and picks out a very deep cross from Blind, whose deliberate volley goes into the ground and bounces up onto the roof of the net.
68 min United look like a side who are ready to challenge for the title. Mind you, we said that last August. It’s probably worth reserving judgement until we are 10 games into the season.
66 min Rashford hits the base of the post with a quite brilliant curling shot from 20 yards. That was a beautiful effort, whipped extravagantly around Hart from an inside-left position. It curled appreciably but not quite enough before rattling off the inside of the post and across goal.
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63 min Mkhitaryan dances into space and hits a fierce low shot from 20 yards that is well held by the plunging Hart.
63 min Just before that Lukaku chance, Sakho made a mess of a free header from a corner, flicking it right across the face of goal.
62 min Zabaleta makes a great block to deny Lukaku a hat-trick. He was teed up beautifully by Rashford and Mkhitaryan, and drilled a low right-footed shot that would probably have gone in the corner but for Zabaleta’s desperate sliding block.
61 min West Ham made a double change, with Declan Rice and Diafra Sakho replacing Noble and Fernandes.
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60 min Valencia is booked for a late tackle on Arnautovic.
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59 min Arnautovic hits the bar! It was a terrific looping header from Fernandes’s lofted pass. De Gea backpedalled but didn’t get there, and it hit the top of the bar before going behind.
57 min Mkhitaryan has a goal disallowed for offside against Rashford in the build up.
55 min West Ham have a job on now. Only Spurs conceded fewer league goals than United last season, and that was before Matic.
It was another straightforward goal. Mkhitaryan curled a free-kick in from the left, and Lukaku got in front of Masuaku to flick an accomplished downward header into the far corner. That’s a really good finish.
GOAL! Manchester United 2-0 West Ham (Lukaku 53)
Another one for Romelu Lukaku!
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51 min Zabaleta is booked for fouling Rashford just outside the area.
50 min Rashford misses a decent chance to make it 2-0. He vroomed away from Reid to meet Pogba’s through pass before opening up his body to try to curl it into the far top corner. He didn’t get enough curl on it and it flew high and wide.
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46 min Peep peep! West Ham begin the second half. If you like to picture these things in the TV style, they are kicking from right to left.
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Ah
“I see that John Hone ‘Can’t believe that nobody has come up with the stat that Lukaku never failed to score against West Ham in ALL his time with Everton!’” says Mo Holkar. “There might be a reason for that.”
Half-time statgasm
“Can’t believe that nobody has come up with the stat that Lukaku never failed to score against West Ham in ALL his time with Everton!” says John Hone. “That goal makes it 10 in a row!”
Half time: Manchester United 1-0 West Ham United
Peep peep! West Ham defended very well for all bar a few seconds of the half, when Romelu Lukaku scored a goal that brought Ian Rush to mind: a perfectly timed angled run behind the defence and an emphatic first-time finish
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45+1 min West Ham almost equalise on the stroke of half-time. Ayew plays a short pass into the area for Noble, who flicks it cleverly behind him while being clattered by Valencia. Fernandes runs onto the ball and thrashes a shot from 17 yards that takes a slight deflection off Bailly and is beaten away by De Gea.
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44 min “Hi Rob,” says Felix Wood. “The sale of Matic to Man U is so baffling for me. Why on earth did Chelsea do it? You must know. You must.”
Look, it’s all related to the 9/11 Cover Up and the Brexit vote. If I say any more than that, I’ll be find in a dump truck.
43 min Bailly is booked for a hack at Hernandez.
40 min Hernandez’s deft lay-off finds Fernandes, whose stinging 20-yard shot is blocked.
40 min Matic goes on a superb, twinkle-toed run down the right before giving the ball away. He has been the best player on the pitch. He looks a serious signing.
38 min United win their ninth corner of the half. It’s half cleared to Valencia, whose low shot is kicked clear. West Ham are being ushered in the direction of the ropes.
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36 min I didn’t give Matic enough, or indeed any, credit for his part in the goal. He got in Obiang’s face and blocked his attempted pass, which diverted it straight to Rashford.
35 min Pogba dances into the area and goes down after a double challenge from Obiang and Arnautovic. Obiang got the ball so Martin Atkinson is right to ignore the penalty appeals.
That’s why United bought him. He has done bugger all apart from score a goal. Obiang, just inside the United half, played an abysmal square pass to Rashford, who scooted 40 yards and then slipped a nice through ball into the area. Lukaku had made a good angled run behind the defence and clattered the ball in off the near post with his left foot.
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GOAL! Manchester United 1-0 West Ham (Lukaku 33)
Romelu Lukaku scores on his league debut for United. It was a simple goal, whacked in off the post from 10 yards.
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32 min Get Fellaini on.
31 min So far, so last season for United. You’d expect them to sharpen up as the match and the season progress but at the moment they aren’t creating much.
28 min “Has the Premier League mandated simplified, two-tone badges as a new feature of their recent rebrand?” says Matt Loten. “I see Spurs in the last game and West Ham in this one are sporting more modern crests than in previous years. The cynic in me wonders if it’s an attempt by club marketing departments to make themselves more easily identifiable to a global audience, but I’m sure that would never happen in the old-fashioned world of football.”
Sorry Matt, I missed that, I was enjoying a beverage from the Guardian’s official Hot Drink Partner.
