Manchester United and Chelsea, Saturday, smashed their opponents in the 2021/2022 English Premiership League opener.
Bruno Fernandes scored his first hat-trick in English football as Manchester United began their Premier League campaign with a crushing 5-1 win at home to Leeds United.
Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s side, who unveiled new signing Raphael Varane on the pitch before kick-off and named Jadon Sancho on the bench, made a fast start and wasted some good chances with Paul Pogba missing from close range.
But Pogba redeemed himself with a lovely first-time ball to set up Fernandes whose shot was too powerful for Illan Meslier to keep out.
Marcelo Bielsa brought on new signing Junior Firpo at the break. And they equalised courtesy of a stunning strike from distance from Luke Ayling which flew into the corner.
But that goal roared the home side into action. Four minutes later, Pogba found Mason Greenwood who rifled the ball into the bottom corner to regain the lead.
And two minutes later, Fernandes fired in a low shot which Hawk-Eye ruled crossed the line after Ayling’s last-ditch clearance.
Leeds were rattled and the Portuguese playmaker completed his hat-trick soon after, running onto Victor Lindelof’s floated ball and smashing the ball into the roof of the net.
Similar to United’s 6-2 win at Old Trafford last season, the visitors’ defensive frailties cost them and United made it five when another Pogba pass led to Fred netting from inside the box.
Sancho came on for his debut in the closing stages while Anthony Martial also made his return from injury as Solskjaer’s side begin their season with a statement victory in front of a full house at Old Trafford.
In another development, Chelsea manager Thomas Tuchel told his side to hunt down Manchester City, Manchester United and Liverpool in the fight for the Premier League title after cruising past Crystal Palace 3-0 to open their campaign on Saturday.
The European champions added the UEFA Super Cup in midweek to their Champions League win last season in Tuchel’s first few months in charge.
Premier League success is the next challenge for the German and the Blues showed why they are considered second favourites to defending champions City against Palace.
Without record signing Romelu Lukaku, Chelsea were still rarely troubled as first-half goals from Marcos Alonso and Christian Pulisic gave them a commanding lead before Trevoh Chalobah rounded off a dream Premier League debut with his side’s third goal.
“I think we have to hunt the others from day one. This is what we want to do, this is our mentality and we are never shy to fight for the best outcome possible, but the reality is we are not the favourites right now,” said Tuchel.
His side finished fourth in the Premier League last season, noting ‘’I see ourselves as number four last year so we cannot be favourites. We just have to close the gap to number three, number two and number one so this is what we’re trying to do.”
For all the progress made under Tuchel, Saturday’s victory was only the second time Chelsea have scored more than twice in the Premier League since he took charge.
“We are well aware of our situation that it was hard for us to convert all the chances that we created last season,” he added.
“It should be enough to score more so we try to help with the addition of Romelu to our squad. In the Premier League, it will stay super hard to score so we’re very happy to have three goals today. We did it without a penalty from Jorginho which is quite spectacular for us!
“We can still improve in the final third. We have to get a bit calmer and a bit more clinical still so we will not stop pushing and looking for solutions.”
Meanwhile, Mohamed Salah scored one and provided two assists as Liverpool got their Premier League title bid off to a winning start with a comfortable victory at newly promoted Norwich City.
Salah got his side’s third to become the first player to score on the opening weekend in five consecutive Premier League campaigns and cap a fine display after earlier setting up Diogo Jota and Roberto Firmino.
