Marcus Rashford must stave off sense of anticlimax after Barcelona switch

If Anthony Martial hadn’t been injured in the warm-up, and Manchester United hadn’t already been missing 12 players, Marcus Rashford wouldn’t have played. It hadn’t seemed a particularly significant game: the second leg of a last-32 Europa League tie against Midtjylland on a chilly and cloudy February night. Old Trafford was far from full, the disillusionment that was beginning to stalk Louis van Gaal escalating after a 2-1 first-leg defeat.

It soon got worse for United as Pione Sisto increased Midtjylland’s advantage. An own goal pulled one back only for Juan Mata to miss a penalty before half-time. But Rashford then slammed in a Mata cutback and converted a Guillermo Varela cross with a side-foot volley to give United the lead. They ended up winning 5-1. In the space of 12 second-half minutes, Rashford had been elevated from almost complete unknown to potential messiah, a status he confirmed three days later by scoring two and setting up another in a win over Arsenal. He was 18, Manchester-born, confident but understated. It was almost too perfect.

What then would have seemed a plausible future? What would he have taken had fate offered? One hundred goals for United? Two hundred? A Champions League? Given that was before Gareth Southgate had become England manager, perhaps dreams of winning a major international tournament would have seemed far-fetched, but 20 goals for his country? Thirty?

Yet here we are nine years on, with Rashford unwanted at Old Trafford and joining Barcelona on loan. He has scored 87 league goals for United and picked up two FA Cups, two League Cups and a Europa League. And while he was part of the side that was second at Euro 2020, the achievement is inevitably tainted by the fact that he hit the post with his penalty in the shootout; three inches to the right, it would have been a goal and England would have led the shootout 3-2 with the pressure firmly on Italy.

It’s a perfectly decent career, but there is an unavoidable sense of anticlimax, particularly over the past couple of seasons. Having scored 30 goals in all competitions for United in 2022-23, when he also got three in the World Cup, Rashford has scored just 19 over the past two years, four of them on loan at Aston Villa. He has often looked disaffected, the headlines about his off-field activities switching from his campaign for free meals for children to ill-judged socialising.

Rashford is still only 27, at his notional peak – albeit that players who start early often reach their peaks early (and those who believe in the rule of 500 may note that Rashford reached his 500th career appearance in Villa’s 2-1 win over Nottingham Forest at the beginning of April).

He did enough for Villa to make it at least plausible that his problems are essentially those of Manchester United and that a reset may yet allow him to reach the heights that seemed conceivable a decade ago. There has been little evidence of the sort of physical decline, the loss of acceleration Raheem Sterling has apparently suffered. Yet Villa clearly didn’t see enough in his 10 league appearances for them to exercise their £40m option to buy; even given how close they are pushing the threshold for trouble with the profitability and sustainability rules, it’s hard to avoid at least a slight sense of Rashford failing upwards, rejection from Villa leading to an offer from Barcelona.

That’s assuming Barça are able to find another lever to pull so they can register him. He joins the goalkeeper Joan García in the queue of players Barcelona have signed but have not yet been able to register because of La Liga’s financial regulations. It’s not an uncommon problem at the club and they’ve always found a way. It took the controversial sale of rights to VIP seats for the next 25 years to a Qatari company for Dani Olmo and Pau Víctor to be registered last season. There is less and less future income to sell off. Rashford has agreed to a minimum 15% cut in his £325,000-a-week wages (potentially 25% including bonuses), but that still represents a significant sum even with Barça returning to the refurbished Camp Nou soon.

View image in fullscreen Marcus Rashford’s breakthrough double against Midtjylland seems a long time ago. Photograph: Jon Super/AP

Complicated as Barcelona’s finances are, though, this could, if the issue is essentially clearing his head, be the perfect place for Rashford to recover his form. He’s away from the constant scrutiny of England, which was only heightened as he became a culture-war pawn. The pace and intensity of La Liga are not those of the Premier League. Barcelona play extremely attacking football, scoring 102 league goals last season; Rashford will get opportunities. Raphinha, who spent much of last season swooping in from the left, scored 18 goals.

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Which does perhaps raise the issue of why Barcelona want Rashford. Theirs is not a squad short of attacking players: Olmo, Ferran Torres, Víctor, Pablo Torre, Fermín López, Gavi and Ansu Fati started league games on the left last season, sometimes with Raphinha operating centrally. Fati has been loaned to Monaco and Torre has been sold to Mallorca, yet Barça still targeted a left-sided player this season, and considered Nico Williams and Luis Díaz before settling on Rashford as a (relatively) cut-price option seemingly undeterred by potential registration problems.

Although there is a £26m option to buy, there is no obligation. If it works out, Barcelona get a quick and direct finisher and enhanced squad depth; if not, they can part ways at the end of the season, with nothing lost but a year of wages.

For Rashford, meanwhile, there is real pressure. If this doesn’t work, what is the future for him? Potential can be a terrible curse. It doesn’t matter how good a young Premier League player looks, he is only ever a couple of disappointing seasons from being linked with the Turkish Super Lig or West Ham. When you promise as much as Rashford did in those few days in February 2016, even a very good career can end up suffering the taint of disappointment, however unfair that may be. For Rashford’s career and his legacy, these next few months are vital.

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