Paul Pogba Has Been at the Heart of Manchester United’s Recent Improvement

When Jose Mourinho’s Manchester United faced David Moyes’ Sunderland on Monday, it was hard not to feel as if a ghost was being put to rest—not the ghost of Christmas past, but the ghost of terrible managerial appointments past.

Moyes’ first home game of his United reign was against Mourinho’s Chelsea, but Boxing Day 2016 saw them face off against each other in more appropriate technical areas.

The Portuguese, a serial winner with one of the biggest personalities in the game in charge of United, and Moyes in charge of an opposition who put up a decent fight but were utterly outclassed.

Fred the Red still loves Moyesey@br_uk pic.twitter.com/YFzw6jBGBf

— Paul Santacast (@UtdRantcast) December 26, 2016

The game will live long in the memories of those who saw it not for that managerial clash—nor for Fred the Red’s polite welcome for Moyes—but for the remarkable moment that was Henrikh Mkhitaryan’s goal, United’s third.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic set the Armenia international up for his moment of magic—for which he was offside, but let’s brush over that inconvenient truth—by slightly underhitting his cross. It meant the ball was behind Mkhitaryan, when it reached him, but that turned out to be a good thing, because he found an otherworldly finish with which to score.

Ibrahimovic had scored a few minutes earlier, tucking home a perfectly weighted through ball from Paul Pogba. The France international had won the ball back from some ineffective Sunderland passing, combining tenacity with a healthy slice of good fortune. He got the pass right and earned his third assist in the Premier League this season—all three for Ibrahimovic.

Paul Pogba has three Premier League assists for Manchester United this season…Pogba > Zlatan > ⚽️Pogba > Zlatan > ⚽️Pogba > Zlatan > ⚽️ pic.twitter.com/gjDTSPsPao

— Bleacher Report UK (@br_uk) December 26, 2016

Pogba’s all-round performance was well worth an assist. Indeed, he was pretty unfortunate not to have more than that. He had eight shots at goal, of which three were saved and two were blocked. Three more were off-target, but a couple of those went close.

There was his glorious dipping volley from just inside the box and a header which went just over the crossbar. Two of the saved shots were more-than-decent efforts, too.

The first was from the edge of the six-yard box. The second was the whipped shot from the edge of the area. He exchanged a one-two with Jesse Lingard, setting him up perfectly for the effort which Jordan Pickford managed to tip on to the post.

His assist was one of two …

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