– If you want to win something, you have to be brave. You don’t win in value competitions by fooling around, but the brave eats the rokan. If England can do that, they will go to the final.
With these words, Urheilu’s expert Juha Rantala evaluates England’s chances in the 11 Friends podcast in the run-up to the European Championships. Kobbie from Mainoo not yet spoken.
The heralded courage has not been seen even a month later – except from the bench. England went wild when Mainoo showed youthful enthusiasm at the end of the group stage.
The player, who turned 19 in the spring, is England’s potential surprise card. The youngster was a surprise choice for the team. He should only be on a study trip, but there are more ingredients.
Back in March, Mainoo was booked on a plane to Azerbaijan. He was supposed to go with England’s under-21s to the European Championship qualifiers.
Got in between Gareth Southgate. The head coach of the men’s national team wanted a teenage player for his own use.
England faced Brazil and Belgium, and Mainoo did not go unnoticed. He came on the field for the last quarter of the match against Brazil and immediately impressed.
Mainoo began to be asked for the starting line-up, and in the second match he already played 74 minutes. He was awarded as the best player of the match.
The same echoes have been heard at the European Championships. Mainoo came on as a substitute for a couple of minutes in England’s opening match against Serbia. At the end of the group stage, he was released at the start of the second half – with convincing results.
– I like him By Declan Rice along with being England’s best midfielder. I see him in the team for at least the next ten years. He brings a quality that has been missing, familiar from Manchester United and England Paul Scholes said during the games.
Heavy words from a 19-year-old. Even more wildly, Scholes thinks Mainoo could get more out of his world-class teammates and change the face of England.
England has been called slow and boring, but Mainoo was anything but. He moved with a wide radius, wanted the ball and was constantly running the game. He manages in small spaces, dares to challenge and utilizes his quick feet and insights.
England won their group, but Mainoo was a startling spark among the stars. They started painting him as a wild card for the next games.
– In a way, you need courage. In the last group game, it came from the bench, new young players. Among them, Mainoo is a potential opening player, Urheilu’s expert Markus Halsti weigh in.
Manchester United has nurtured Mainoo in their academy for ten years. In many ways, Mainoo is his own son.
The scenery of his childhood is a 20-minute drive from Old Trafford stadium. He has worn the club’s colors since he was 9 years old. By then, United had been chasing the talented lad for years.
Manchester’s two big clubs were competing for the attention of the boy and the family. The junior tournaments were full of talent scouts to the point of embarrassment. He was invited to train with both Manchester United and Manchester City. He himself preferred United.
When he was younger, Mainoo was so clearly better than others that he was given extra rules. Sometimes you always had to pass and not shoot, sometimes you had to score with your weaker foot. He spent only a few months in his first company before the road was completed.
Not for the player, but for the club.
– I told his father that I can no longer offer him more challenges, Mainoo’s first coach said For The Athletic.
Mainoo has named a Brazilian Ronaldinho as his idol, like many other ball skills who played gimmick videos on YouTube in the early 2000s. He was attracted by Ronaldinho’s joy on the pitch: an unflinching smile combined with inventive solutions.
The similarities outside the field are few for now. Ronaldinho is a showman who gets into all kinds of tricks, but Mainoo tries to live in the midst of the glow one day at a time. In that, he is more like Scholes, whom he has named as his dream partner in the midfield. So the admiration is mutual.
The youngest of four children in a Ghanaian family started scoring in the backyard behind his sisters. Since then, the siblings have stood beside Maino in interviews, helping to keep their feet on the ground.
– His character is a great mix. He’s confident on the field, but really humble off it. It would be nice to say we taught him that, but it’s about his home education, the head of United’s academy Nick Cox is said.
A breakthrough player for a successful club
The most passionate supporters had gotten a taste of Mainoo when he helped United win the FA Youth Cup in front of 67,000 spectators.
The others at Takuu heard at least rumors about the upstart. The news threshold started to be crossed when the head coach Erik ten Hag joined the representative team in Mainoo at the age of 17.
