It turned out to be a frustrating afternoon at Anfield for Manchester United on Sunday. The Reds went down 2-0 to arch-rivals Liverpool in what was a pulsating 90-minute match.
As to be expected, the Premier League’s runaway leaders dominated large parts of the game, however, the scoreline remained tight at 1-0 right up until stoppage time when United, who were pushing for a late equaliser, were caught out by a Liverpool counter-attack and Mohamed Salah sealed the victory.
Up until that point, it had been one of Salah’s quietest performances at Anfield this season, which in large can be attributed to the impressive performance of United’s young full-back Brandon Williams.
The teenager started as a left-wing back for the Reds and was tasked with guarding against the attacking threat of both Salah and Trent Alexander-Arnold on Liverpool’s right-hand side.
His good work tracking Salah was highlighted by the fact that the attacker received just 19 passes in the game, a reduction on his usual average of around 22.49. He also contributed to Liverpool creating very few attacks down their right side. In fact, as highlighted below, just seven of their 39 positional attacks came down the side governed by Williams.
His own impressive individual display was highlighted by his solid match statistics. He completed 23/28 attempted passes, won 3/4 of his defensive duels and made three progressive runs.
Irrespective of the above, it’s fair to say it has been a meteoric rise for the 19-year-old who, despite playing just over 1,300 minutes of competitive action this season, can already stake a real claim to be considered United’s current first-choice left-back.
His impressive performances have highlighted enough quality that Ole Gunnar Solskjaer felt able to allow club captain and regular left-back Ashley Young to depart for Inter Milan.
However, an away trip at Anfield presented a test of his credentials beyond the stuff easily quantified in numbers, examining qualities such as leadership, courage and tenacity.
But notably, Williams demonstrated the above on numerous occasions, like in the below example.
As United look to launch an attack, note how Williams is instructing his team-mate on where to play the pass.
As the pass comes into the feet of Anthony Martial, Williams is making a run down the flank to receive a forward pass.
The pass from the Frenchman is poor and behind the run of Williams, who tries to atone for his team-mate's error.
The poor pass is recovered by Liverpool’s Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain who looks to launch a counter-attack for the home side. However, Williams aggressively pursues the Liverpool midfielder and throws in a robust sliding challenge to knock the ball out of play and halt Liverpool’s progression up the pitch.
His display was a bright spark in an otherwise difficult afternoon for United.
Now 30 points behind their Merseyside rivals in the league, there is sure to be some wholesale changes to the squad in the coming seasons as the club look to close that gap.
Yet, Williams is currently proving that he is one of the few players worthy of building the squad around in the years to come.
