Michael Carrick\u2019s tactical change has given Bruno Fernandes room to operate in the right-side pocket behind the front line, and the results are clear. Carrick restored United\u2019s skipper to the No. 10 role after a period in Ruben Amorim\u2019s two-man midfield, and Fernandes says the move has altered his positioning. \u201cI float a lot in that zone there now with Michael,\u201d Fernandes reflected in an interview with Opta. \u201cHe doesn\u2019t want me to just be stuck in the middle, so often asks me to find that pocket [of space].”<\/p>\n
That positional freedom has put Fernandes on the cusp of two Premier League landmarks with four matches left in the season. He has 19 assists in 2025\u201326, level with Mesut \u00d6zil on the season charts and one behind the all-time single-season mark of 20 set by Thierry Henry and matched by Kevin De Bruyne in 2019\u201320. No player in the 34-year history of the Premier League has provided more than 20 assists in a single campaign, and Sunday\u2019s derby with Liverpool presents a high-profile chance to close that gap.<\/p>\n
Fernandes showed the shift in focus at Brentford, taking no shots as he concentrated on creating. Eventually, Benjamin \u0160e\u0161ko finished one of the five chances Fernandes created, taking the skipper to 19 assists and a single assist behind the record.<\/p>\n
If Matheus Cunha recovers from a slight hip issue, he is the likeliest direct beneficiary. As Opta note, Cunha has received 19 open-play chances from Fernandes this season\u2014the most chances any player has been provided by a single teammate in the current Premier League campaign.<\/p>\n
There is also a set-piece subplot. United\u2019s No. 8 has set the former Real Madrid man up for six Premier League goals this season\u2014another division high\u2014five of which have come from set pieces. Fernandes sits on 10 set-piece assists, one shy of Steven Gerrard\u2019s top-flight record of 11. The midfielder has worked on dead balls and admits the demands have changed: \u201cI will tell you that five years ago, I would go to take a corner and just put the ball into the middle of the box and let\u2019s see if someone gets it,\u201d he revealed. \u201cAnd nowadays I have to hit a spot, so sometimes it\u2019s even harder to get an assist from a set piece than it actually is in open play.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Fernandes can break two Premier League assist records: season assists (19) and set-piece assists…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13563,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[230,175,179,172],"tags":[1162,317,342],"class_list":["post-13564","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-analytics-stats","category-liverpool","category-manchester-united","category-epl","tag-analytics","tag-benjamin-sesko","tag-bruno-fernandes"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13564","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13564"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13564\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13563"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13564"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13564"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13564"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}