United pass clean-sheet landmark at Everton

Alejandro Garnacho was the headline maker, due to his sensational acrobatic effort early on, while goals from Marcus Rashford and Anthony Martial sealed a valuable win at a febrile Goodison Park.

But the Reds had to stand firm at certain stages of the encounter, particularly during a first half where the Toffees were searching hard for an equaliser.

Kobbie Mainoo cleared Dwight McNeil’s effort off the line, while Andre Onana made an excellent stop from Idrissa Gueye just after Rashford had made it 2-0. It was a third successive shutout for the Cameroonian and his defenders, following 1-0 successes over Fulham and Luton Town.

Onana currently sits joint-top of the Premier League’s Golden Glove rankings and his fifth clean sheet of the season helped United pass the landmark on Merseyside, with only Chelsea (476), Liverpool (460) and Arsenal (456) keeping more than 400.

Shutout no.500 occurred in our 1,203rd fixture in the division and only twice have we completed a season without making it into double figures for clean sheets, during the 2018/19 and 2021/22 campaigns.

In the 1994/95 and 2008/09 terms, we stopped the opposition from scoring on 24 occasions, with the latter seeing Edwin van der Sar and his back four go an incredible 14 straight games without being breached.

The bulk of United’s clean sheets are shared by three keepers, with David De Gea leading the way on 147, according to the Premier League.

Peter Schmeichel is next up, with 112, while van der Sar kept opposition forwards at bay on 94 occasions for United.

Fabien Barthez (34), Roy Carroll (26), Tim Howard, Tomasz Kuszczak (both 16), Raimond van der Gouw (12), Mark Bosnich (11) and Anders Lindegaard (9) are also key contributors to the record.

For the completists out there, the following United keepers have also been credited with clean sheets in the Premier League: Ben Foster, Sergio Romero, Gary Walsh, Dean Henderson, Kevin Pilkington, Victor Valdes, Paul Rachubka, Ben Amos and Joel Pereira.