Marcus Rashford, Mason Greenwood and Juan Mata.

Who is United's most natural finisher?

Monday 19 August 2019 10:39

Manchester United manager Ole Gunnar Solskjaer is working hard on sharpening up his team's shooting skills with strikers Anthony Martial, Marcus Rashford and Mason Greenwood.

The boss believes 17-year-old Greenwood is the most natural of finishers among those exciting forwards but he wants to see more tap-ins and scrappy goals, like the ones the Norwegian regularly contributed during Sir Alex Ferguson's era.

Martial started well in this respect, forcing home Andreas Pereira's cross in the opener against Chelsea, and has acknowledged a need to produce such moments now he is often operating as a centre-forward.

These are the sort of finishes, Anthony Martial's goal against Chelsea, that Ole wants to see more of.

"I guess I have always tended to score quite nice goals and so, if I managed to score more of this kind of goal, in addition to the more spectacular ones, then I’d end up with a much higher goals total come the end of the season," the Frenchman declared in an exclusive interview with our official app.

The signs were certainly positive when United hit four past Chelsea last weekend, showing ruthless efficiency in front of goal, and it could be vital this continues in Monday's tough test on the road at Wolves.

"Anthony's had spells where he's played no.9 or centre forward under Louis van Gaal," said Solskjaer. "Then he's played on the left the last few years. I think him and Marcus are both capable of playing both positions.

"Sometimes, it will be Marcus playing through the middle and Anthony on the left, or Dan James on the left and one of them on the right, but, of course, the goals are scored from between the posts and not the worldies that we've seen them score, both of them.

"Marcus and Anthony, curlers up in the top corner. I want both of them to score the easy goals. You don't have to work too hard to score them, just a little bit of movement. It was a great counter-attack [against Chelsea], great runs by Anthony.

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Mason Greenwood scored on his Under-23s debut at Molineux last season.

"I think maybe he felt he should have got the first pass, which went out wide to Jesse [Lingard] and he stopped. But then, he got himself back in a good position and, even though he might have mis-hit it, it went in. So, if he can get five extra goals like this every season, both of them, that's 10."

When asked which of Anthony and Marcus was the most natural finisher, Ole replied: "Natural finisher? Well, they've still got a way to go, because Mason's more of a natural finisher than those two."

Greenwood scored at Molineux on his Under-23s debut last season so he will be hoping it is a happy hunting ground for him, if he is involved in the big game against Nuno Espirito Santo's side.

Meanwhile, Martial and Rashford are already off the mark for the campaign, with three goals between them, and both looked sharp last time out.

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