Tahith Chong showed his commitment to Manchester United this week when he signed a new contract.
Now hopefully we are going to start seeing the best out of the youngster. The latest signs are promising.
Chong signed off his previous performance against Club Brugge with an assist for Fred’s second goal of the game.
He played 45 minutes that night at Old Trafford. Again as a substitute in a 5-0 victory, he got 19 minutes this time away at LASK.
Chong added an assist in the win in Austria, setting Mason Greenwood away with a defence splitting pass for the striker to smash the ball into the net.
This means now in the last 64 minutes of first team football, Chong has two assists. That’s pretty good going, and shows why United wanted to keep him.
He’s worth persisting with
Chong is still a work in progress and we saw that last night. He had one driving run into the penalty area and just ran into a defender, bounced off the ball, and was on the turf.
We have seen in many times in his performances this season, he needs to toughen up, get in the gym, and just learn to anticipate movement of first team defenders a little better. That should come with time, and more chances.
What was encouraging was that he was right back at it, minutes later he went on another run and forced a corner.
In the next wave of attack, he was away again on the counter attack and set Greenwood away.
When he has space to run into, Chong is dangerous, and he appears to have the mental resilience he needs to succeed. United will be drilling this into him.
At under-23 level this season Chong has seven goals and seven assists in 10 games.
Often he has looked like a different player for the first team, but now he is threatening to show what he is really capable of.
He is likely to get another start at home to LASK if the tie goes ahead, and the opportunity to build on his recent progress.
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