Marcus Rashford will not be 20 until the end of this month, but he is already a key player for club and country.
Indeed, a return of five goals and three assists in 11 appearances for Manchester United has made him one of Jose Mourinho’s most impressive performers in the early weeks of the 2017-18 campaign.
Rashford has also scored twice in 11 appearances for England – including the winner against Slovakia last month, which set the Three Lions on the way to qualification for the 2018 World Cup.
If England’s first match of the tournament took place tomorrow, Rashford would be in Gareth Southgate’s XI. He is still a teenager, but has become a key individual for the national team, rather than a player that is given minutes here and there.
Granted, the 19-year-old has had to share the left of the United attack with a certain Anthony Martial this season, but that says more about the exceptional performances of Martial than it does about Rashford.
Mourinho, for the time being, sees Rashford as a wide player, who has the ability to influence matches from the left. He was excellent in United’s 4-0 win over Crystal Palace last weekend – providing two assists, and causing a whole host of problems with his pace and trickery in a wide position.
Rashford has actually only started at centre-forward once this season, and ended that particular fixture with a brace against Burton Albion in the EFL Cup. The teenager is happier through the middle, but the presence of Romelu Lukaku at United and Harry Kane with England means that Rashford will have to continue to play his football from a wide position.
A player that joined United from Fletcher Moss Rangers at the age of seven, Rashford has scored 24 times in 82 first-team appearances for his club. He was still 18 when Mourinho took control of the Red Devils, and the Portuguese, who had previously gained a reputation for not trusting young players, selected Rashford on 53 occasions during the 2016-17 season.
Former United defender Phil Neville hit the headlines last month when he claimed that Rashford should be considered in the same class as Paris Saint-Germain’s Kylian Mbappe and Barcelona’s Ousmane Dembele.
"Everybody praises Ousmane Dembele and Kylian Mbappe but nobody talks about Rashford in this country," said Neville after Rashford’s brace against Burton.
"Because he's English we just say 'he plays on the left wing, he's OK'. He is up there with Dembele and Mbappe, who also play on either wing. People say you have to play Rashford as a centre-forward but you can play him anywhere because he is good enough.”
Mbappe will become the most expensive teenager of all time when he joins PSG on a permanent deal at the end of this season, while Dembele became Barcelona’s club-record signing from Borussia Dortmund during the recent summer transfer window.
Mbappe’s record at professional level stands at 30 goals in 66 appearances, while Dembele, who is currently nursing a thigh problem, has 22 goals in 82 appearances since breaking into the first team at Rennes.
There is no question that Rashford has a lot to work on. The 19-year-old has electric pace, sublime skill and incredible athleticism, but his finishing needs to go up a level in order to be mentioned in the same breath as Mbappe, who might well be the standout young player in the world. That ruthlessness in the final third is often a natural ability, although there is every reason to believe that Rashford will improve in that area over the next three or four years.
Then there is the youngster’s attitude, which simply cannot be questioned. A key player for club and country at the age of 19, he could be forgiven for having a touch of arrogance. Plenty before him have, but there is no sense of entitlement for Rashford.
If it all ended tomorrow, you can bet that he would still be down the park playing the sport that he loves - playing like nothing else in the world mattered. Talent is fantastic, but without the right temperament, it will never be enough.
“When I was younger my family taught me how to behave. My brothers (Dwain and Dane) look after me now and my mum (Melanie) relaxes,” said Rashford in a recent interview.
It is difficult to put a label on just how far Rashford can go in the professional game, but one thing is for certain - he is currently one of the most talented teenage footballers in the world.
All being well, Rashford will pass the 100 mark when it comes to appearances for United this season. He will hope to have helped Mourinho’s side win a couple of trophies in the process, and will enter next summer’s World Cup as one of the most exciting young players in the world.
Is he going to become as good as Mbappe or Dembele? The answer is that right now it does not matter. Rashford is doing his own thing, and since that famous night against FC Midtjylland in the Europa League, he has simply never looked back.
