Scott McTominay celebrates

Why Saturday's comeback was historic

Saturday 07 October 2023 18:28

On a weekend where all our thoughts were with Sir Alex Ferguson and family, it was perhaps fitting that Manchester United were involved in a classic comeback at Old Trafford.

Late wins, of course, seemed a regular occurrence under our legendary former manager, particularly during the 1998/99 Treble-winning season.

Teddy Sheringham and Ole Gunnar Solskjaer famously found the net in injury-time at the Nou Camp, as United went from 1-0 down as the board was held up by the fourth official to 2-1 victors - and history-makers - at full-time.

Aside from Barcelona '99, we've all got our favourite United late show, where a couple of goals turn a bad afternoon into a brilliant one.

Think Federico Macheda scoring against Villa to help us to the title in 2009, or Robin van Persie's magnificent hat-trick at Southampton in Sir Alex's final season.

But even under the Scotsman, we didn't manage to win a Premier League game we'd trailed going into injury-time.

Saturday's effort, with Scott McTominay's two strikes proving pivotal, was in fact a unique occurrence for United since the top flight rebranded in 1992.

Our friends over at Opta were the ones to raise that stat and another was trending shortly after.

McTominay is the first player to score two goals in the 90th minute or later of a Premier League game since Steven Bergwijn for Tottenham v Leicester in January 2022.

Those efforts from the Dutchman also saw his side come from behind to win the match, with Spurs prevailing 3-2 on that occasion.

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