Opta Analyst sat down exclusively with Manchester United captain Bruno Fernandes to discuss his sensational season, and why adding context to the data behind his output is crucial to fully understanding his qualities.
Very few players have had as much impact on a Premier League club in recent years as Bruno Fernandes has at Manchester United.
This campaign might prove to be his most impactful yet, though. His assist for Benjamin Sesko’s goal in the 2-1 win over Brentford on Monday night was his 19th of the Premier League season – already seven more than he’s previously managed in an English top-flight campaign.
That took him to within one of the all-time Premier League seasonal record, held by both Thierry Henry and Kevin De Bruyne, who assisted 20 goals each in 2002-03 and 2019-20 respectively.
The United captain has four games left to equal, or even break, that record. Based on his creative form in recent months, he has every chance of doing just that.
After opening the 2025-26 campaign without an assist in his first seven league appearances, Fernandes has astonishingly assisted 19 goals in his last 24 games in the Premier League at a rate of one every 109 minutes since his first assist of the campaign versus Liverpool on 19 October.
Fernandes is now on 70 assists in the Premier League overall, ranking him 18th in the all-time charts. He ranks even higher when looking at assists for a single club, with all 70 of his of course coming at Manchester United – a tally only 11 players have bettered with a single team in the competition.
Since his United debut on 1 February 2020, Fernandes is the leading assister in the Premier League, two ahead of Mohamed Salah (68). It is only Salah (193) who has been involved in more goals overall than Fernandes (140 – 70 goals, 70 assists) in that time.
His assist record has been well publicised, but the numbers behind his incredible chance creation stats have been less so.
Meeting Fernandes at United’s training ground in Carrington, the talented midfielder’s smile widened nearly as big as the gap between himself and his Premier League contemporaries when the Opta Analyst team presented the data on just how exceptional a season he’s having in 2025-26.
Fernandes discussing his data with Opta Analyst’s Matt FurnissIn the list of the top 10 players for chances created in a Premier League campaign on record (since 2003-04), Fernandes appears three times. Already equalling his tally of 114 from 2023-24 with four matchdays left to play this term, he’s now just five off his all-time seasonal record of 119 set in 2022-23.
Incredibly, Fernandes has created nearly twice as many chances as any other player in the Premier League this season, 52 ahead of both Declan Rice and Dominik Szoboszlai (61).
The gap between Fernandes is even wider when going back to his competition debut, with the Portuguese creating 220 more than any other player in the Premier League since the start of February 2020 (De Bruyne is next, on 432).
The focus of his attacking role has evolved in that time.
From Goalscorer to Creator
Although his goal and assist tallies are now identical in the Premier League (70 of each), the data shows that Fernandes has developed into much more of a creative mastermind in recent times than a player who finds good goalscoring positions.
Since Michael Carrick’s appointment on 13 January, Fernandes has a lower non-penalty expected goals (xG) average on a per-90 basis (0.14) than under any previous Man Utd manager. But the opposite can be said of his ability to create high-quality chances – his expected assists per 90 average is 0.40, which is 0.12 higher than he’s had under any other coach at the club.
Rather than believing he’s just matured into more of a creative player than one who finds himself getting into dangerous scoring positions, Fernandes puts a lot of that down to opponents knowing his qualities.
“It’s about space,” he said. “Over the years, teams know you better, so they don’t want to allow you as much space as they probably would have allowed me when I first came to the club because they didn’t know me as much.”
Expected assists (xA) measures the likelihood that a given pass will become a goal assist. The model rewards players who pass into dangerous areas, regardless of whether the receiver takes a shot or not – a key difference from an actual assist, where a goal must be scored for it to be awarded.
That means that xA is an ideal metric to quantify the ‘true’ creative power of a player. It’ll come as no surprise to learn that Fernandes is top of the Premier League xA rankings this season (10.3), well ahead of Rayan Cherki in second (7.8) and close to his own personal season high at United, set in 2022-23 (10.7).
Since Carrick’s appointment, his total is 5.2 xA in the Premier League, and 3.9 from passes in open play only, with many of his dangerous passes coming on the right side of the final third.
