Oviri Kelvin, Sports Editor, Abuja
Manchester United has moved up to the fourth position on the Premier League table after goals from Cristiano Ronaldo and Bruno Fernandes handed a 2-0 win over Brighton to the Red Devils at Old Trafford.
United, which had floppy performances in their last three games with the club captain Harry Maguire facing a series of criticism, put up an excellent show to secure a maximum of three points.
The game played on Tuesday 15, at Old Trafford, saw the host team in a more determined mindset trying to dominate the play but met an evenly matched response from Brighton. Both teams tried breaking the deadlock but couldn’t until the second half.
After the start of the second 45 minutes of the game, Manchester United forward Cristiano Ronaldo found the back of Brighton & Hove Albion’s net through an assist from Scott McTominay at the 51st minute after taking a powerful strike from the edge of the penalty box to beat Robert Sanchez.
Conceding a goal in the early minutes of the second-half spurred Brighton to come all out to get an equaliser with Manchester United goalkeeper making some important saves to deny them of their attempts.
In the 54th minute, Brighton was reduced to 10 men after defender Lewis Dunk was red-carded for a nasty challenge on Manchester United forward Anthony Elanga.
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Also in the 71st minute, a right-footed attempt by Bruno Fernandes from the centre of the 18-yard box was saved by Robert Sanchez.
Paul Pogba in the 74th minute came in as a substitute for Fred and in the 90th minute, provided an assist for Bruno Fernandes to slot in his right-footed shot into the net to record the second goal for the Red Devils.
However, at the end of the game, the interim boss of Manchester United, Raff Rangnick noted that Cristiano Ronaldo, who was named as the man of the match, performed incredibly well.
He said, “It was a good performance by Ronaldo.
“In the last few weeks, it was certainly the best performance by him and a very, very important goal,” he added.
With this win over Brighton, Manchester United leapfrogged Westham in top-four and tops Arsenal, who has three games at hand, with 4 points on the Premier League table.
