📅 September 3, 2026

Our United XI at Everton: Sesko Starts, Bruno Drops Deeper, and Rashford Gets a Winger at Right-Back

By Mav Jones · Manchester United fan writer

Everton away is a different problem from Ipswich at home, and the eleven should change with it. This is the side we’d send out at Hill Dickinson Stadium on Sunday, and the short version of why: Benjamin Sesko starts, Bruno Fernandes plays as an eight rather than a ten, and Marcus Rashford spends the afternoon running at a right-back who was a winger two months ago.

United (4-3-3): Lammens; Dalot, Maguire, Martínez, Shaw; Tielemans, Fernandes, Mainoo; Mbeumo, Sesko, Rashford.

That’s one change in personnel from the side that beat Ipswich 5-2, Sesko for Matheus Cunha, and one change of formation, a midfield three in place of the 4-2-3-1. Both come from reading Everton, so start there.

Update, Sunday: The confirmed line-ups are in. Carrick kept the Ipswich eleven, so Cunha starts and Sesko is on the bench.

What Everton are now

David Moyes has four points from two games, which is one more than United, and he got them the way he tends to. Everton beat Crystal Palace 2-0 on the opening day at Hill Dickinson, Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall from range on 42 minutes and Thierno Barry heading in an Iliman Ndiaye cross on 53. A week later at Bournemouth they were second best for long spells, went behind to Alex Scott on 41, and took a point when James Tarkowski scored from a corner in the 91st minute.

Then the window shut on them. Ndiaye, who made the Barry goal and was their most dangerous forward, went to Manchester City on deadline day for £60m plus add-ons. Beto went to Fiorentina the same day. A £40m move for Folarin Balogun from Monaco was reported to have collapsed on a medical, so the replacement never arrived. Barry, 23, is the one recognised senior centre-forward left. Nathan Patterson also left, which matters for reasons we’ll get to.

What came in is a midfield: Hayden Hackney from Middlesbrough, Christian Nørgaard from Arsenal, Merlin Röhl from Freiburg, Brennan Johnson in a swap that sent Dwight McNeil to Palace, Tyrique George from Chelsea, and Jack Grealish back on loan from City for a second season, confirmed on Tuesday. Grealish hasn’t played yet. He will.

The system is the one Moyes has used since he came back: a 4-2-3-1 with Dewsbury-Hall roving behind the striker, which drops into a compact 4-4-2 without the ball. Last season Everton’s play tilted hard to the left, where Dewsbury-Hall and Grealish combined, and their best route to goal was a dead ball. Through the first five matchweeks of 2025/26 they led the Premier League for shots from set plays, with 28 for 3.17 expected goals, most of them from Dewsbury-Hall’s left foot into a crowded six-yard box. Tarkowski’s equaliser on Saturday came from exactly that source.

Why Sesko, and why not Cunha

Cunha as a false nine was the right pick against Ipswich, and we said so after arguing the opposite before kick-off. Ipswich pressed high and turned better than one in five of those turnovers into shots, so the game was won in midfield, and a forward who drops into midfield won it.

Everton aren’t that side. They defend in a compact block with two lines of four, and Tarkowski and Jarrad Branthwaite are as good a centre-back pairing in the air as United will face before Christmas. A false nine against that block gives you three forwards who all want the ball to feet in the space that Moyes has already filled. What beats a block is a runner who makes the centre-backs turn, and a body in the box when the ball goes wide.

There’s a template for it, and United wrote it at the same ground in February. The only goal of a tight game came on 71 minutes: Cunha’s long pass from his own half isolated Bryan Mbeumo against Michael Keane, Mbeumo went past him, and squared for Sesko to finish. That’s the move, and it needs Sesko in the box at the end of it rather than Cunha drifting out of it.

The second reason is at the other end. Everton’s threat is a delivery into a crowded six-yard box, and Sesko is six foot five. Hull scored twice from set pieces against United a fortnight ago. Adding the tallest player in the squad to the defensive wall at corners isn’t a small consideration when the opponent’s best route to goal is a corner. Cunha becomes the change on the hour if the game is stuck, which reverses the Ipswich plan rather than repeating it.

Why a three, and why Bruno plays as an eight

Against a 4-4-2 block, a number ten is the easiest player on the pitch to find. He’s standing between the lines, and both members of Everton’s pivot, Harrison Armstrong and James Garner, know where he is. Move Fernandes to the left of a midfield three and he starts deeper, arrives later, and Everton have to decide whether a central midfielder follows him out of the block. Every time one does, a gap opens for Kobbie Mainoo to take the ball on the half-turn.