It’s an area of the pitch that Carrick has tried to give Fernandes more freedom to roam into since he arrived at Old Trafford.
“I float a lot in that zone there now with Michael [Carrick],” he said. “He doesn’t want me to just be stuck in the middle, so often asks me to find that pocket [of space].”
Looking at a map of his open-play assists and high-xA passes (an xA of 0.10 or higher) since Carrick arrived, many of those dangerous balls into the box have come from the right side of the final third.
“The outswing crosses are very dangerous. The inswing cross is much harder for them to head the ball as there’s less power on the ball normally and not as easy for them to put power on the ball when heading.”
Goals for Casemiro versus Leeds and Benjamin Sesko against Crystal Palace are the most recent examples of Premier League assists from Fernandes coming in this manner, but his creative threat isn’t narrowed down to crosses from the right. Having teammates who run from deep behind opposition defences makes Fernandes the ideal orchestrator in central areas, too.
New Teammates Flourishing with Fernandes
With the recruitment of Matheus Cunha, Bryan Mbeumo and Sesko this summer, Man Utd knew they were buying goals. That trio scored 48 top-flight league goals between them in 2024-25 – four more than the Red Devils scored as a team in the Premier League last season (44).
That recruitment has paid off. United have already scored 60 league goals this season, with only Manchester City (66) and Arsenal (64) scoring more. The new trio have scored 27 of those, contributing 45% of United’s goals, but more importantly, they are players who can thrive off the creative brilliance of Fernandes.
The 31-year-old has created 19 open-play chances for Cunha in the Premier League this season; no single player has created as many for a single teammate in the competition. Mbeumo and Sesko aren’t far behind either, with Fernandes creating 13 for both.
For Mbeumo and Sesko in particular, much of their threat comes from their fast-paced runs in behind opposition defenders. Of players to play at least 1,500 minutes of Premier League football this season, Mbeumo ranks first for off-the-ball runs in behind opposition defences per 90 (14.8), while Sesko ranks ninth (11.3).
These are the type of players that Fernandes has thrived as a creator for in the past at United, with Marcus Rashford making the most of the midfielder’s exceptional passing range in 2022-23. The English forward scored 17 Premier League goals that season, and Fernandes created more chances for him in open play (34) than any other player did for a single teammate.
“When you look at the top players in that list, Rashy [Marcus Rashford] is someone who likes the ball in behind and into the pockets,” he said. “Normally, I would find him more into the space. Cristiano [Ronaldo] makes small diagonals behind the defenders, so I would always play in behind the defenders.
“When you play a little bit deeper and you have guys in front of you between the lines, it’s just about getting that ball through in the best way possible to give them a chance of shooting or eventually serving the other 10 or striker at that time.”
Two of Fernandes’ assists this year for those summer signings highlight his threat in such situations. His ball in behind the Aston Villa defence to assist Cunha’s goal at Old Trafford in March showed how dangerous the Brazilian is when running in behind the opposition backline, as did Fernandes’ inch-perfect pass for Sesko’s equaliser at Burnley in January.
Sensational Set-Pieces
Another teammate who has thrived in front of goal this season has been Brazilian midfielder Casemiro. The veteran, who is leaving Old Trafford in the summer after four seasons at the club, has enjoyed his best league campaign in front of goal, scoring nine times in the Premier League.
Six have been assisted by Fernandes – the most prolific partnership in the Premier League this season – while five of those six assists have come from set-piece deliveries.
Fernandes has become one of the best set-piece takers in the Premier League and is nearing another competition record. With 10 assists from set-pieces in 2025-26, he is just one away from Steven Gerrard’s record of 11 set-piece assists in a single Premier League campaign from 2013-14.
Fernandes’ excellent set-piece delivery has turned United into one of the most threatening teams from set plays in the Premier League.
Only Arsenal (22) have scored more non-penalty set-piece goals than United (20) in the league this season. United’s tally is their joint-third best in a single Premier League campaign behind only 2007-08 (23) and 2012-13 (22), when their set-piece prowess underpinned league title wins.
