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Manchester United returned to the Premier League after the FIFA World Cup with a thumping 3-0 victory over relegation-threatened Nottingham Forest in their home stadium of Old Trafford on Tuesday (December 28) morning. It was also their first match after Cristiano Ronaldo left the club, and the side looked free of a big burden and played some exciting football.
Key to their performance was Danish midfielder Christian Eriksen, who wanted to respect Ronaldo's legacy by moving on. "First of all we are sad Ronaldo is not part of it. His legacy and his name at any club are special, and for me to be fortunate to play with him in my career was very nice. The football goes on. You feel that the next game after, people will forget what it was like before and now our focus is really like he is not here," Eriksen said.
"The atmosphere is good. We have a lot of people coming back from the World Cup, the last guys are coming back and everyone is coming together," Eriksen added.
Marcus Rashford led the line and was their main orchestrator in attack, scoring the first and assisting the second goal, scored by Anthony Martial. Eriksen was especially appreciative of Rashford. He played very well [against Forest]. Luckily I haven't been on the pitch where he has played a bad game yet," the Dane said.
"I let him continue that. He is looking sharp and confident and you can feel that when he is going forward. You feel that in the stadium and you feel that with him and it is a nice thing and I hope he keeps it going. You can see that he came back [from the World Cup] pretty confident.
"I didn't see as much of his [England] games of course. You guys will have seen more, but he came back in good shape and luckily he has taken that into United. We are in a good place. The start of the season is very different compared to now. Football is different now from the beginning," he added.
