Anthony Martial\u2019s Manchester United story began with promise and ended with a sharp fall. When he arrived from Monaco in the summer of 2015, he was a surprise headline signing and a forward few outside France knew well. Yet the club paid heavily for his potential, with one add-on even linked to a Ballon d\u2019Or win.<\/p>\n
His background suggested a player built for the highest level. Born in the suburbs of Paris, Martial started out at Les Ulis before moving to Lyon at 14. He made his senior debut shortly after turning 17, then joined Monaco seven months later. In the principality, he progressed from the B team to the first team and eventually delivered 12 goals in 48 appearances in his second season.<\/p>\n
United\u2019s faith looked justified almost immediately. Martial scored on his debut against Liverpool with a solo run from the left, then followed that with two goals against Southampton. He also struck a stoppage-time winner against Everton in the FA Cup semifinal, helping set up the club\u2019s first major trophy since Sir Alex Ferguson retired. That first campaign finished with 11 Premier League goals and 17 in all competitions.<\/p>\n
But his role changed when new competition arrived. Zlatan Ibrahimovi\u0107 took his No. 9 shirt, and later Romelu Lukaku pushed him further from the centre of the attack. Martial had his moments, but his numbers fluctuated and his starts often gave way to substitute appearances.<\/p>\n
There was a bright spell in 2019-20 under Ole Gunnar Solskj\u00e6r. Used centrally, Martial produced 23 goals in all competitions and looked as though he had finally found the right platform. Instead, that proved to be his peak. His output dropped sharply afterwards, with injuries, fitness problems and a red card interrupting his rhythm.<\/p>\n
Martial\u2019s final United years brought a loan spell at Sevilla, where he failed to score in nine La Liga appearances, before his contract ended in 2024. Across his best two seasons at the club, he scored 40 goals in 97 matches, but his last four years produced only 19 in 95. A free transfer to AEK Athens brought seven goals in 16 Super League Greece appearances, though the limited number of games underlined how far his career had drifted.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Martial\u2019s United rise, role changes, injuries and release left a career that never matched its early promise.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":18329,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[991,1083],"tags":[1836,992,1974],"class_list":["post-18330","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-aek-athens","category-man-utd","tag-2026-27-premier-league","tag-anthony-martial","tag-louis-van-gaal"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18330","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=18330"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18330\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18329"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18330"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18330"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18330"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}