Fernandes is keen to point out that creating goals from set-pieces isn’t any easier than doing so in open play, and in fact, can often be harder.
“When we talk about set-pieces and needing to hit the ball in the right space, it’s sometimes harder than a standard pass,” he said. “The way corners and free-kicks have been, my teammates ask me and demand where they want the ball. Sometimes I’m going to get it right, sometimes not so much.”
Eight of Fernandes’ corners this season have led to a goal; not necessarily as a direct assist, but it shows how the Red Devils have players in such situations that constantly cause opposition teams problems.
It’s something that United and Fernandes have worked hard on to improve.
“I will tell you that five years ago, I would go to take a corner and just put the ball into the middle of the box and let’s see if someone gets it,” he added. “And nowadays I have to hit a spot, so sometimes it’s even harder to get an assist from a set-piece than it actually is in open play.”
Risk Equals Reward
As prolific as Fernandes has been through set-pieces, it’s his open-play creation that is the most dangerous to opposition defences. He is an expert at finding a yard of space in the tightest positions, while his intelligence allows him to escape opposition radars despite seemingly being kept under lock and key.
What separates him and other world-class creators across football is their willingness to take risks in possession.
Fernandes can sometimes receive criticism for how often he loses possession, but that is an example of using statistics without enough context – a dangerous game to play.
While true that he often ranks high for ‘possession lost’ across his career, so do most of football’s other top creative stars. Lionel Messi topped the La Liga rankings in most of his seasons at Barcelona, De Bruyne ranked highly for it in nearly every Premier League campaign at Man City. It’s about weighing up risk versus reward.
Fernandes was keen to stress this point early in our discussion: “The position I play requires more risk than the other ones.
“When you play in a team where you probably have to be the one to try and create chances more often than other players, you’re going to end up missing more opportunities and more chances than the others.”
There’s also the fact that Fernandes gets tightly marked much more than your average player.
He’s one of only three players to have made over 1,000 passes under ‘high pressure’ – defined as occasions when opponents are within two metres of a player when passing – while nobody has made more progressive passes while under high pressure than he has (91) in the Premier League this season. Over a third (42 – 37%) of his 114 chances created in the league in 2025-26 have come despite being under ‘high pressure’ from opposition players, too.
“It’s about putting the stats together with the eye test to understand why you missed that shot or a pass,” he added. “If I miss a pass trying to make something happen by playing the ball forward, I don’t mind it. Because if I don’t take that risk, I might miss eight out of 10, but I’ll get at least one right, and we win the game by that.”
Incredible Availability
Something that stands out when analysing Fernandes is his outstanding availability for Manchester United since signing in early 2020.
Rarely injured, he’s made more appearances (323), more starts (307) and accumulated more minutes (27,496) than any other player for a top-five European league side across all competitions since his Man Utd debut.
Internationally, no player has played in more games for Portugal than him across this time, too (68), missing only eight of their matches across a six-year period since leaving Sporting CP for United.
He’s been absent for just 20 of United’s 343 competitive games since his debut, with three of those coming when he missed a trio of Premier League games following a hamstring injury at Aston Villa on 21 December. Even then, he was able to return quicker than expected and has been off the pitch for just 30 minutes of competitive action since returning for the draw at Burnley on 7 January.
Just 13 more competitive appearances will move Fernandes into the top 50 appearance makers in Man Utd history, while he already ranks 23rd for appearances specifically in the Premier League for the club.
Few have had as much impact with their goals and assists, however. Fernandes is now tied with compatriot Cristiano Ronaldo for Premier League goal involvements at United on 140, with David Beckham (142) now firmly in his sights. Only Paul Scholes (162), Ryan Giggs (271) and Wayne Rooney (276) rank above them.
For now, Fernandes will undoubtedly be locked in to securing a return to the UEFA Champions League for United next season while having a personal aim of breaking the Premier League seasonal assist record. Few would bet against him securing both.
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Bruno Fernandes Exclusive Interview: Manchester United’s Creator-in-Chief on the Cusp of Record-Breaking Season Opta Analyst.
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