Manchester United's Champions League Ambitions: Sesko's Impact

Manchester United will face far fiercer examinations of their Champions League ambitions than the one Sabah FK offered at Old Trafford. That much felt obvious before a ball was kicked, and even more so by the final whistle.

The Azerbaijani champions looked every inch the weakest of the eight league-stage opponents Michael Carrick’s side are due to meet. Yet the night still delivered something valuable for the United head coach.

It underlined, in bold, that this team simply functions better when Benjamin Sesko starts.

Sesko changes the picture

This was Sesko’s first start since that Liverpool game last March, the afternoon he finally accepted he could not keep playing through the shin problem that had nagged at him for weeks. United had hoped he would be ready for the start of the Premier League season. He wasn’t.

Hull away on the opening day? Second-half substitute. Ipswich and Everton? Same story. Cameos, not centrepiece.

Sabah’s misfortune was to catch him on the night he was finally deemed ready to lead the line again. It showed. Brutally.

At 6ft 5in, the 23-year-old brings a physical edge no other United forward can match. With Amad Diallo sidelined, Carrick has lost the option of using Bryan Mbeumo as a central spearhead, as he did in pre-season. Matheus Cunha has filled the role and has quality, but he plays it on his own terms.

The Brazilian likes to roam. He drops into pockets, pulls wide, comes short. Useful traits, but they leave a hole at the very top of United’s attack. The penalty-box presence disappears, the last line of defence goes unoccupied.

Sesko rips up that problem. He pins defenders back. He doesn’t get brushed off the ball. He runs at people, not away from them.

And crucially, he scores.

At Everton, his sheer size and timing brought a close-range header that should have been the winner, only for Ainsley Maitland-Niles to produce a late thunderbolt. Against Sabah, he again carried that menace. An audacious back-flick in the first half was the warning. The goal was the punishment.

Mbeumo slid a pass in behind, Sesko burst beyond the visiting defence, and everything slowed. One touch to take the ball past the onrushing Stas Pokatilov, then a calm finish into the empty net. No fuss, no panic, just clarity.

“Of course, I’m happy with my goal,” Sesko told TNT. “I saw him rushing out, and it was a great opportunity to take the ball away from him and make the goal a little bit easier.”

United’s issue is not that Mbeumo or Cunha lack that kind of composure. It is that Sesko offers it on top of the aerial power, the running in behind, the sheer physical strain he puts on a back four.

The old cliché about “good control for a big man” feels tired, but players who genuinely combine size, touch and pace remain gold dust.

“He definitely offers a different kind of threat,” Carrick said. “That’s the beauty of it, really. We know what Ben gives us. There’s not many around that kind of give you what Ben does in terms of his physique, his physicality, playing on the last line and his speed to run in behind. He’s a real threat.

“It’s great to have him back at this level after working to get his fitness back. A couple of goals and good performances, and good minutes in him. I’m really pleased with the way he’s gone.”

A derby dilemma

All of which leaves Carrick with a very clear, very big call before Sunday’s derby against Manchester City at Old Trafford.

Does he back Sesko’s fitness and keep him in the side for the biggest domestic test of the season so far? Or does he step back to the safer ground of Cunha, especially with no sign that Amad is close to returning?

On the evidence of this performance, Sesko has to start.

If Carrick agrees, the next question lands on the left flank. Cunha, who opened the scoring against Sabah, or Marcus Rashford, who did not get on the pitch?

Rashford’s numbers since returning from last season’s loan at Barcelona are stark: no goals, no assists. The output is missing. The threat is not. His pace and direct running have consistently stretched teams, even without an end product.

Cunha, by contrast, often wanders into the same spaces as Bruno Fernandes. Two creative hubs, one area of the pitch. It can look pretty, but it can also clog United’s structure. With Rashford wide and Fernandes central, the shapes and lanes feel cleaner.

Carrick knows it. Whether he acts on it is another matter.

“It’s not an easy decision, of course it’s not,” he said of his selection choices. “But it’s definitely one I’d prefer: to have goals in the team and for the boys to be playing well.

The understanding they all have is that sometimes it’s going to be a start, sometimes it’s going to be finishing the game. We need that within the group, from game to game over the season, to be able to call upon slightly different kind of things at different times.

“It’s fantastic they’re all in good form and started so well.”

Sabah FK will not define United’s season. Manchester City might. Carrick now knows exactly what Sesko brings when he leads the line from the first whistle. The question is simple, and it’s coming fast: is he bold enough to unleash that against the champions?