Confirmed XI: Mazraoui starts at left-back against Fulham; De Ligt & Zirkzee on the bench; Mainoo, Casemiro & Mount in midfield

Manchester United welcome Fulham to Old Trafford for the opening Premier League match of the 2024/25 season. Erik ten Hag’s side will look to overcome the penalty defeat to Manchester City in last weekend’s FA Community Shield at Wembley, which saw Alejandro Garnacho score for United.

United have done well this summer in signing Joshua Zirkzee from Bologna, Leny Yoro from Lille and do far both Matthijs de Ligt and Noussair Mazraoui from Bayern Munich. Yoro will miss the first three months after suffering an injury against Arsenal in pre-season. Which was a massive shame.

Rasmus Hojlund will have support this season from Zirkzee, but the Danish international will also miss the start of the season though injury, but he should be back in September after the first international break of the season, which is not all that bad. It will be great to see him back.

Manchester United

Onana;

Mazraoui, Maguire, Martinez, Dalot;

Casemiro, Mainoo;

Amad, Mount, Rashford;

Fernandes

Substitutes

Bayindir; De Ligt, Evans; Eriksen, McTominay, Collyer; Zirkzee, Garnacho, Antony

Fulham

Leno;

Tete, Diop, Bassey, Robinson;

Lukic, Smith Rowe;

Traore; Pereira, Iwobi;

Muniz

Substitutes

Benda; Cuenca, Castagne; Reed, Wilson, Cairney, King; Jimenez, Stansfield

United will need to start the 2024/24 Premier League season in good form to get points on the board and try to change their fortunes from the start of the season as in the past, this is one of the areas where United have gone wrong. A lot has changed at United this summer, which is a good thing.

Ten Hag has been joined by Ruud van Nistelrooy and Rene Hake as assistant managers and the hierarchy of the club has changed with Sir Jim Ratcliffe overseeing things with Omar Berrada as the CEO, Dan Ashworth as the sporting director and Jason Wilcox as the technical director.

This should give United a better direction with the Glazers no longer holding the club down and footballing men in charge of the footballing decisions. Of course, it is on the pitch where the answers are found and United will need to find them as a new era fresher the air on the trial to glory.

Written by Paul