Gary Neville thinks Marcus Rashford is approaching the “inevitable end” of his Manchester United career after the striker was again left out of the matchday squad on Sunday. The 27-year-old England international will miss a third match in a row as he prepares to face Bournemouth in the Premier League at Old Trafford. The new manager also ruled out Rashford Ruben Amorim for last weekend’s 2-1 win over Manchester City and Thursday’s 4-3 League Cup quarter-final defeat to Tottenham.
Rashford, a product of United’s youth system, told journalist Henry Winter on Tuesday he was “ready for a new challenge and next steps”, with former United and England defender Neville believing there was little that could be done now to stop separation between player and club.
“It’s not big team news anymore,” Neville told Sky Sports shortly before Sunday’s match. “This is something like the norm, a pattern has developed over the last week. It came as a surprise last weekend.
“It gets to the point where you leave him out for three games, something is clearly going wrong or has gone wrong and it doesn’t look good for Marcus’ future at the club or for Manchester United keeping him “
“I suspect it is approaching a point in the journey where it has an inevitable end.”
Neville, now a pundit, added: “It’s a distraction for the manager. It becomes obvious that he may have to leave and that the club wants him to go – it will probably work out for both sides.”
“There are also good examples of players who fought for United…Jadon Sancho went to Chelsea and is doing better, Scott McTominay wasn’t struggling but he went to Napoli and he’s doing well so Marcus might think it’s the right thing for him too.”
Amorim gave reasons for Rashford’s “selection” absence in the previous two matches and did so again on Sunday when the Portuguese coach, speaking before kick-off against the Cherries, said: “It is my decision and it will always be so.”
“This is selection. I want to see the best out of my players and I try different things with different players, so that’s my goal.”
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
Topics mentioned in this article
Leave a comment