EFL Cup holders Manchester United were knocked out of the tournament after a late strike saw them lose 2-1 away to Bristol City.

Joe Bryan opened the scoring for the hosts in the 51st minute before Zlatan Ibrahimovic equalised from a free-kick seven minutes later on his first star since his return from injury.

Korey Smith scored the winner deep into injury time to send Bristol through.

Here, we focus on Ibrahimovic’s performance.

Basic stats

Ibrahimovic

Goals – 1

Assists – 0

Shots – 4

Dribbles – 1

Passes – 29

Key passes – 0

Pass Accuracy – 79.3%

Touches – 46

Dispossessed – 2

Effectiveness

Ibrahimovic may enjoy likening himself to a lion but on evidence of his handful of appearances since his return from a serious knee injury, he seems to be only human after all.

Every minute he spent on the pitch this season has been underwhelming and Wednesday night was no different. Making his first start since his recovery, he was once again lacking sharpness. Playing up front, he looked a shadow of his former self.

The Swede neither had the pace to stretch the defence nor the guile to drop off and conjure openings for his side. His touch often deserted him and he seemed to run out of ideas while in possession, usually ending up surrendering it.

At the very least, you’d expect the towering 36-year-old to use his physique and use his hold up play to good effect but he failed in that respect as well.

But as it so often is in football, everything can change in the blink of an eye and with one swing of his right boot, arguably the worst player of the night, dragged United level in the 58th minute from a free-kick.

That turned out to be his only real contribution of the night as he was substituted 11 minutes later.

Key moments

11th min: Martial’s in-swinging cross from the left is met by Ibrahimovic at the far post. The Swede attempts to volley the ball back across the box but it takes a deflection off Nathan Baker and strikes the crossbar instead.

40th min: The ball falls kindly for Ibrahimovic inside the box from a corner kick, and he lashes it with a fierce but ultimately sliced volley which blazes over the target.

44th min: The striker receives the ball at the top of the box with his back to goal and does well to turn and play it to Rashford but the Englishman can’t get it under control and the chance is gone.

58th min: Pogba does well to skip past a player and win a free-kick in a dangerous area. Ibrahimovic steps up and drills a low effort into the far corner to level proceedings.

69th min: Ibrahimovic is replaced by Henrikh Mkhitaryan.

Our verdict

There was very little to shout about Ibrahimovic’s performance apart from that free-kick for the equaliser. He was a colossal figure last season but he looks like any other player struggling to make his way back from a long injury lay-off this time around.

4/10

 

All statistics are compiled using whoscored.com