UK Edition
Alexis Sanchez debut verdict: 'As a start this was close to perfection'
For a moment Alexis Sanchez must have wondered what on earth he was doing. There were his former club Arsenal booking a place at a Wembley final the minute he left and here he was, playing in a League Two stadium, with more sand on the pitch than on the beach at Weston-super-Mare.
At the Emirates he had despaired of the lack of recruitment of quality colleagues and here he was lining up alongside Matteo Darmian. Then, barely had he got used to wearing Manchester United’s hallowed number seven shirt than he was welcomed to Yeovil with a tackle entirely lacking in ceremony. It came from the uncompromising home centre back Nathan Smith, who sent him spiralling with an assault perfectly matching the agricultural surrounds. Anticipating nights with United in Paris, Munich and Madrid, being kicked in rural Somerset was presumably not what he signed up for.
But Sanchez immediately demonstrated his fighting spirit, picking himself up and firing the resultant free kick just wide of Artur Krysiak’s goal. Not that the locals seemed keen to celebrate his resilience. As the ball hit the advertising boards to the side of the goal, the occupants of the home stand chanted in his direction: “What a waste of money.”
Money has been the defining mark of everything to do with Sanchez’s transfer. Before this game, one newspaper reported that his car is worth more than the value of the motors of the entire Yeovil squad added together. But never mind the quality of his wheels, there is no question that the locals were pleased to see him start the game.
As he warmed up, the occupants of the stand running along one side of Yeovil’s neat Huish Park gathered at the front to film him on their phones. This was proper celebrity arriving in a place where the biggest name they were previously expecting was A-ha, the now venerable Norwegian pop band whose gig here in June was advertised on posters in the gents.
And, whatever the supposed cost, Sanchez is a player who rarely fails to offer value for money. When, midway through the first half, he took out two defenders with a sudden switch of direction, the home supporters oohed and aahed in appreciation. This is not someone inclined to remain static.
A constant whirl of energy, he gave his marker, Tom James, a guided tour of every inch of the Huish Park turf. But what will have pleased the visiting fans on the open terrace was how quickly he seemed to have assimilated into the Manchester United system. Integration appeared immediate.
Playing on the left of a front three, from the off he was exchanging sharp passes with Marcus Rashford and Juan Mata, releasing Scott McTominay to draw a magnificent save from Krysiak. Even if not everything came off, even if his long passes were occasionally awry, how his new colleagues seemed to relish his presence, loved the space he found and the space he created for them.
“I am very happy,” said Mourinho of Sanchez. “It was no surprise for anyone. Three and a half years in the Premier League, everyone knows what kind of player Alexis is. A fantastic player.”
There were hints of that throughout. It was his pass that sent Rashford through for the visitors’ first goal. Though in truth it was less the precision of his intervention than James’s nervous dawdling on the ball that allowed the forward to score. And it was his pass too, hit at speed and timed to perfection, that set up Ander Herrera for the second.
When he left on 75 minutes, to take his place in the modest Huish Park dug out, there was no doubt he had made his mark.
“We would have won if we had Sanchez,” suggested the Yeovil manager Darren Way. “I thought he was absolutely world class.”
The United fans will be hoping there is more to come, more goals, more assists, more involvement. But as a hint of the future this was as positive as it comes, a man of the match winning show.
The cost of his transfer may be way beyond the ken of anyone at Yeovil or anywhere else. But on this evidence he is going to make Manchester United a better team. And in today’s Premier League economy, that represents investment well made.