Men in the middle strike up solid bond

In Casemiro, Mainoo has the perfect role model to study and learn from

- TYRONE MARSHALL

WHEN Casemiro won his first Champions League title, Kobbie Mainoo was a nine-year-old pupil at Cheadle Catholic Junior School who had just embarked on his tentative first steps to a career in football.

Mainoo joined United that year, but back then making it into the first team at Old Trafford was a pipe dream. But the prodigious midfielder has always had the game and the character to make an impression and by his teenage years, he was earmarked as someone who had more than a fair chance.

That progression has accelerated under Erik ten Hag this season. Mainoo caught the eye of the United manager in pre-season and although his progress was curtailed by an ankle injury, he was immediately restored to the senior set-up when he returned and has now started nine games in a row.

The last three of them have been alongside Casemiro, a five-times Champions League winner and 75-cap Brazil international who knows a thing or two about making it to the top of the game as a midfield player.