Manchester United 2-0 Nottingham Forest: 5 things learned as Reds progress to Carabao Cup final

Manchester United progressed to the Carabao Cup final after their second leg victory against Nottingham Forest at Old Trafford on Wednesday evening, which saw Anthony Martial and Fred score the goals in a 2-0 win.

That followed the 3-0 victory last week at The City Ground and means that Erik ten Hag’s side will face Newcastle in the final of the competition later this month.

Here are five things that UtdDistrict learned in this fixture.

Ten Hag will not change his ways

There has been much criticism online about Ten Hag’s resistance to rotating his team. That happened again when he decided to start another strong side in the second leg of this game, in which The Reds already had a three-goal lead in.

However, the manager has already clarified that he values the chance to have his first-team players gel more and more by playing more games together. It doesn’t seem like he will change despite a busy schedule and there will be key players in most of those fixtures.

But there are still worries…

Saying that… there are still worries. Especially in this game as multiple players scared fans, and likely Ten Hag, when they went down; most notably Raphael Varane in the first half.

Thankfully, there were no injuries and Ten Hag’s players came out unscathed. That might not be the case for future games; as shown against Reading for Christian Eriksen’s injury.

Being able to use five substitutes is a positive, of course. But the squad management will be such a difficult task for the manager in this upcoming month.

United are not allowed penalties

Who knows when United will be awarded their next penalty? It seemed certain to happen when Wout Weghorst received a kick to his shin after pickpocketing Scott McKenna. VAR somehow decided it was not a ‘clear and obvious’ error from Peter Bankes.

Thankfully, the decision came when United were already 3-0 up in the tie. It does not make it any less of a ridiculous decision, however.

It seems to be a weekly occurrence now. And due to the fact that The Reds were awarded one favourable VAR decision against Manchester City, it seems that everyone is turning a blind eye.

Sancho back. New position?

The largest roar of the night came at the full-time whistle. The second largest came when Jadon Sancho came onto the pitch.

The 22-year-old returned to the team for the first time since October after completing an individual training camp. He is back and it’s a big boost for United.

Interestingly, when he came on, Sancho was positioned as the number 10 with Bruno Fernandes moving to the right wing.

This could be something that we see more often, with Sancho’s skillset suiting the position. For United’s second he played the ball wide to Fernandes, who crossed into Rashford to play across for Fred to score.

Martial back and bags a goal

Weghorst impressed during his cameo but was replaced by the returning Martial, who scored on his return to the side.

The frustrations of the Frenchman have been apparent this season. Great when he has played but it hasn’t happened enough.

But it was important for him to slot the chance away to give United the lead and it can hopefully be a kickstart to a good patch of form for the striker. That would be a huge boost for the upcoming weeks.