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UEFA Europa: Manchester United Thrash Midtjylland 5-1, As Tottenham Scores 3 Pass Fiorentina

Published

8 years ago

February 25, 2016

The 18-year-old academy graduate, who was told he would start 30 minutes prior to kick-off after Anthony Martial injured himself in the warm up, yet stole the show
Manchester United youngster Marcus Rashford scored twice on a dream debut to help his side to a 5-1 victory over FC Midtjylland in the Europa League on Thursday.
Anthony Martial had been selected to start only to pick up a hamstring injury in the warm-up, forcing Louis van Gaal into selecting academy graduate Rashford as their only striker.
Yet Pione Sisto shocked United fans by opening the scoring just before the half-hour mark, skipping past Michael Carrick and Joe Riley before firing low past Sergio Romero.
The hosts were shortly back in the game – and the tie – when Nikolay Bodurov turned the ball into his own net in an attempt to clear a teasing cross from Memphis Depay.
And United came close to taking the lead after Morgan Schneiderlin hit the post with a header.
Shortly after, however, they were gifted the chance to make it 2-1 when Andre Romer fouled Ander Herrera inside the area, yet a tame penalty from Juan Mata was palmed wide by Mikkel Andersen.
Mata went some way to redeeming himself after assisting for young striker Rashford to score on his debut.
Rashford’s dream debut continued as he doubled his lead and put United 4-3 ahead in the tie with a simple finish at the back-post following a cross from Guillermo Varela.
Herrera scored from the spot minutes before Andre Roemer was dismissed for a second bookable offence, leaving Memphis to wrap up a comprehensive second-leg victory with a fifth goal late on.

La Viola were helpless to prevent the London outfit from breaching their goal thrice as they were swept away by a dominant performance from the home sideTottenham produced a rampant performance to comprehensively demolish Fiorentina 3-0 in the second leg of their round-of-32 Europa League tie on Thursday.Mauricio Pochettino’s men held a 1-1 result from the first leg in Florence and simply needed a draw to ensure progress to the next stage of the tournament.The Argentine opted to rest some of his bigger names at White Hart Lane but that did not stop the side from taking the initiative and finding their opener in the 25th minute through Ryan Mason.Tottenham controlled proceedings from there and duly added a second through Erik Lamela who turned home an instinctive finish.Gonzalo Rodriguez’s own-goal nine minutes from full-time then ensured an emphatic 4-1 aggregate scoreline for the hosts, who march into the last-16 in convincing fashion.