MANCHESTER UTD 2 FOXES 1
Report by Graham Tracey
There was a disappointing outcome to our first trip to Wembley for 16 years on a footy picture postcard scorcher of a day, as a late goal left us empty-handed in an extremely even game that generally boded well for the new season. It was a great day out, especially as I guess there would have been many thousands of younger fans seeing us at Wembley for the first time.
Sat in neutral seats thanks to a mate's Club Wembley ticket at the opposite end to our fans, we looked a fine sight. Nevertheless, I feel any defeat painfully these days, and it would have been nice to take home the Charity Shield as the league champions usually should against the FA Cup winners.
I was keen to see what the starting line-up would be, but none of the summer signings were handed a debut, with King replacing Kante in the inevitable change. It was impossible to say whether this was a true indication of Claudio's intention for the coming season, or more of a reward for last term's heroics. United also had a familiar look, handing debuts only to Bailly and Ibrahimovic, although of course Mourinho was hoping to avoid consecutive sackings after defeats to Leicester.
The first half seemed to lack intensity by both sides. It was hard to apportion this between the heat, the semi-competitive occasion, United's ponderous style of play and pre-season sluggishness. We created the first real openings, with Okazaki curling a deflected effort just wide, and then glancing the resulting corner against the crossbar.
Vardy was having a battle royale with Bailly, and started to come out on top the more the game progressed. The delight of the United fans when Bailly won a tussle showed the fear and respect of our loyal talisman. Mahrez and Drinkwater were somewhat off form, but both still hungry for the ball at every opportunity. Simpson looked unusually shaky, and after a booking his position began to look precarious, but the rest of the back four was right on the money.
The opening goal followed our pre-season theme of good goals that were all the same preventable. Lingard picked the ball up 40 yards out in a central position, and managed to beat 3 desperate challenges and Schmeichel's boot. Once again, we were behind out of the blue, which despite quality opposition was happening too often not to be a concern.
I felt that being able to make 6 substitutions devalued the status of the game, but we naturally I was excited to see Ahmed Musa for the first time after his Julian Joachim style goal against Barcelona. With Demari Gray also replacing Albrighton I doubt we had ever had such an array of flair and pace on the field at once. Indeed it triggered a much more competitive and enjoyable second half.
Within a few minutes of the restart, Musa had so unsettled the universally-derided Fellani that he played in Vardy with a perfect back pass, which was finished expertly. Even in defeat, it is memorable for your team to score a goal at Wembley and we celebrated wildly. No doubt the Vardy lookalike did the same, who we saw in non-stop selfie action on the tube and on Wembley Way.
Unfortunately we couldn't seem to find the next gear which would have brought us the winner. There were impressive showings from Mendy and Hernandez, which made me feel (with some sadness) that they will be ahead of King and Simpson before long. The strength of our squad was also shown by players like Amartey, Chilwell, James and Kapustka not even making the bench.
Penalties after 90 minutes were starting to look likely when Gray couldn't prevent a cross, and Ibrahimovic headed back across Schmeichel and agonisingly in off the inside of the post. It had been an otherwise anonymous debut by the Swede whose hero-worshipping by the media (some 5 Live pundits refer to him by his first name alone) is a mystery to me, as was the absurd odds of only 28-1 to score a hat-trick.
In the closing minutes Schmeichel camped in United's penalty area for a succession of Hernandez's long throws, but it wasn't to be and that actually felt strange. Overall, there was nothing to suggest we shouldn't finish above a team like United again, but it will need the rediscovery of a collective ruthless streak at both ends of the pitch. I tried not to think that had we still had Kante we would probably have won.
CITY: Schmeichel 6, Simpson 4, Fuchs 7, Huth 7, Morgan 7, King 5, Drinkwater 6, Albrighton 6, Mahrez 6, Vardy 8, Okazaki 7. Subs: Gray 8, Musa 7, Hernandez 7, Mendy 7, Schlupp and Ulloa n/a
The views expressed in this report are the opinions of the Trust member nominated to file the report only and do not represent the views of the Foxes Trust organisation