Cunha's wild afternoon ends United's losing run

Two down, then chaos

Roma led 2-0 and were cruising, according to Sky Sports, before Rúben Amorim's side tore the game apart in the closing stages. United dragged themselves level and then in front to win 3-2, a result Sky Sports described as a wild comeback and The Athletic called a miraculous one. For a club mired in a ten-game winless run, the manner of it matters almost as much as the three points.

Cunha's afternoon

Matheus Cunha scored twice in the late stages to turn the game, the decisive contribution in a collapse Roma will not want to watch back. The Brazilian forward then picked up a red card in the same spell, according to The Athletic, capping an afternoon that swung from frustration to inspiration to controversy inside a few manic minutes. United finished the game a man down and somehow still saw it out.

It is exactly the kind of individual moment United have been short of during their slump, a forward dragging his side out of trouble when the easier path was to disappear into it.

Why the run of form made this different

United sit 13th in the Premier League with seven points from seven games, a record of one win, four draws and two losses that has had Amorim under real pressure. A ten-game winless run across competitions, as reported by Sky Sports, had turned Old Trafford into an uneasy place to be on matchdays. Going 2-0 down to Roma in front of your own fans is usually the moment a crisis gets worse, not better.

Instead, United found a response that had been missing for weeks. Whatever Amorim said or changed at half-time or in the warm-up to the collapse, the players delivered something they had not managed in ten attempts: a win, and a dramatic one at that.

What it means now

One result does not fix a league position or erase a ten-game run, and United still have plenty to prove in the weeks ahead. But a 3-2 comeback against a European side, driven by a two-goal, one-red-card afternoon from Matheus Cunha, is the kind of night a struggling dressing room can point back to when things get difficult again.