Manchester United‘s signings of Matheus Cunha and Bryan Mbeumo were initially met with some scepticism due to their xG overperformance, but their underlying numbers always provided plenty of cause for optimism.
Sunday’s surprise win – let’s call it what it was – over Arsenal was a victory that provided considerable vindication for Manchester United’s much-maligned recruitment team. There haven’t been many such days over the past 13 years, so when they arrive, they’re hard to miss.
Bryan Mbeumo, Patrick Dorgu and Matheus Cunha scored United’s goals in the 3-2 defeat of the Premier League leaders, with all three players signed since the start of 2025.
United’s recruitment, especially post-Alex Ferguson, has been widely and consistently derided. There have been relatively few unequivocal success stories among players they’ve brought in over that time, a situation made even worse by the fact they are reported to have spent about £2 billion on transfer fees alone since the summer of 2013.
What do they have to show for that outlay? Two FA Cups, two League Cups, one Europa League title and just five top-four finishes in 13 seasons. And this term, the only trophy they can (mathematically) still win is the Premier League title.
But – and whisper it quietly – the general outlook regarding United’s recruitment (of players, we should specify…) at the moment is a little more positive, and that’s particularly down to Cunha and Mbeumo.
Of course, some will be hesitant to praise such signings because hindsight might tell us they’re “obvious” buys. Oh, well done for scouting high-performing Premier League players, you’ve really outdone yourselves there.
Except, there was actually a reasonable amount of noise in the summer questioning United’s pursuits of Cunha and Mbeumo.
A lot of it stemmed from both massively overperforming in relation to their non-penalty expected goals (xG) figures last season. One theory – raised in jest by some but perhaps taken seriously by others – was United targeted them purely based on their xG overperformance because it would address the team’s collective xG underperformance.
Although United’s recruitment team have attracted criticism over the years, we’re going to assume they didn’t genuinely think the equation was that simple. Nevertheless, beneath the more childish elements of this train of thought were some perfectly sound points.
Mbeumo and Cunha did score way more goals than the average player would have expected based on the quality of their chances, and consistently doing that over several successive seasons is rare.
Take Erling Haaland, for instance. Most would probably agree he’s one of the best finishers – if not the best – in Premier League history, and yet he’s only overperformed in relation to non-pen xG by 4.88 (86 non-pen goals, 81.12 non-pen xG) since moving to Manchester City from Borussia Dortmund.
With Cunha and Mbeumo, then, expectations would be key. If United were signing them to replicate their goals returns, most likely they’d be setting them up to fail – but both have so much more to their games that we know they clearly weren’t just bought for their finishing.
Both players also had good track records for chance creation. Cunha ranked 11th – a place ahead of Bruno Fernandes – among all Premier League players for xG assisted (6.5) last term, and Mbeumo wasn’t far behind in 14th (6.0).
Furthermore, each could be expected to bring confident and purposeful ball carrying, given they both ranked inside the Premier League’s top 10 among non-defenders for progressive carries (Cunha – 277, Mbeumo – 267) in 2024-25; both also possess good physical attributes even if Mbeumo lacks height, and the Cameroonian’s relentlessness out of possession can stretch opposition, as highlighted by him recording the third-most off-ball runs into the final third (422) in 2024-25.
So, although it’s very unlikely they’ll match their non-pen goal returns from last season, that’s fine because they offer a lot in general, and they’re impacting games positively for United.
Mbeumo has proven particularly decisive, and on big occasions. He scored the opening goal in the 2-1 win at Liverpool and the 2-2 draw at Tottenham; then, since coming back from the Africa Cup of Nations, he’s netted United’s first in each of the wins over City and Arsenal, showing impeccable composure for both strikes.
Cunha’s stepped up on the big stage as well. Although named as a substitute against City and Arsenal, he’s come up with important contributions both times, first crossing for Dorgu’s goal in the derby and then netting the stunning winner at the Emirates Stadium.
