Manchester United needed the help of a 19-year-old at Atletico Madrid to take a potentially valuable draw into the second leg. Ralf Rangnick was full of praise for Anthony Elanga after the final whistle.
A 19-year-old finally had to do it for Manchester United. In a long, harmless performance at Atletico Madrid, the Red Devils lacked essentials offensively until the closing stages. There was no sign of Jadon Sancho, Marcus Rahsford or Cristiano Ronaldo, and the Colchoneros’ biting defence seemed too intimidating.
Defensively, ManUnited were not up to scratch either, especially in passage one. “I still can’t believe what we played in the first half,” Ralf Rangnick let slip to “BT Sport”. His team played “without conviction” and “without the necessary aggressiveness”.
“It’s fun to watch him”.
75 minutes watched it before Rangnick made his first attacking change. The 63-year-old brought on Anthony Elanga for Rashford – and in doing so swapped in the equaliser. The 19-year-old Swede made a decisive appearance with his first action, blithely tucking a through pass from Bruno Fernandes into the left-hand corner.
Elanga’s 80th-minute equaliser made him United’s youngest scorer in the knockout stages of the Champions League, and Rangnick raved about him afterwards. “He is fun to watch. I wish some other players would take him as an example. Not because he does everything right, but because he enjoys himself on the pitch.” A clear message to Rangnick’s remaining offensive personnel, who shied away from all one-on-one situations on Wednesday night.
Elanga, by his own admission, was told by Rangnick to “scare” Atletico’s defence when he came on as a substitute. He only wanted to be “the best player on the pitch”. The youngster was the match-winner for United, and the 1-1 draw gives the Red Devils the best chance of progressing in the second leg in front of their home crowd. “The way we scored the goal, we have to play against them,” said Rangnick, who knows how he wants United to reach the quarter-finals on 15 March.