The word friendly might not be in Lisandro Martinez’s vocabulary after a crunching tackle on Bukayo Saka in a pre-season match.
Manchester United took on Arsenal in front of an 82,500-capacity crowd at the MetLife Stadium in New Jersey on Saturday night, and won 2-0 thanks to Bruno Fernandes and Jadon Sancho.
Martinez spared no prisoners and wiped Saka out
He stood over the England international
And while the match was billed as a friendly, Martinez clearly did not get the memo as he wiped Saka out in the first-half.
Despite the Gunners star being in a fairly safe position, the centre-back lived up to his ‘Butcher’ moniker by scything him down in a forceful challenge.
It led to a furious reaction from the Arsenal players, who raced in to protect Saka.
Odegaard, the captain of the Gunners, even confronted Martinez, who did not back down and stared at the Norwegian.
Even though there was a brief eruption of rage, things soon calmed down, but there is still no love lost between these two former enemies.
And it demonstrated that United was up for this friendly after sprinting out to an early two-goal lead.
Bruno Fernandes had opened the scoring after an error from Aaron Ramsdale when the Portuguese midfielder took a pot shot from distance.
The Gunners goalie got a glove to it but it was not strong enough as the ball squirmed through his hands.
Odegaard arrived to defend his teammate but Martinez was not backing down
When Gabriel Magalhaes botched a routine ball over the top, Mikel Arteta’s team faced even more difficulties.
When the Brazilian missed the ball, Jadon Sancho was free to sprint in the direction of the goal.
The forward outran Gabriel, but there was still work to be done as he sent a shot from a small angle high into the net.
Ramsdale was once more defeated with ease because he failed to protect himself or his near station.