But even aside from that winning goal, Cunha’s presence off the bench on Sunday was hugely helpful. United were under significant pressure by that point, but several times he provided an outlet and was then able to hold on to the ball while forcing his team upfield.
He tallied four carries in his 21 minutes on the pitch and the average distance of them was 21.1 metres, easily his biggest average for the season. Granted, it’s a small sample size, but it still demonstrates how that is such a strength of his, and his efforts helped alleviate pressure.
Of course, one of those carries also preceded his goal, as he cleverly picked up a pocket of space and burst towards the area once receiving the ball – his finish perhaps highlighting how he outperformed his xG to such a degree last term.
Out of the two of them, Mbeumo can probably claim to have had the biggest impact over the course of the season, though Cunha wasn’t helped by an injury absence early in the campaign. And while neither of them have been kept to a single role, the Brazilian’s arguably been moved around even more than Mbeumo.
It’s obviously difficult to definitively determine a specific player’s impact on a team; is a team (or their results) better because of that individual, or is that individual being impactful because of how they fit into the collective?
With Mbeumo and Cunha, it’s probably somewhere in the middle. While clearly important, you wouldn’t say either – not even Mbeumo – has carried United this term. The team has been better than they were last season, but until the win over City, you wouldn’t have said there’d been a dramatic improvement.
Clearly, though, Mbeumo and Cunha have at least contributed to United being a more effective and efficient side in an attacking sense – and you could have made that case even before Ruben Amorim’s sacking.
As touched upon before, their respective xG overperformances were always likely to be unsustainable at those rates, but the key thing was the underlying data still reflected well on them.
Mbeumo, for instance, averaged 0.2 non-pen xG per 90 last term, which was actually his lowest in a Premier League season for Brentford (0.34 in 2023-24, 0.27 in 2022-23 and 2021-22). But it was still a decent return, and combined with his output in those prior seasons, it all indicated a good level of consistency in that respect.
Cunha averaged 0.32 and 0.30 non-pen xG per 90 in his two full seasons in a Wolves side who struggled for a significant chunk of that.
This season, Mbeumo is averaging 0.38 non-pen xG per 90 – better than any of his previous Premier League seasons – and Cunha is at 0.32, which is again consistent with his output at Wolves.
So, in both cases, United knew they were signing multi-faceted players who had – exclusive of their xG overperformance – shown they could consistently be an attacking threat, and in less illustrious surroundings. The club needed their ailing attack to be refreshed, and those two can certainly claim to have made a difference.
They have contributed to United’s non-pen xG average improving from 1.32 per game in 2024-25 to 1.66 in 2025-26, their shot count going up to 16.2 each game from 13.9 and now scoring 1.7 goals per game, as opposed to 1.1 last term.
There’s a big part of the season still to be played, however, and both will surely have key roles as United push for Champions League football.
But it’s easy to forget, given the hysteria that’s accompanied United’s last two games, that there are still some big question marks hanging over Michael Carrick’s side. The new head coach – appointed until the end of the season – has masterminded two brilliant wins in big matches, but as has been covered plenty of times before, United’s form in such fixtures wasn’t really the concern.
The major issue is how they’ve struggled to beat opposition most would suggest they should defeat. Case in point, United’s 12 points from games against the current top six isn’t bettered by anyone this term and their six wins vs top-half opposition is the joint most (with Aston Villa), whereas they’ve won just four vs bottom-half opposition.
If Carrick’s side are to make proper strides between now and the end of the season, the challenge is not whether Cunha or Mbeumo can help United rise to the occasion against elite opposition – we know they can – but whether their influence can be felt on the more mundane matchdays, when prior underwhelming results have defined a lot of the team’s stagnation over the past couple of years.
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Man Utd Knew xG Would Catch Up With Bryan Mbeumo and Matheus Cunha, But That Was the Point Opta Analyst.
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