Manchester United Manchester United 2 1 Rangers

Manchester United skipper Bruno Fernandes scored a dramatic stoppage-time winner to give his side victory in their all-British match with Rangers at Old Trafford.

Rangers’ fans were still celebrating what they thought was a famous draw after Cyriel Dessers had brilliantly levelled United’s opener with an 88th-minute drive into the bottom corner from the edge of the area.

But Fernandes cut those celebrations short when he got on the end of Lisandro Martinez’s angled cross to the far post and drove a first-time shot through Jack Butland’s legs.

From his seat in the directors’ box, legendary United boss and former Rangers striker Sir Alex Ferguson could only shake his head in wonderment at the drama of it all.

At least the ending meant the game was not known purely for Butland’s terrible own goal, when he came to clear Christian Eriksen’s 52nd-minute corner and succeeded only in punching the ball into his own net.

United’s character shone through just four days after head coach Ruben Amorim had stated his side were “maybe the worst team in Manchester United history”.

For Rangers, it was a cruel way to extend a run in which Philippe Clement’s side have not won away from Ibrox since 8 December.

They drop into the play-off places in 13th and need to beat Belgian side Union Saint-Gilloise on home soil next week and hope other results go their way to gain automatic passage into the last 16.

They have, however, guaranteed a place in the knock-out round.

United, now fourth, will definitely make it into the last 16 if they win away at Romanians FCSB.

After the mountain of publicity Amorim created at the weekend with his controversial comments, and his ‘sorry, not sorry’ attempt to clarify them on Wednesday, the Portuguese could probably have done with the kind of low-key victory United seemed set for until the crazy last couple of minutes.

The United head coach repeated his well-used phrase that his team have to “suffer” during the bedding-in period as they get used to his tactics.

One example of that is a failure to fill the space vacated when one of United’s three defenders breaks out of the line to press the ball or challenge a forward who has dropped deep.

Young midfielder Toby Collyer, making his first start under Amorim, reacted to stem one attack but until it becomes instinctive United will be at risk of being caught out, which is how Nicolas Raskin got a clear run at Altay Bayindir only to lose control of the ball and allow the Turkey goalkeeper to dive low to push it into the path of Ridvan Yilmaz, who fired over.

It is the kind of basic drill United have not been able to work on properly because they have had so many midweek matches since Amorim replaced Erik ten Hag in November.

That is why a top-eight place in this competition is so important, because it would mean three successive weeks at the start of February with no second game to crowd their schedule.

Nothing can be taken for granted yet. FCSB are also in the top eight and will not want to relinquish their place next week.

And Amorim also knows there needs to be a lot of work done off the field over the next 12 days before the transfer window closes, with doubts over the future of so many of his stars – including Alejandro Garnacho and Marcus Rashford – and finance needed to refresh his own squad.

However, thanks to Fernandes, at least they can do so with the intense pressure on them eased for a couple of days at least.