Fred: Manchester United’s last hope in the absence of Pogba and Herrera

Manchester United have a mountain to climb in order to qualify for the quarter finals of the Champions League. The Red Devils travel to the French capital to take on PSG after losing the first leg 2-0 at Old Trafford. The return leg may be worse as Lingard, Martial, Mata, Herrera, and Matic are out injured and Paul Pogba picked up a red card that will see him miss the return leg. Now may be the time for Fred to step up and prove his worth. 

The Champions League is a competition that means a lot to Brazilian star Fred. He spoke glowingly about it earlier this season and as a Shakhtar Donetsk player it was the stage that allowed his talents to shine, and that first alerted the queue of clubs that wanted to sign him this summer. It’s worth remembering in the fallout to his fairly calamitous first season at Old Trafford that United weren’t the only ones beating a path to the Ukraine this summer. Pep Guardiola wanted Fred at Manchester City, too.

When Manchester United and City were scouting Fred they were unlikely to be drawing too many conclusions from his performances domestically against such illustrious names as Veres Rivne, Chornomorets Odesa and Stal Dniprodzerzhynsk. Instead he was being judged on his performances in Europe’s leading club competition, on how he fared against Manchester City, Napoli and Roma last season, or Paris Saint-Germain and Real Madrid in 2015/16.

This was the competition that catapulted Fred towards the clutches of Manchester United and Manchester City, with the midfielder eventually opting for Old Trafford. His final goal for Shakhtar came against Roma in the last-16 last season. Before joining United the 25-year-old had made 30 Champions League appearances for Shakhtar, beginning against Real Sociedad. 

“It was sensational. We used to play the Champions League video game, so to be able to play in the competition with Shakhtar, to listen to that famous music, this time in the stadium… for me, it was an amazing feeling,” he said of his debut when recalling it earlier this season. “It brings back all the memories from when I started, all the help my family gave me when I was growing up. To be able to play in the Champions League made me really happy – even happier because we won that match.”

This week Fred will almost certainly make his fourth Champions League appearance for United. Having moved to Old Trafford for £52million in the summer he’d have expected to have a far bigger impact in his first season, while United fans certainly expected more as well. He hasn’t completed 90 minutes since August and his Champions League group stage appearances home and away against Young Boys and in the dead rubber at Valencia amounted to just 190 minutes of action.

But as United plot the most unlikely of comebacks in Paris this week, Ole Gunnar Solskjaer will almost certainly have to turn to Fred in the Parc des Princes. With Paul Pogba suspended and Nemanja Matic and Ander Herrera battling injuries, Fred may be the most experienced member of the United midfield in the French capital on Wednesday night, alongside Scott McTominay and Andreas Pereira.

The pace of the Premier League has been a problem for him so far, but he should be more familiar with a Champions League knockout game, even if United are up against it in Paris. If McTominay will be asked to anchor the midfield against the runaway Ligue 1 leaders, it will be down to Fred and Pereira to try and influence the game going forward and provide service to United’s attackers.
The Brazilian will know United fans haven’t seen anywhere near his best in his first season at the club. With responsibility on his shoulders against PSG, this would be the ideal time to show why the club were happy to spend so much money on him.