Jose Mourinho oversaw an impressive victory over former club Chelsea as Manchester United did title-chasing Tottenham a massive favour.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The Premier League title race was blown wide open as Ander Herrera scored one and assisted another for Marcus Rashford in Manchester United\u2019s 2-0 win over leaders Chelsea at Old Trafford.<\/p>\n
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Chelsea\u2019s lead over closest rivals Tottenham remains at just four points with six matches to play after Antonio Conte\u2019s men lost for the second time in their last four games.<\/p>\n
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Jose Mourinho made four changes to his side, with Zlatan Ibrahimovic \u2013 described by the manager as \u201cvery tired\u201d \u2013 among the players dropping to the substitutes\u2019 bench.<\/p>\n
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But United made a fast start, Rashford putting them ahead after only seven minutes with a controversial strike after Chelsea had claimed for handball against Herrera in the build-up.<\/p>\n
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The Blues were already without the injured Thibaut Courtois before they lost an unwell Marcos Alonso in the warm-up and were struggling to make an impression before Herrera\u2019s strike deflected in off the wing-back\u2019s replacement, Kurt Zouma, early in the second half.<\/p>\n
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And a subdued Chelsea \u2013 4-0 winners in the reverse fixture \u2013 could not find a way back into the game, failing to register a shot on target, as Mourinho celebrated his first victory over his former side in three attempts since his sacking last season.<\/p>\n
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The win moves United, who are now 22 league games unbeaten, up to fifth, four points behind Manchester City with a game in hand.<\/p>\n
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Rashford, starting up front alongside Jesse Lingard in Ibrahimovic\u2019s absence, had already struck wide from a good opening before he made the early breakthrough, netting for a second league game running.<\/p>\n
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Chelsea were furious that Herrera was not penalised for an apparent handball as he intercepted Nemanja Matic\u2019s pass and the Spain international then sent Rashford racing clear with an excellent throughball, allowing the striker to convert with a cool finish past Asmir Begovic into the far corner.<\/p>\n
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Ashley Young, United\u2019s captain after coming in as one of Mourinho\u2019s alterations, saw his cross-shot only just evade Rashford in the Chelsea box and then fired wide from Paul Pogba\u2019s pass as the hosts\u2019 lightning start continued.<\/p>\n
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Chelsea were frustrated at the other end and did not manage a shot in anger until Diego Costa, who was booked for fouling Pogba before scuffling with Marcos Rojo, finally hit one wide in stoppage time.<\/p>\n
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United doubled their advantage four minutes into the second half, with Herrera \u2013 dismissed in last month\u2019s FA Cup meeting between the sides \u2013 the scorer on this occasion.<\/p>\n
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After initially having a cross blocked by David Luiz, Young dispossessed N\u2019Golo Kante at the corner of Chelsea\u2019s box before being challenged by Zouma. The ball then fell into Herrera\u2019s path and his drive took a huge deflection off the defender to beat Begovic.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
United threatened to run riot as Lingard blasted over from Rashford\u2019s pass, with the striker then firing into the side netting after being set up by Michael Carrick, who had come off the bench for his 450th United appearance.<\/p>\n
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Chelsea, who brought on Cesc Fabregas and Willian for Victor Moses and Matic, saw Pedro shoot off target with one effort and have another attempt deflect wide as David de Gea continued to be unoccupied.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The lively Rashford was denied by a smart Begovic save at his near post after impressively outmuscling David Luiz, with a third United goal looking more likely than a comeback from the visitors.<\/p>\n
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Rashford came off to a standing ovation in the closing stages, Ibrahimovic getting a late run-out as Chelsea were forced to turn their attention to next week\u2019s FA Cup semi-final against in-form rivals Tottenham, a side who represent a huge threat to their league hopes as well.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Jose Mourinho oversaw an impressive victory over former club Chelsea as Manchester United did title-chasing Tottenham a massive favour. The Premier League title race was blown wide open as Ander Herrera scored one and assisted another for Marcus Rashford in Manchester United’s 2-0 win over leaders Chelsea at Old Trafford. Chelsea’s lead over closest rivals Tottenham remains at just four points with six matches to play after Antonio Conte’s men lost for the second time in their last four games. Jose Mourinho made four changes to his<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":6034,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[7],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.banglanewsus.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6033"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.banglanewsus.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.banglanewsus.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.banglanewsus.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.banglanewsus.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6033"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.banglanewsus.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6033\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6035,"href":"https:\/\/www.banglanewsus.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6033\/revisions\/6035"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.banglanewsus.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6034"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.banglanewsus.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6033"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.banglanewsus.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6033"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.banglanewsus.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6033"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}