The encouraging signs were seeing Pogba playing closer to goal with Matic behind him and a solid half for Mkhitaryan. Lukaku, though, has disappointed me so far. He is faster than Ibra but I think skill-wise he's a significant step down from him. When Lukaku has his back to goal or is in a tight area, I don't have the feeling that he can create a goal-scoring opportunity out of nothing like Ibra so often did. I think Jose should be looking at, someway and somehow, using 4-3-3 so that Lukaku has the runners to create space for him. If we continue having a single man up top, we'll run into the same kinds of problems as Ibra where he's either getting no service or he keeps dropping deep to help us get forward.
I've had the nagging feeling that we'll again be struggling for goals, even though we have players for a very good attack. The one goal we scored yesterday, for example, was when Sampdoria had players forward for a free kick taken in our box, which is very rare. It was a nice counterattack - Valencia and Darmian both made decisive plays - but it came out of an odd moment in the game. This has been an ongoing pattern - we seem to nick goals when the opposition makes a bad mistake or we're able to get it onto Fellaini's head. We just can't seem to create goals with the opposition in front of us.
The second half was poor until the last 15 minutes or so, even taking into account the many changes (and Sampdoria keeping all 11 out from the 1st half). Our passing was all over the place and we had trouble just holding onto the ball. Herrera was unlucky in hitting the post but for much of the half he looked lost. Fellaini, Tuanzebe, and Joel Pereira were about the only ones who played well. Even Mata was nondescript before scoring.
Outside of the goal, we were okay defensively. Lindelof, though, I am concerned about. CBs especially need time to settle into a new team but he looks overawed by the task ahead and is not even getting the basics right. He might develop into a very good player for us but you wonder how many points he might cost us early in the season. I also don't think making him one of the CBs in a 3 will do him any favors, as he won't have the support of a FB in a back 4.
So I guess the big element of the day - Matic. Mkhitaryan MOTM.