Late Bruno winner rescues Manchester United against Fulham despite another poor game from Erik ten Hag’s team

The bleeding is at least stemmed but all Erik ten Hag can take from another dreary display is three points. Manchester United were as poor at Craven Cottage as they had been at home to Manchester City and Newcastle United, devoid of inspiration and fortunate to cling on for long enough to get to the stage where Bruno Fernandes delivered a moment of rare quality in the 91st minute to rescue a 1-0 victory. 

Ten Hag will breath a little easier for now but this performance did nothing to address the most profound critiques of his season and change in charge. Against a team more than prepared to give them the ball, United betrayed no plans for what to do with it. Fernandes’ smart turn and low drive was enough to carry the day after an ordinary performance but Old Trafford has seen enough occasions when individual brilliance bails them out to know that this is not a sustainable vision for the weeks ahead. The best that you could say of this display is that United players couldn’t be accused of throwing in the towel as they were in their last two games. Then again they were three goals down in those.

From the moment Ten Hag revealed that Marcus Rashford had missed out with injury — a day after being the brunt of his boss’ criticism for partying after the Manchester derby — it was apparent this would be a tense and spiky occasion for coach and players. Ten Hag raged when his side saw an early Scott McTominay goal disallowed, Harry Maguire judged to have made a play at Christian Eriksen’s free kick from an offside position before Alejandro Garnacho rolled the ball across the face of goal. Perhaps the Manchester United manager knew there and then how infrequently these opportunities would come across for a side with so little idea of what to do with their possession dominance.

Not until the 20th minute did United touch the ball in the Fulham penalty area. It took a further eight minutes to register a legitimate shot on Bernd Leno’s goal. Their hosts had sat back and challenged the Red Devils to break them down. Ten Hag’s men had no idea how to do so. Eriksen, the man who should have been spotting gaps inside the final third, was getting as many touches level with the center backs as anywhere else.

Ten Hag has spoken of his desire to forge “the best transition team in the world,” but even a side with that philosophy needs to have some idea of what to do against a low block. Yet again there was no sign of that, the visiting support crying “attack, attack, attack” as the ball meandered around the United third. If the absence of possession play has been a familiar tale this season, United have at least proven to be a team that can reclaim the ball high up the pitch. There was no sign of that today. Perhaps that is no wonder. A Harry Maguire-Jonny Evans center back pairing shielded by Eriksen hardly has the recovery pace to push high up the pitch.

After a sedentary start a brace of Garnacho shots early in the second half offered hope. That was more than could be said on the opposite flank where Antony reliably delivered possession to Fulham. The Brazilian hardly looked like a $100 million player at Ajax. On current form a tenth of that looks like an overpay. Even with one flank out of commission, United did at least progress towards an attack that approximated consciousness.

Fulham, though, looked no less a threat as this game opened up. A cruel assessment of United might be that they had found opposition at their level. Cruel, but not necessarily untrue. Twice in a matter of minutes Andre Onana saved springily from Harry Wilson and Joao Palhinha while Diogo Dalot cleared a Calvin Bassey flick off the line soon after. How United could do with a player like Alex Iwobi, a progressor with his dribbling and passing without insisting on Bruno Fernandes-esque hero ball.

For 91 minutes that did not look like working. That it did at least buys Ten Hag a few more days to address the profound issues that his side have when the ball is at their feet. Copenhagen and Luton Town will surely have taken heart from this game; you do not have to be very good to push this side to their limits. United may have another win to their name but this was not a day to assuage any doubts over their footballing qualities.