Time was running out on Monday Night Football to dissect Manchester United's supine performance at Newcastle, so Gary Neville presented a comparison of the two midfields.
Newcastle's trio of Bruno Guimaraes, Joe Willock and Sean Longstaff had higher numbers for touches, possession won, duels won, shots attempted and touches in the opponent's area than the combination of Bruno Fernandes, Scott McTominay and Marcel Sabitzer.
Newcastle's midfield had six more touches, regained possession on seven more occasions, won 22 duels to United's 15, had nine times as many attempts at goal and eight more touches in the opponent's area. Also read: Ten Hag pushing for United to be more ruthless in transfer window The influential Guimaraes was the man of the match, Willock got the winner and Longstaff performed like the £50million midfielder Newcastle valued him at when United came calling in 2019.
United have yearned for Casemiro when they have fortuitously won without him, so you can imagine how abysmal they were at St James' Park in defeat.