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Manchester United put in a disappointing opening performance against Wolverhampton Wanderers but still somehow came away with three points.
However, manager Erik ten Hag was clearly not impressed and a lot of work remains to be done and the manager is already working on possible solutions.
In order to give the players who did not play against Wolves game time and work on improving their fitness, United conducted a behind-closed-doors friendly against Everton on Tuesday.
Martial back in action finally
United ended up winning the game that was held at Carrington 2-0 thanks to a first-half own goal while Scott McTominay scored the second in the second half.
As per The Manchester Evening News, Ten Hag gave minutes to the likes of McTominay, Harry Maguire, Donny van de Beek, Hannibal Mejbri, Dan Gore, and Anthony Martial.
The French striker “made his first appearance for Manchester United in 79 days in their behind-closed-doors friendly win against Everton.”
Martial had last played for United in the last league game of the previous campaign against Fulham and while he was supposed to be fit in time for pre-season that ultimately did not prove to be the case.
He was on the bench against Wolves but did not come on and his fitness will be key in the coming weeks as Marcus Rashford struggled up front on his own while new signing Rasmus Hojlund remains injured.
McTominay gets on the scoresheet
McTominay did come on in the game against Wolves but was still used in the friendly and this could be seen as a measure taken by the manager after he saw the midfield get overrun against Wolves.
Hannibal and Gore could still see minutes this season, especially after the disappointing performance from new signing Mason Mount.
The report also mentioned that the Toffees gave game time to the likes of Dominic Calvert-Lewin, Arnaut Danjuma, Jarrad Branthwaite, Ben Godfrey and Vitalii Mykolenko along with several under-21 players.
As pointed out by Samuel Luckhurst, the friendly was the fourth consecutive season United have conducted behind-closed-doors friendlies at the start of the season.
Last season, both Wrexham and Halifax had played in August friendlies while the Red Devils also took on the Merseyside club in December prior to the domestic season’s resumption after the World Cup.