Were it not for the €70million (£59m, $76.2m) centre-back making his first appearance, less than a week since it seemed a near certainty he would be joining Real Madrid, then attention would have been firmly on Manchester United’s left wing during the first half at Murrayfield.
It was difficult to draw your eyes away from Leny Yoro, who put in an assured and composed performance beyond his 18 years on his pseudo-debut, showing flashes of the athleticism and ability to read the game that led United’s recruitment department to rate him as the best centre-back of his age in Europe.
But on another day, the story would have been Jadon Sancho making his first United outing of any sort in almost 11 months, his first start since last summer’s pre-season tour, and being selected by Erik ten Hag for the first time since the pair of them decided to bury the hatchet.
Sancho returned to Carrington last week as expected and, after a meeting with Ten Hag, was readmitted to first-team training.
His involvement in the Champions League final with Borussia Dortmund and late arrival back meant he missed Monday’s 1-0 defeat by Rosenborg, but he is now expected to take full part in the rest of the pre-season schedule.
Sancho’s performance in his 45 minutes against Rangers was what we have come to expect from him in a United shirt: neat touches in tight spaces, promising link-up play around the edge of the box, the odd creation of an opening that could have led to an assist, but often short of that decisive end product.
If that sounds critical, look at it another way: this typical Sancho display — no better or worse than most of what United have seen before — came when he was short of match sharpness, in his first minutes of a new campaign. It was a foundation to build on, at the beginning of what could still be an unlikely return from the wilderness.
Ten Hag has spoken publicly about Sancho twice in the past week — first to journalists in Trondheim after the Rosenborg defeat, then to Dutch newspaper AD Sportwereld in the second part of an interview published on Saturday morning.
Words to the effect of ‘draw a line’ made up about a tenth of everything he said across both answers, in case anyone was in any doubt about the message the United manager wants out there.
There was the first hint of contrition on Sancho’s part in Ten Hag’s AD interview. “Everyone can make a mistake,” he said. “If the player reflects on this well, you draw a line and move on.” Whether “reflecting well” stretched to a full and frank apology on Sancho’s part remains unclear.
So does Sancho’s future. Ten Hag confirmed that after the signings of Yoro and Joshua Zirkzee, United are essentially in a position where they now need to sell to buy.
In that case, it is difficult to believe that if a potential suitor came along with £40million and an offer to pay the wages of one of United’s highest-earning players, then a club would not be willing to have a conversation at least.
Such a compelling offer has not arrived, though, and so Sancho staying beyond pre-season and the end of the transfer window has to be considered a possibility. If that transpires, he will have his fresh start in a United shirt.
Sancho’s only problem will be the level of competition around him. For all the intrigue around the 24-year-old’s return in Edinburgh, not to forget the excitement around Yoro, the standout performance in a 2-0 win against Rangers came on United’s right-wing rather than on the left.
Amad will hope to establish himself as a Manchester United regular after a strong end to last season (Ash Donelon/Manchester United via Getty Images)
Amad missed the Rosenborg friendly as his new Ivorian passport had not arrived in time, preventing him from obtaining a Norwegian visa.
And yet on this first pre-season outing, he scored and picked up where he left off after ending last season with a run of three consecutive league starts, including his first under Ten Hag. Before that, he had been named as a substitute 18 times, only coming off the bench in eight of those games.
Ten Hag put that apparent reluctance to use Amad down to a difficult recovery from the meniscus knee injury he picked up in New Jersey last summer, which unquestionably hampered his progress. But it is also true that the United manager is now talking about him in more glowing terms than ever.
“In the last games of the season, he showed his assets,” Ten Hag said at Murrayfield, before laying down a gauntlet. “This season has to become his season.”
It sounds as though opportunities will now come for Amad. And so with his emergence and Sancho’s exit now more uncertain, United suddenly have an abundance of options out wide.
Marcus Rashford and Antony missed the trip to Edinburgh due to minor injuries. Alejandro Garnacho is away recovering from Argentina’s success at the Copa America, though is set to return the week before the Community Shield against Manchester City.
That makes five players with realistic ambitions of regular minutes competing for two places. Garnacho and Rashford ended last season at the top of that pecking order, with Amad rising behind on their coattails. And he has versatility in his corner.
Ten Hag believes Amad is capable of playing all across the frontline — even up top, if necessary. Sancho has shown a similar flexibility under Ten Hag when available, playing left, right and centrally two seasons ago, but his preference for the left is no secret and he is not at the front of the queue in any position.
Ten Hag thinks the changes to the format of UEFA competitions will make squad depth more important than ever this season. In that respect, minutes will surely need to be shared around. Opportunities will come.
But if Sancho is to remain at United beyond the summer, even if the tensions of last season are now water under the bridge, Amad’s performance was a reminder of the increased competition he faces and that there will be no easy route back.
(Top photo: Matthew Peters/Manchester United via Getty Images)
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