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27 min Mata misses a great chance. Pogba found him with a glorious chip over the defence. Mata made another superb, stealthy run and controlled the ball deftly on the six-yard line. He should have shot but tried to square it to Lukaku, and Ogbonna cleared from under his own crossbar.
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26 min SOMEBODY GET ME MATIC’S PASSING STATS RIGHT NOW.
25 min Rashford beats Zabaleta twice on the left of the area before hitting a shot that deflects behind for a corner. Blind’s outswinger flashes all the way across goal.
24 min Matic is playing like he has been at Old Trafford for a decade. He looks so comfortable and authoritative. That aside, United have been average so far. The attacking play hasn’t clicked.
22 min West Ham will be really pleased with this start. Hart has only had that one block to make, and they have been bright in possession.
20 min Noble plays a terrific angled chip over the defence to find the run of Hernandez, who mishits his left-footed volley across the area. It was a half-chance at best.
18 min A good chance for United. Mkhitaryan’s pass through the inside-left channel finds Mata, who makes a lovely angled run behind the defence. His attempted clip across goal is blocked by the leg of Hart. It comes back to Mata, who feeds it towards Lukaku on the six-yard line. That leads to a scramble between Lukaku and two defenders, and eventually West Ham clear.
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16 min “Carroll’s unavailable for West Ham?” sniffs John Beaven. “I’m shocked, shocked I tell you....”
But for injuries I reckon he’d have won the Ballon d’Or by now.
14 min After that sluggish start, United are starting to impose themselves. Matic drives a fine long pass to Mkhitaryan, who wins a corner. Matic has started excellently.
12 min A dismal defensive header from Masuaku goes straight to Mkhitaryan on the right corner of the box. He swings a left-footed shot high over the bar.
11 min United enjoy their first extended spell of possession until Pogba’s low cross is well cleared by the sliding Reid.
9 min “Just take a look at the bench Slaven Bilic has named: a goalkeeper, two senior centre halves, two senior full backs, a junior centre half (the highly promising Declan Rice), and a forward who’s barely played a game in two years,” says Daniel Barnett. “What do you think his plan B could possibly be in the unlikely event that West Ham are behind in the second half? It does seem a trifle unambitious. Then again, if a backs-to-the-wall defensive display ends up with Mourinho spitting furiously about “19th-century football”, there can be no complaints. I would love to hear Bilic claiming to have “out-tacticed” him.”
In his defence, he has loads of players unavailable: Lanzini, Cresswell, Feghouli, Carroll, etc.
8 min Lukaku scorches down the left to win United’s first corner. Blind’s outswinger is met in front of the near post by Bailly, whose header flashes across goal before a West Ham defender boots it clear.
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7 min Get Fellaini on.
6 min West Ham continue to play like the home side, moving the ball away with a lot of confidence.
5 min It’s been a frantic start, with both sides full of attacking intent. Thus far West Ham have been the more accomplished in possession.
3 min Jones gets a talking-to after taking a clumsy shortcut through the back of Hernandez. It’s been a bright start from West Ham.
2 min If you’re into the whole tactics thing, Mkhitaryan rather than Mata is playing as a No10.
1 min Peep peep! United kick off from right to left. They are in red, West Ham are in claret.
The players emerge from the tunnel on a cool Manchester afternoon. Joe Hart looks very happy to be back in the Premier League, and in Manchester.
Since you asked, West Ham’s last win at Old Trafford was in 2007 - a game no Hammer will ever forget.
In the early game, Spurs got their title challenge off to a solid start with a 2-0 win at Newcastle. You can read about it here.
Pre-match reading
The teams
Man Utd (4-2-3-1) De Gea; Valencia, Bailly, Jones, Blind; Pogba, Matic; Mata, Mkhitaryan,Rashford; Lukaku.
Substitutes: Romero, Smalling, Darmian, Herrera, Fellaini, Lingard, Martial.
West Ham (4-3-3) Hart; Zabaleta, Reid, Ogbonna, Masuaku; Noble, Obiang, Fernandes; Ayew, Hernandez, Arnautovic.
Substitutes: Adrian, Rice, Byram, Collins, Fonte, Cresswell, Sakho.
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Preamble
What comes next in this sequence: 1, 1, 2, 1, 2, 1, 7, 4, 5, 6? It reads like a maths puzzle that even Max Fischer couldn’t solve. In fact, as you have doubtless realised, these are Manchester United’s league positions in the last 10 years. There have been plenty of reasons for United’s league struggles; this year, however, everyone at the club will at least expect them to challenge for the title for the first time since Sir Alex Ferguson retired. It’s not as easy as it seems – a very good team will finish sixth this season – but this looks like a very powerful, very Mourinho team.
United’s biggest problem last season was that they repeatedly thrashed teams 1-1 and 0-0 at Old Trafford. Today will give us an early indication whether they will be more clinical this season. The signing of Romelu Lukaku, a small-game specialist at this stage of his career, should certainly help.
West Ham have done some interesting business of their own, signing Marko Arnautovic, Pablo Zabaleta and the former Old Trafford favourite Javier Hernandez. He was at United as they transitioned from serial champions to also-rans. The home fans hope the return journey will start today.
Kick off is at 4pm.
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