Lindelof buoyed by strength of United bench

While many were forecasting a difficult afternoon for United at Old Trafford, two early goals set the tone for a thoroughly convincing victory against the entertaining Elland Road outfit.

Ole is carefully managing the minutes of his players and has already hinted Lindelof and his regular central defensive partner Harry Maguire may need resting at some point.

Lindelof scored one of the goals against Leeds, his first of the season, when netting after Anthony Martial helped on a Luke Shaw corner. Afterwards, he spoke to MUTV's Stewart Gardner and highlighted the ability on the bench, with nine substitutes allowed for the first time this season in the Premier League.  

Dean Henderson, Eric Bailly, Alex Telles, Juan Mata, Nemanja Matic, Paul Pogba, Donny van de Beek, Edinson Cavani and Mason Greenwood were those who watched the lightning start by the XI on duty.

The resounding win took United up to third place in the table ahead of the numerous tests to come.

"Obviously, it's always like that [confidence is high] when you win games of football," he said. "It gives you confidence. We're on a good run now, we've been performing good on the pitch, so hopefully we can just keep on going because we know, in this period, there's a lot of games. We have to recover well and be ready because some important games are coming up.

"Of course, that also shows the depth in the squad," Lindelof said when asked about the bench. "That's very important during this period. Like I said, games are coming up quick and I don't think every player is able to play every minute of every game so that's very important for us to have players who, if they didn't play today, are ready for the next game."

UNITED'S REMAINING FIXTURES OF 2020

Wed 23 Dec: Everton (A) 20:00 GMT
Sat 26 Dec: Leicester (A) 12:30 GMT
Tue 29 Dec: Wolves (H) 20:00 GMT