There has been a peculiar swirl of noises off around Anthony Martial ever since his arrival in England. Overpriced they said: at first – but not for long. A centre-forward in waiting. A man unfairly shackled to his touchline, emblem of the stubbornness of late Louis van Gaal.
Throughout Martial has remained oddly untouched, a still centre at the heart of various overlapping weather fronts. United’s season has lurched and dwindled around him. Martial’s striking partners have come and gone, the system revolving around its most constant peg on the left of that shifting attack.
Against Everton at Wembley Martial won this semi-final by simply doing what he has all season, providing a relentlessly challenging, suffocating presence from the left, always looking to veer in behind, gliding about with his head up ready to punish any moment of slackness, any pocket of untended space.
Martial scored his 13th goal of the season here at the death to complete a 2-1 win, and made the first for Marouane Fellaini in the first half. In between he was an elegantly surging presence whenever the ball arrived at his feet, even as United’s performance, like their season, waxed and waned around him.
In truth Martial’s winner was a rescue act in may ways. Once again United had some compelling periods against an Everton side who played like reanimated cadavers for the first 45 minutes but then roused themselves after the break and might easily have won the game. Romelu Lukaku’s missed penalty was a reminder of the fine margins on these occasions.
Indeed, had Everton taken their chances it might have been tempting again to reflect on Van Gaal’s tendency towards positional fudge, pieces slotted into jangling, oddly-shaped holes. The sight of Wayne Rooney playing in central midfield and Marouane Fellaini, Jesse Lingard and Martial as a revolving attacking press behind Marcus Rashford might have drawn some familiar reflexive jeers of frustration had United not started so well.
On a clear, cold, sunny day, with the competing roars of genuine Cup-flavoured excitement barrelling around the ends of this steeply-banked steel and concrete bowl, the most notable innovation was Rooney once again playing in a deeper role. He did something amazing almost straight away, as Everton broke with speed and power from a United corner. Lukaku scampered in on goal, took a heavy touch, rounded David de Gea, dinked the ball goalwards, wheeled away to celebrate and stopped as – hang on – Rooney hurtled back to head off the line. It was a wonderful clearance, first for its athleticism, Rooney ending tangled up in the side netting, but above all for the intelligence, the certainty required to hare back from the other end and get there in time.
There have been so many chapters to Rooney’s career in between his emergence at Everton – in the excitable popular imagination at least – as a kind of foundling genius, some man-child dustbin footballer discovered living in a burrow in Croxteth.
His snap and spring have receded now. He remains a very clever, well-seasoned footballer, even in a role that has never totally suited, but which was, here, a partial success. For a while he was everywhere, at the hub of everything, changing the tempo, passing long and short.
It must be said, it hardly requires Graeme Souness levels of midfield craft and power to produce a dominant performance against a below-par Darron Gibson. Plus United had an overload in that area, with all five front players intruding into the centre. At one point in that early spell three United players robbed Ross Barkley on the edge of his area, Rooney among them, closing in like a pack of Corgis dismembering a squirrel.
That initial period of fluency lasted half an hour. Just as it seemed to be ebbing a little United scored. It came from Martial, as it always seemed likely to. As Rashford laid the ball back to Martial he simply glided away through the channel of space offered by Muhamed Besic, cut back from close to the post and saw Fellaini’s slightly bobbled finish drift into the net past Joel Robles.
At which point the plates began to shift a little. As Rooney faded, United’s midfield was a little overrun at times as Barkley came to the fore. So it fell to Martial, the best player on the pitch, to provide the decisive moment. There has been a concerted social media howl around Van Gaal’s refusal to play Martial as a centre-forward. This has always seemed odd, the idea your best player must play at centre-forward oddly blunt, a piece of primary school logic.
Beyond that Martial is simply a settled, compelling force as a wide attacker. This is United’s one genuinely A-list point of strength right now. He is a perfect fit there, utterly comfortable with the ball at his feet gliding both ways from the touchline. Not changing any of this, leaving him to simmer and spark and provide a relentless stream of menace is an excellent piece of non-tinkering from Van Gaal.
Fittingly enough Martial scored the winner from the centre-forward position, albeit this tells you little about the goal, which started with his run from a deep left-flank position. Martial covered 40 yards at a full sprint, then had the poise to take the ball away from John Stones and sidefoot home with surprising power, a man, not for the first time, in exactly the right position.