The other job in that three belongs to Youri Tielemans, and it’s the one he’s for. Everton will sit compact on the side of the ball, which is what a compact block does. The way to move it is the long diagonal, and Tielemans is the best switcher of play in the squad. Where that switch goes is the point of the whole selection.

The matchup: Rashford against a winger at right-back

Everton have spent the summer looking for a right-back and haven’t found one. Seamus Coleman’s long run at the club is over, Patterson has gone, and Moyes has said publicly that the club bid for several without landing any. His answer in both league games so far has been Röhl, a right-winger by trade, and Moyes praised his pre-season performances there before the season started.

That’s the one-against-one. Rashford started on the left against Ipswich because the man at right-back was a converted centre-back, and the logic is stronger this week, because the man at right-back is a converted winger. Röhl will attack well and defend late. The Tielemans diagonal lands on Rashford’s side, Rashford runs at a player learning the position, and the ball ends up in a box that Sesko occupies.

The cost is the other flank. Grealish, once he plays, or George until he does, will come at Diogo Dalot down United’s right, with Dewsbury-Hall inside him. Dalot has the hardest defensive job on the pitch for the second week running, and Mbeumo holding width in front of him is what keeps Vitaliy Mykolenko honest.

The risk we’d be lying about if we skipped it

Set pieces. United conceded two from dead balls at Hull with 72 per cent of the ball, and Everton’s whole attacking case, with Ndiaye gone, is Dewsbury-Hall’s delivery and a crowd of bodies at the near post. Tarkowski, Branthwaite and Jake O’Brien all attack the ball, Barry attacks the near post, and Pickford’s kicking gets them up the pitch to win the corners in the first place.

Two things follow for United. Don’t give away the free-kicks: Tielemans conceded the one Hull scored from, and against this side a foul 30 yards out is a chance. And defend the first contact rather than the second. The Everton goal on Saturday came from a corner that was only half cleared.

Team news

United. Mason Mount is back in full training after the foot knock that kept him out of the Ipswich game, and is available. Amad Diallo is out until around the Tottenham game on 10 October. Carlos Baleba is targeting the Brighton cup tie on 16 September for his debut. Matthijs de Ligt is late October at the earliest after back surgery, and Manuel Ugarte is months away after his knee. No defenders arrived in the window, so Luke Shaw remains the only senior left-back, and the bench options at the back are what they were in August.

Everton. Nørgaard missed the opening day with a muscle injury. Grealish is registered but hasn’t featured since returning. Ndiaye and Beto have gone, Balogun didn’t arrive, and the striker cover behind Barry is whatever Moyes improvises.

How it goes

Everton will have less of the ball and won’t mind. The game will be decided by whether United can get Rashford isolated on Röhl before Everton win their first corner, and by whether the first goal comes from open play or a dead ball. United have scored five in two games, four of them from open play, and both goals they conceded at Hull came from set pieces. Everton have scored three, and two of them came from a set piece or a cross into the six-yard box.

We’d take 2-1 United, Sesko scoring at the ground where he scored the winner last time, and a nervous last ten minutes because of a corner.

Kick-off is Sunday 6 September at 2pm UK, which is 9 AM Eastern, 8 AM Central and 6 AM on the west coast. The full list of kick-offs converted to Eastern is on the schedule page, which US service carries which competition is in the watch guide, and the table updates after the matchweek.

Follow-up, 3 September: the window is shut, Sunday isn’t: the case for feeling good about Everton.

Corrected 3 September: an earlier version said United had scored six from open play in two games and conceded three of four from set pieces. The correct figures are five goals, four from open play, with both Hull goals from set pieces. Sources: ESPN — Everton 0-1 Manchester United, 23 Feb 2026, and Iliman Ndiaye joins Man City from Everton (Sep 2026); Fiorentina official site — Beto is a Fiorentina player (1 Sep 2026); Sports Mole — Everton summer transfers 2026 (updated 2 Sep 2026); VAVEL — Everton 2-0 Crystal Palace (22 Aug 2026) and Bournemouth 1-1 Everton (29 Aug 2026); Sky Sports — Bournemouth v Everton starting line-ups (29 Aug 2026); Premier League — Analysis: Dewsbury-Hall at the centre of Moyes’ Everton evolution (29 Sep 2025); ToffeeWeb — Moyes discusses Everton’s right-back search; Yahoo Sports — Everton on transfer deadline day (Sep 2026) and Man Utd injury latest v Everton (1 Sep 2026); Premier League — What’s new for 2025/26: the 62nd stadium.