Just 170 minutes.
The sum total of Marcus Rashford’s Premier League career so far this season.
Oh, and 90 minutes in the Europa League.
Three games, and already he is being talked of as the player to save Manchester United’s season.
But he’s a bloody teenager for god’s sake, and he didn’t even have a Wikipedia page up until last month.
But the hype train shows no sign of derailing yet. He was only named Manchester United’s player of the month for February.
Two games, four goals and a stunning impact from Marcus Rashford in February – he's the #mufc Player of the Month! pic.twitter.com/oZyDkiRD3m
— Manchester United (@ManUtd) March 3, 2016
There is little doubt that Rashford is the talk of English football right now, but surely Louis van Gaal must be looking around his squad and be wondering what kind of chumps is he working with.
A raw 18 year old who scored twice against Arsenal, has put players worth millions to shame, and therein lies the root of Manchester United’s current terrible form.
Van Gaal may take the credit for introducing him to the first team after just a handful of Under-21 appearances, but the Dutchman has had nothing to do with Rashford’s rise to prominence.
Instead, Rashford’s raw enthusiasm highlights the damage that the Dutchman has inflicted on the once great club.
A player who goes out and is unburdened by van Gaal’s tactical straitjacket, and is still carefree enough to play on instinct, has lit up their campaign in the space of a fortnight.
There is no sideways passing; there is no attempt to play the safe ball. Rashford, with his unfiltered talent, highlights how the club have got it so wrong under the Dutchman.
Would we even know of him if it wasn’t for an injury crisis? Look how the light in Anthony Martial’s eyes has dimmed to a candlelight glow in the few months he has worked with the Dutchman and his staff.
It would be an almighty shame if the same were to happen to Rashford, as the malaise that has afflicted his ‘Walking Dead’ like team-mates.
No Premier League player completed more take-ons last night than Marcus Rashford (5).
Buzzing with confidence. pic.twitter.com/dGaSITjWOk
— Squawka (@Squawka) March 3, 2016
Many United players are clearly afraid of being creative, fearful of breaking the omerta surrounding van Gaal’s tactics. They do not trust him but are condemned to the pedestrian game the ex-Ajax coach loves.
The win over Arsenal last weekend was a typical Manchester United mish-mash, with one individual rising above the morass in which the club currently finds itself.
Even the success over Watford was once again founded on a piece of individual skill – a wonderful free-kick from Juan Mata – that van Gaal seems determined to coach out of players.
Special individuals are struggling to flourish at Old Trafford, but Rashford is a player who must be allowed the freedom to develop and prosper, as well as fail, in his own style.
The concern is, will he be allowed do that at his boyhood club under the current regime.
Rashford was brought into Manchester United in 2005 when the club still believed in youth, still had an academy that was the envy of their City rivals (instead of vice versa) and still had a definable way of playing in 2005. It was speed of thought, it was fleet of foot, and it was beautiful to watch in full flow.
Old Trafford is treated to so few of those moments now that, when they get them, they crack out the champagne and try and pretend that the good times are back.
Rashford may be able to defy gravity for a while, but physics will always catch you in the end.
The club are on a downward spiral unless Rashford and his younger colleagues are allowed do what comes naturally, and that is go against almost everything in any coaching manual.
https://twitter.com/marcus_rashford/status/705365201013477376
The February player of the month award is unlikely to be the last gong the teenager picks up this season, even if calls for his inclusion in England’s Euro 2016 squad are a tad premature.
But any success he derives with not be down to Manchester United’s current manager.
It will not be down to anything to do with his team-mates laborious play.
It will be down to the most thrilling thing in football, unpredictability.
And there’s no coaching that.
