Manchester United are back in action on Thursday night as we travel to Crystal Palace.
Monday’s draw at home to Southampton means we missed the opportunity to move into the top four, whilst Chelsea moved four points ahead of us yesterday with a 1-0 win over Norwich City.
Leicester City will host Sheffield United on Thursday evening prior to our trip to Selhurst Park. We are currently level on points with the Foxes and three goals behind in a tight race for Champions League football.
Ole Gunnar Solskjaer has spoken to the media this morning ahead of tomorrow’s game and has given a team news and injury update.
The boss has said he will give Luke Shaw as much time as possible to recover from the twisted ankle he picked up against his former club last time out but that the England international has a swollen ankle.
Shaw had previously started all 18 games of our current unbeaten run in all competitions but limped off in the final 20 minutes.
Ole told MUTV this morning:
“Luke has got a swollen ankle, so hopefully I’ll give him as much time as possible to recover – it was a twist on his ankle.”
Luke Shaw’s replacement earlier in the week was youngster Brandon Williams. However, the left-back didn’t finish the game either as he went off with an eye injury heading into stoppage time with the score at 2-1.
Whilst Ole said neither left-back have trained since the game, he has hinted that Williams could still be fit to face Palace, saying:
“Brandon’s eye, he cut up his eye there, so I don’t really know. We’ve not trained this morning, none of them trained yesterday, so they were both swollen and I’ll give them as much time as possible to get ready.”
Should the 19-year-old not recover in time then we could see Diogo Dalot make his first Premier League start since October. The Portuguese full-back has played there on occasion for both FC Porto and us previously.
Alternatively, the boss may simply switch to a back three as he has done during his time in charge of the Red Devils.
We are already without defenders Axel Tuanzebe and Phil Jones, with the former not likely to return until September.