Manchester United vs FC Midtjylland. UEFA Europa League Knockout Play-offs.
Old TraffordAttendance58,609.
6-3
Thursday 25 February 2016 19:52, UK
Manchester United will again be without goalkeeper David de Gea for the second leg of their Europa League last-32 tie with FC Midtjylland.
The Spain international was injured in the warm up ahead of the first leg in Denmark and misses out again having failed to sufficiently recover from that knee problem.
Louis van Gaal's side slipped to a 2-1 defeat last Thursday, meaning either a 1-0 win or victory by two clear goals will see them progress.
United recovered from that first-leg defeat to beat League One Shrewsbury 3-0 in the FA Cup on Monday, while Midtjylland have had a full week to recover and prepare for the game at Old Trafford with the Danish Superliga only returning after its winter break this weekend.
Team news
Chris Smalling will be assessed after sustaining a knock colliding with an advertising hoarding at Shrewsbury.
Cameron Borthwick-Jackson and Will Keane are other doubts after sustaining knocks in Monday's FA Cup tie, while Antonio Valencia (ankle) and Adnan Januzaj (cup-tied) trained with the squad on the eve of the game but will miss out.
Donald Love comes back into contention and the returning Marcos Rojo could play 20 minutes, but Wayne Rooney (knee), Marouane Fellaini (muscle injury) and Matteo Darmian (shoulder) are out, as are Phil Jones, Luke Shaw, Ashley Young and Bastian Schweinsteiger.
Opta stats
Midtylland are unbeaten on both their visits to England (W1 D1), winning on their only previous visit to Manchester (Man City 0-1 Midtylland).
Manchester United have racked up 10 goals in the three home matches played against Danish opposition in European competition, winning two and drawing the other.
The Danish outfit are now unbeaten in three games against English sides (W2 D1), winning each of the last two fixtures.
Manchester United last reversed a 1-2 first leg defeat in the 2007 Champions League Quarter-finals against Roma, by winning the second leg 7-1 at Old Trafford.
Midtjylland have lost their last two away clashes in Europe and have failed to score while conceding six goals.
United have won seven of the last nine home matches in Europe (D2), last losing at home in Europe back in March 2013 against Real Madrid.
Charlie's predictions
We had the debate on Soccer Saturday about Manchester United and what they are doing. What will they do with Louis van Gaal? Would replacing him with Ryan Giggs really give them a lift?
What we do know is they need wins and this is another must-win for LVG. Then there's Arsenal on Sunday where they can keep their top-four hopes alive.
They've obviously got a lot of injuries and we're at a stage where they've just got to win this to keep their reputation in tact after the humiliation of last week.
There's got to be a lot of anger in that United side and I'm expecting them to respond sufficiently to qualify.
Charlie predicts: 2-0 and Anthony Martial to score first (13/1 with Sky Bet)
Betting
United are 2/7 with Sky Bet to bounce back from their first-leg defeat in Midtjylland and qualify for the last 16 of the Europa League. The Danes are 12/1 to win at Old Trafford and 5/2 to dump the three-time Champions League winners out of the competition.
The Red Devils are available at 21/10 to win on the night with both teams scoring, but Sky Sports pundits Jamie Redknapp and Charlie Nicholas don't expect any upsets and both are tipping the hosts to win 2-0. Check out all the odds here.
