Michael Carrick has challenged Jadon Sancho to go and show the world how talented he is after scoring his first goal for Manchester United.
Sancho slammed in a shot off the bar to seal United's 2-0 win against Villarreal in the Champions League and it capped arguably his best performance since his £73million move from Borussia Dortmund.
The winger was starting back-to-back games for United for only the second time and his performance grew in stature in the Estadio de la Ceramica. He missed one excellent chance after good combination with Bruno Fernandes, but made no mistake in the closing stages.
Sancho has struggled to make an impact since his summer switch to Old Trafford, but this was a positive step forward and Carrick has told the 21-year-old is now up to him if he uses this as a springboard.
“He’ll feel better after playing how he played. The goal is the obvious one and for Jadon himself, it will give him a massive boost," he said.
"I thought his performance overall, I know how much he likes the ball at his feet, that’s where he’s happiest, but the most pleasing for me was the effort and application he put in off the ball. At times he didn’t see a lot of the ball but he was doing a job and he played a big part in the team performance.
"You earn your rewards, he epitomised the team performance to dig in but also to enjoy the ball at other times. It’s up to him what happens next and how he kicks on, he’s got all the talent in the world and he’ll have our support that’s for sure."
United scored twice in the last 12 minutes to earn the victory in Carrick's first match as caretaker manager and they took control of the game in the final quarter when Bruno Fernandes and Marcus Rashford came off the bench.
“The game panned out as I thought, when you’ve had results we’ve had and gone through what we have it would be very foolish to think it would be free-flowing and everything would be wonderful," said Carrick.
"They make you work for it and make you defend, test you with how clever you are at closing spaces. I had a feeling it would be a tight game.
"I said before the game it’s important who starts it but it's just as important finishing the game and how you finish it. That was the balancing act going through the mind of me and my staff and in the end it kind of came through.
"First half was tight, we grew into the game as we went on and you could see we were taking more of the ball and that belief was growing. I thought we'd be better at halftime but it proved to be a little bit tougher at the start of the second half, we had players to change it and in the end it worked out. Everyone played their part. There was a real drive and togetherness and support for each other."