– Sometimes I stop to think that two years ago these guys were on my video game team. Now we play together and argue on the field, Mainoo wondered from early summer.
He played his debut match a year and a half ago.
Head coach ten Hag had envisioned an immediate regular place in the lineup before the injury at the end of the summer.
In the very first match in the starting line-up in the Premier League, Mainoo was chosen as the best player on the pitch.
Last November, aged 18, he was also in the starting line-up in the Champions League when United traveled to Istanbul to the roar of a loud Turkish crowd.
– The highest possible praise is painful for me to say, but he looked like a Manchester City player. I looked at him and thought that Pep Guardiola sees a player like that thinking he wants him in his midfield, a United legend Gary Neville is said.
Mainoo played in 24 Premier League matches. He was in the starting line-up every time and played the full 90 minutes most of the time. He scored three goals and assisted one. There were mistakes, of course, as for all teenage and older players.
– He is in an important position if ManU dares to start a new rise. A lot has been loaded on the young man’s shoulders. He has made a rocket-like rise, says Halsti.
In May, Mainoo and United celebrated the victory of the men’s FA Cup. Local opposition City fell in the final with 2–1 in front of 85,000 spectators.
Mainoo, who was chosen as the best player again in the final, was responsible for the winning goal.
Most of Mainoo’s qualities can only be appreciated by watching him play, but sometimes there are also top moments that are broadcast on teletext. In February, he scored a stunning 97th minute winner against Wolverhampton. In April, he scored the equalizer in Liverpool’s net.
United’s topper legend Rio Ferdinand compared extracts to the Dutch to Clarence Seedorf. Team-mate Rasmus Höjlund described Mainoo as a generational talent. Ten Hag said he caught his eye as soon as the coach started getting to know the junior players of his new employer.
Played next to Maino in Manchester, won the Champions League five times Casemiro beamed at his 13-year-younger teammate.
– He is a top player. Exceptional. Humble and hardworking. He knows how to listen. “I play next to him, so I know that United will get one of the best midfielders in the Premier League for years to come,” Casemiro said on the club’s website.
“A great type of player”
The older Mainoo has become, the lower he has fallen on the field. This has only been his third season as a midfielder. The former striker has sometimes also played on the wing.
– I got frustrated as an attacker. I didn’t get the ball terribly, and I love to keep the ball. So it was natural to move a little further back, Mainoo explained.
Since then, he has settled in at the bottom of the midfield, but occasionally looks up higher. It has already been seen in the EC matches how instincts take over.
– Mainoo brought well-timed moves to depth. Through them, England got deep more often. Especially the beginning of the second period was England’s golden time in the match, when Slovenia was forced to defend deep. You need that if you are going to be a threat, Urheilu’s expert Toni Koskela said about Mainoo’s contribution in the final match of the group stage.
Against Slovenia, 33 out of 34 passes went to Maino. Likewise, every concentration.
– He is a great type of player. He withstands the pressure very well and is able to take the first pressure close to him. When also Cole Palmer came onto the field, England began to find his movements. Interplay opened up spaces through which England could get inside Slovenia’s shape. The kind of entrance where you can wait more minutes, added the person sitting next to you Miika Nuutinen.
The skill level is so high that Mainoo does not hesitate if the space becomes cramped. He tries to be non-gestural and keeps his playing as simple as possible, but effective. He can rely on his ability to find a pass line or a chance to get out of a defensive player’s grip.
It’s moments like that that could give breakthroughs to England, against whom many teams defend low. However, it would also require courage from Southgate, who has many more ready players at his disposal.
– Trent Alexander-Arnold failed in their first two matches, Conor Gallagher didn’t do much of anything until being replaced. So the door could be a little open for Mainoo, Nuutinen estimated after the group stage.
Neville went further in the British media.
– Every England change made it better. I’m sure Mainoo will start in the next match, the 85-cap hero was eager.