Man United put nine past sorry Saints

Scott McTominay celebrates with Manchester United team-matesafter scoring their sixth goal at Old Trafford tonight. Picture: Phil Noble/Pool/Getty

Premier League: Man United 9 Southampton 0

Ole Gunnar Solskjaer will not have the luxury of playing this wretched and struggling Southampton team every week but, for now at least, the fixture list was kind enough to present his team with this gift of a fixture and their biggest win in nearly 26 years.

That famous 9-0 win over Ipswich in March 1995 is well remembered in these parts, not least because of Andy Cole’s five goals on the day, but while no individual stood out here, it was still a much-needed morale-boosting win against the nine men of Southampton.

The evening stroll was helped by the visitors playing for 88 minutes with 10 men but still featured some excellent finishing and could have resulted in an even more embarrassing scoreline.

By the time Jan Bednarek was shown a straight red for bringing down Anthony Martial and Bruno Fernandes calmly converted the 87th minute penalty, United had won a league game by seven goals for the first time since February 1999.

United won that particular game 8-1 at Nottingham Forest with some bloke called Solskjaer coming on as a late substitute and scoring four times in the final 10 minutes. As omens go, perhaps that suggests this might yet be Solskjaser and United’s year.

But  United were not finished there. Martial swept in his second of the night, from Aaron Wan-Bissaka’s 90th minute cross and deep in injury-time, Fernandes dragged the ball back across goal for substitute Dan James to force the ball in.

The game’s turning point had arrived after all of 75 seconds, when Southampton’s Swiss teenager Alexandre Jankewitz marked the first league start of his career by launching himself, studs-up, at the thigh of Scott McTominay. There was only one decision for referee Mike Dean to make and, barely 40 minutes later, Southampton were not only down to 10 men, they were four goals behind.

On 18 minutes Luke Shaw delivered a delicious far-post cross which fellow full-back Wan Bissaka volleyed in on the run from four yards.

Seven minutes later, Shaw was again involved as he slipped in Mason Greenwood who squared for Marcus Rashford to finish clinically.

Southampton were beaten, on every level, even before Rashford sped down the right after 34 minutes and his lethal cross was turned into the Southampton net by Bednarek.

Five minutes later, Edinson Cavani finally converted one of the number of chances with which he’d been furnished, heading home accurately from another brilliant Shaw delivery.

Shaw was replaced by Donny van de Beek at the break and the Dutchman’s first meaningful act was to give away a free-kick which led to Che Adams “scoring” only for the VAR George Scott to judge that the striker had been offside by the proverbial armpit.

There was a Fernandes shot which the busy McCarthy smothered before the Portuguese laid on that fifth goal on 69 minutes with a delightful lifted through ball for substitute Anthony Martial.

The Frenchman, struggling for form in recent weeks, cushioned the ball superbly on his chest, took a touch and beat the Southampton keeper with the sort of clinical finish that has been missing from his armoury of late.

Martial would be less convincing a few minutes later when he rolled the ball wide when clean through but by then United had their sixth after a Greenwood shot was saved but only cleared as far as McTominay who slammed the ball in from 25 yards.

MANCHESTER UNITED (4-2-3-1): De Gea 7; Wan-Bissaka 7, Lindelof 7, Maguire 8, Shaw 8 (van de Beek 45, 6); McTominay 8, Fred 7; Greenwood 8, Fernandes 9, Rashford 7 (James 60, 6); Cavani 7 (Martial 45, 8). Subs (not used) Bailly, Pogba, Henderson, Telles, Matic, Williams.

SOUTHAMPTON (4-4-2): McCarthy 6; Ramsay 4, Bednarek 5, Stephens 4, Bertrand 4; Armstrong 5, Ward-Prowse 5, Jankewitz, Djenepo 5 (Tchaptchet 78, 4); Adams 6, Ings 5 (Redmond 70, 5). Subs (not used) N’Lundulu, Lewis, Forster, Ferry, Finnigan, Chauke.

Referee: M Dean 6