Kobbie Mainoo praised by Fernandes and Ten Hag as highlights v Arsenal emerge | OneFootball

Manchester United's perfect start to pre-season continued on Saturday evening as they defeated Arsenal in New Jersey.

Pause

Unmute

Current Time 0:00

/

Duration 8:10

Loaded: 1.46%

The Red Devils were victorious against Leeds United and Lyon in their opening two pre-season matches.

They made it three wins from three games at MetLife Stadium as they beat Arsenal 2-0.

Goals from Bruno Fernandes and Jadon Sancho gave them the victory over their Premier League rivals.

United then emerged victorious in the penalty shootout as they scored each of their five spot-kicks.

One of United's most promising youngsters, Kobbie Mainoo, was given the opportunity to impress against Arsenal.

The defensive midfielder, who turned 18 in April, was named alongside the likes of Raphael Varane, Mason Mount and Fernandes in United's starting lineup.

Mainoo had a tough task with Arsenal fielding a midfield three of Declan Rice, Kai Havertz and Martin Odegaard.

But the youngster was not fazed at all.

Mainoo was terrific during his 45 minutes on the pitch. He was incredibly calm on the ball and produced a number of terrific passes.

He even set up Fernandes' opener on the half-hour mark.

Kobbie Mainoo's stats in Arsenal vs Manchester United

Mainoo's stats from the game make for very impressive reading.

He was given a rating of 7/10 by SofaScore.

He completed 23 of his 24 passes for an accuracy of 96%. He won each of his two ground duels, recorded an interception and won a tackle.

The young Englishman was so impressive that he received 35% of the vote in Manchester United's Player of the Match poll.

He just missed out to Fernandes, who picked up 36% of the vote.

Bruno Fernandes and Erik ten Hag sing Mainoo's praises

Fernandes and Erik ten Hag were both full of praise for Mainoo after the match.

"Honestly, Kobbie is a great player, he shows great resilience," Fernandes told MUTV, per Manchester Evening News.

"He's always ready to work. He's capabilities are high and everyone can see it [his talent]. He's good on the ball, strong, he can defend and attack.

"You see how he attacked the space for my goal. He's still pretty young, but we see a bright future for him and hopefully he will get more minutes, more time, and he will be a great player for us."

While Ten Hag told MUTV, per Manchester Evening News: "Manchester United are famous for always bringing young players through and he can be one, but we have to see. We have confidence, he's playing with confidence and I really liked his performance.

"He showed it, then in the spring he got injured, so we're really happy there are more youngsters with us now and they're all doing very good, but I don't want to rise expectations too high.

"We have to see, the Premier League is tough, but definitely, you can see, we have some really good young players who can play a role in our squad. But the bar is high."

Mainoo won the Jimmy Murphy Young Player of the Year award in the 2022/23 season, given to the best player in United's academy.

He also made three appearances for the first team last campaign. It seems he could play a much bigger role in the upcoming season.