From the lowest of lows, Marcus Rashford is a player reborn

It has been so long since Marcus Rashford has been a genuine contender for a regular starting place with England that it is easy to forget what type of game best suits his undoubted abilities. The Manchester United winger is at his most dangerous when the opposition is stretched, when there is space to run into, and when he has an opportunity to turn on the afterburners.

His goals in those types of games – like in the win over Liverpool and his pair against Arsenal not long after – have provided the foundation for his recent resurgence in form, lifting him out of what he freely admits has been the most challenging period of his career. This low-stakes curtain closer of a World Cup group stage against a Wales side determined to save face was not that type of game. Not at the start, at least.

During a dour first half which threatened to be a grimly utilitarian retread of Friday’s stalemate with the United States, Rashford did not appear suited to the specific demands of the task at hand. Against a drilled, deep-set defence, he had to combine and link with the rest of the attack rather than burst ahead of it. He can do all that just fine, of course, and he was on the end of England’s best chance as a result. He spurned it.

Rashford fired home two goals to help England into the last 16 (AP)

Yet if it is a cliché that goals change games, it is no less true. And while when he was at his lowest point last season it was as though everything had to be perfect around Rashford for him to play even moderately well, he is now a player capable of scoring game-changing goals again. How else to describe the ferocious, rasping free kick that finally broke Wales’ resistance and secured England’s place as Group B winners?

It was a stunning strike, the type that Rashford had developed a reputation for once upon a time, and not totally dissimilar from his best in a League Cup tie at Stamford Bridge in late 2019. The truth is that not many similarly spectacular free kicks have followed since. It has been rare to even see Rashford stand over a dead ball over the last few years at Old Trafford. That he did here was more evidence of a player confident in his abilities again.

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Rashford scored the first and, a minute later, he as good as made the second. Harry Kane will take credit for the assist but he was the beneficiary of a Ben Davies fumble that was forced entirely by Rashford’s willingness to press and harry less than 60 seconds after giving his side the lead. By the time of his second, his goal and assist had helped bend this game into a mould that fits him.

England’s third was trademark Rashford, exploiting a high line, twisting a full back inside out and finishing past a Wales defence that had been dragged up the pitch by his goal and assist. This was the player that Southgate knew he was missing during his international exile and before that too, when he was only a bit-part figure during the run to the European Championship final. The England manager met with Rashford at the end of last season to discuss his slump in form and his potential route back to the squad.

Rashford has fought his way back into Gareth Southgate’s plans over the last few months (AP)

As one of the few players who pre-dates the Southgate era, who knows the culture of what has been built over the last six years, his path back into the fold would always be that little bit more straightforward than others stuck on the outside. Rashford is grateful for the second chance too. Amid all the criticism that followed the stalemate with the States, he was the one chosen to front up to the media at England’s base camp over the weekend. His defence of Southgate – like his faith in the England manager – was total.

Ahead of a last-16 tie against Senegal, the question now moves on to whether that faith and this performance will be repaid with a second consecutive start. A lot will be made of the fact that Rashford and Phil Foden were two of Southgate’s four changes and provided all three of England’s goals. Many will point out that those goals only came when Foden switched from right to left and Rashford switched from left to right.

It was not a tactical switch that changed this tight, attritional game however. It was changed by a spectacular strike from a player reborn.