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Steffen Schmidt - July 17, 2021
Derby County vs Manchester United
Pre-season Friendly 2021/22,
Date: Sunday, 18 July 2021
Kick-off 13:00 UK/ 14:00 CET
Venue: Pride Park Stadium.
Manchester United begin pre-season campaign on Sunday with a visit to Pride Park Stadium to play Wayne Rooney’s Derby County.
The Red Devils are back in action for the first time after 53 days and a painful loss to Villarreal on penalties in the UEFA Europa League final.
They will open pre-season with the clash against Championship team Derby County away at Pride Park Stadium.
This will also be the first summer test for the hosts who will enter the new Championship season with low ambitions due to the EFL transfer embargo.
The Rams generally barely avoided relegation last season, retaining the second-tier status only in the very last round of the competition.
Derby struggled badly to keep things tight at the back in the finish of the previous league campaign.
They conceded at least two goals in each of the last five Championship outings, including three on the final day against Sheffield Wednesday (a 3-3 draw).
Manchester United should thus have plenty of room to deliver in the final third here, despite missing most of their first-team regulars.
Ole-Gunnar Solskajer can’t count on services of the players who have featured summer tournaments (pretty much his full main XI list).
Manchester United have been much more successful historically, winning 40 and losing 24 of 87 clashes against the Rams.
The two sides last met each other in the last 16 round of the FA Cup in March last year when Manchester United celebrated a 0-3 victory on the road.
The Red Devils won five of the last six encounters with Derby County, netting two or more goals in each of these six games.
This is the first game in the off-season for both teams. The quality is obviously on United’s side despite the limited squad availability for Solskjaer at this stage of the year. However, instead of the outcomes bets, we will rather go for goals as it is very hard to imagine a low-scoring contest with these two outfits involved.
After all, five of the last six head to head outings between the two outfits ended with three or more goals scored. The Over 2.5 goals FT should be a banker bet at the 1.53 odds.
