In the 2-2 draw with Southampton FC on Monday night, Ole Gunnar Solskjaer selected the same starting lineup for the fifth game in a row. No Manchester United manager has done that in 27 years.
With three players getting injured in that match, a quick turnaround coming with a trip to Crystal Palace on Thursday, and another quick turnaround coming on the weekend for the FA Cup semifinal against Chelsea, expect OGS to finally do some squad rotation. He gave the usual press conferencisms today, which make it sound like he won’t make a lot of changes, but he definitely has to.
Crystal Palace are in a position in the table where their season is over, and they have indeed played like a team that’s not too interested for most of the restart.
This is a good chance to give a couple key guys a breather.
“The team selection for Thursday is based on Thursday, not Sunday,” Solskjaer said.
“Sunday is irrelevant and does not come into my head at all, just Thursday.There were a couple of doubts before the Southampton game but they all reported fit on the day. There might be one or two fresh legs coming in.”
The Norwegian also gave updates on the injury issues he has at left-back. Luke Shaw and Brandon Williams both went off hurt against Southampton.
“Luke has got a swollen ankle, I’ll give him as much time as possible to recover, it was a twisted ankle,” Solskjaer said.
“Brandon cut up his eye. They were both swollen and I’ll give them as much time as possible to let the swelling to go away.”
Manchester United Starting XI Prediction (4-2-3-1) at Crystal Palace
De Gea; Wan-Bissaka, Lindelof, Maguire, Williams; Pogba, Fred; Lingard, Fernandes, Rashford; Martial.
Manchester United at Crystal Palace FC FYIs
Kickoff: Thurs July 16, 8:15 pm, Selhurst Park
Team news for both sides: go to this link
TV Coverage: NBCSN
Odds: Crystal Palace win 17/2 Draw 15/4 Man United win 4/11
Form Guide: Crystal Palace LLLLL United DWWWW
Prediction: United 2, Crystal Palace 2
With United undefeated in their last 18, across all competitions, and Crystal Palace having been outscored 2-13 in their last five, you’d have to be rather unorthodox to go against the visitors in this one.
Paul M. Banks runs The Sports Bank.net, which is partnered with News Now. Banks, the author of “No, I Can’t Get You Free Tickets: Lessons Learned From a Life in the Sports Media Industry,” regularly contributes to WGN TV, Sports Illustrated, Chicago Now and SB Nation.
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