A 3-1 win over Swansea City is hardly the most significant achievement given the Swans’ form this season, but the weekend victory over Bob Bradley’s side ended a four-game winless run for Manchester United. Jose Mourinho’s men had looked a shadow of the side that romped to a 4-1 win over defending champions Leicester at the end of September, their last win before the weekend, before United kicked off November with a bang. The victory at the Liberty Stadium will certainly have come as a welcome reprieve for the 13-time Premier League champions.
It’s fair to say United have looked far from their best in recent weeks after a strong start to the current campaign saw them dubbed one of the early title favourites. Indeed, a 4-0 defeat at Chelsea last month - Mourinho’s first match back at Stamford Bridge following his sacking last December - was the lowest point of a disappointing season so far for the club and manager. It was also one of the four Premier League games Juan Mata has not started this season.
Once Mourinho was named as United boss back in May, it was widely expected that Mata’s time at Old Trafford would come to an end. The Portuguese boss famously sold the pint-sized Spaniard to United in 2014 after a supposed falling out between the two. After coming on in the Community Shield win over Leicester City back in August before being infamously hauled off in the dying embers of the encounter with no apparent injury, it only added fuel to the fire that Mata would be forced to depart for pastures new while the transfer window remained open.
The rest though, as they say, is history. Mata has started seven of the 11 Premier League games this season and scored United’s first top-flight goal of the Mourinho era. The player is yet to end up on the losing side in the seven games he has started, while United have failed to win the four league matches Mata was not included in the starting XI. Yet, there is more to United’s record with and without Mata than meets the eye.
Mourinho has set up his side in a favoured 4-2-3-1 formation this season, with the emphasis on the full-backs to provide width from deep. While Antonio Valencia’s injury means United lose one of their key offensive outlets, his role, coupled with Mata’s insistence on cutting infield, was crucial for United. No defender has completed more crosses than Valencia (12) in the Premier League this season, with Mata opening up space for the winger-turned-right-back to exploit down the flank.
Indeed, Mata is more than capable of carrying the ball infield to help open up opposition defences, highlighted by the fact that of his 10 attempted dribbles in the Premier League this term, only one has been unsuccessful. Furthermore, he is being dispossessed just 0.4 times per league game this season, with Mata’s tidiness on the ball and close control a crucial asset to his all round attacking game. With that, United are more than capable of keeping pressure on opponents in the final third to help improve their chance of netting.
Indeed, it comes as little shock that only Paul Pogba (220) has played more successful final third passes than Mata (155) in the Premier League this season of all United players. Furthermore, a pass success rate of 90.8% is the sixth best in England’s top their term, proving the playmaker is not only capable of retaining possession, but that his distribution in attack - where Mata is expected to be under more pressure - is of the highest standard.
It’s no small shock that United have developed a statistically calculated WhoScored style of play of ‘possession football’ in part due to players of Mata’s ilk, with the player himself boasting a strength of ‘passing’. While he’s not the speediest of outfield players to say the least, Mata’s speed of thought means he is incredibly difficult to rob of possession. His impact this term has seen him emerge as an unlikely star of Mourinho’s United, particularly when considering he was one of a few who could well have been phased out of the side during the summer.
Yet with Mourinho insisting that the full-backs help stretch the opposition and provide the width from deep, Mata’s willingness to drift into space in the middle of the pitch means he is a somewhat ideal player for United. A WhoScored rating of 7.24 is his best in his third full season at the club and the fifth highest of all United regulars this season. Even after a summer of heavy investment, it further highlights just how important Mata has become to the club.
