Pereira: Crowd made me feel like I could run all day

Manchester United thrashed Chelsea 4-0 yesterday with goals from Marcus Rashford, Anthony Martial and new signing Daniel James.

Andreas Pereira set up Martial for the second before being substituted in the second half after feeling the strain of the first competitive game of the season.

Speaking to South China Morning Post, Pereira has reflected on the result and his performance.

I was dead. But the crowd was so loud I felt I could run all day long. I walked around the pitch which was strange as I didn’t know we had to do that, but the crowd applauded me and that made me feel very proud.

I didn’t receive many balls. It was sloppy and nervy. The second half was better. There was more space and I could get free myself into the pockets and I made the assist for the goal.

We made errors and there was tension. We had a good preseason but this was the league, it was the first game we’ve played at Old Trafford and we were playing a big opponent in Chelsea.

The average age of United’s starting line-up was 24 years and 227 days, which is the youngest of any team in the opening game of this season. Pereira discussed Ole doing things “the United way”.

I was confident that I was going to play because I was doing well. The manager has told me that he has the confidence in me to play and that means so much to me. I wanted to show him that he was not wrong. Young players think like this.

We started the game today with five academy players. We had two more on the bench. This is exceptional. This is the United way, the Manchester United DNA. We have a young team, it’s fresh blood and that’s what the club needs to be mixed with the experienced players that we have.