Manchester United's Europa League miracle will be completely wasted - if they don't make these major changes

Two last-gasp goals. A staggeringly improbably comeback. Memories of 1999. Robbie Savage’s excruciating howls on co-commentary duties - Manchester United’s laughably dramatic Europa League win over Lyon was the kind of wildly improbable success that can change the psychological direction of an entire club.

“This kind of moment can help the players a lot in this kind of season,” a previously beleaguered Ruben Amorim said after the staggering 5-4 extra-time victory. “It can create some connection with the fans and the players and we can forget for a few minutes what kind of season we are having.”

In Amorim’s own comments, however, lies the real question – will they only forget for a few minutes? Or can this be the big reset of the team’s mentality that has been so sorely needed for so long? And for all of the drama… weren’t Manchester United still quite bad?

The statistics which suggest that beating Lyon doesn’t mean turning a corner

“Today is a good feeling,” Amorim went on to add. “But tomorrow we start everything again."

Truer words were perhaps never spoken. Yes, this was a famous victory, and the first time in a long time we’ve seen Manchester United display a little bit of the ‘do or die’ attitude of the Ferguson years – but it will take more than one win to turn United into a side who feel like inevitable victors, as they did in that gilded age. The reality of Thursday night’s match is that United were still quite bad right up until the 120th minute.

On balance of play, United only really managed to get on top of the visitors in the second half of extra time. Even in going 2-0 up in the first half of normal time, United were barely the better side, and they couldn’t even really get a grip on matters against ten men for half an hour or so.

In regulation time, Lyon had much the better of possession and more shots on goal, although United’s chances were better. Even in the first period of extra time, with Corentin Tolisso sent off, Lyon were able to control the game – United didn’t manage a single shot on goal, at home, against a side who had had a man sent off.

This was United’s first win in five games and simultaneously the second consecutive game in which they had shipped four goals, and the broad brushstrokes of their performance laid bare their failings. This wasn’t anywhere near as bad as the 4-1 defeat to Newcastle at the weekend and Lyon are a decent enough team, but it wasn’t great.

United still lacked any real cutting edge in the final third, and it is perhaps telling that all four of their goals from open play came from defenders and defensive midfielders, even if Harry Maguire was being deployed as a makeshift target man at the moment he planted his magnificent forehead through the ball to seal the comeback.

They also struggled to maintain cohesion at the back, and you didn’t have to work hard to understand how they could concede eight goals in two games. Too often, the marking was slack, players were caught out of position, and the decision-making was poor. Nobody could really blame André Onana for this one.

On top of that, United took far too long to find ways to get the ball down and play against a team who were playing with ten men for a full third of the match’s duration. They had a man advantage for 40 minutes, and maybe made it count for 10 of them. In fairness, those 10 turned out to be decisive. For once, United showed a fighting spirit and picked themselves up off the canvas, and that alone could perhaps be a watershed moment for a team that have usually signalled to their corner to throw the towel in.

Ultimately, however, Lyon – a side in dire financial difficulties, playing away from home with a man sent off – managed 59% of possession, the same number of shots as their hosts, nearly half as many successful passes again, and four goals, several of which emanated from defensive errors. United, for their part, only managed to string 12 passes more together in 120 minutes than they did when getting thrashed by Newcastle a few days earlier.

This is still a United side riven with flaws. There is still a deep disconnection between midfield and the players around them, and a huge disparity between the players available and Amorim’s methods, to which he seems intransigently bonded. This is still, fundamentally, a fairly bad team, and it will take more than a stirring last-minute win and a good mental health day to turn things around.

Individual errors continue to plague Manchester United

The issue runs deeper than the visible chasm between Amorim’s tactical vision and the talents of the players in front of him – there are still too many players performing poorly or simply not proving capable of performing the task asked of them.

To lead with what may be argued as a harsh example, one of the viral clips of the evening which seemed to encapsulate the gutsy bombast of United’s win was a video of young defender Leny Yoro launching himself face-first across the turf to make sure he blocked a Malick Fofana shot with his face in extra time.

It was an act of physical bravery and resilience which stirs the soul just a little bit. Yoro is a talented young player, and seems to have some of the steel and resolve which has been lacking at Old Trafford for so long. Still, he was also directly responsible for two of Lyon’s goals.

It was Yoro who fell asleep and let Tolisso nip in ahead of him to score Lyon’s first, and Yoro who lost track of Nicolás Tagliafico at the back post to score the second. It isn’t that he didn’t contribute anything to the overall performance (it was also his darting forward run that drew Tolisso’s second yellow card, of course), but there are still too many mistakes in there and too many goals being conceded due to avoidable individual mistakes.

The bigger problems lie up front, of course. There is a reason that only five teams (the bottom four and Everton) have scored fewer goals than Manchester United in the Premier League this season, and a reason that scoring five on Thursday night isn’t a fair reflection of their capabilities in front of the opposing goal.

Take Rasmus Højlund, once again isolated and impotent up front. Or Alejandro Garnacho, a fine winger but such a poor finisher and so bereft of confidence inside the box itself that he makes no sense for the narrower role he needs to play in Amorim’s system.

The Argentine did pick up one assist and his well-judged cut-back for Bruno Fernandes was instrumental for the opener, but he also squandered a tremendous chance when his own run onto a deep ball put him through one-on-one with Lucas Perri. Garnacho will be a fine buy for a team that wants a true wideman this summer, but is a poor fit for Amorim’s United team.

United won because of their laudable resilience, yes, but also because they dug out ‘moments’ from players whose job isn’t meant to be scoring goals. You can’t rely on Diogo Dalot for precision finishes every week, or on Maguire for towering headers on call.

It was an astonishing win, and if Amorim is smart he could perhaps use it to kick-start a sea change in the dressing room atmosphere and in the expectations that the players set themselves before kick-off every week. But the feel-goods won’t last if he doesn’t build a coherent attack, connect the midfield with the rest of the team and coax better performances out of his defence.

Even if United do now go on to win the Europa League in Bilbao this May, it won’t mean much in the grander scheme of things. Erik ten Hag was still a failure despite his FA Cup and League Cup wins, and José Mourinho lifting the Europa League did not stop his tenure from being viewed as a disappointment.

Beating Lyon is a small step in the right direction, and could be a key step on the path towards the construction of a United side that is competitive at the right end of the table once again – but the work done in the transfer market this summer and the way that Amorim marshals a rebuilt squad will be far more important. This was a famous, breathless, wildly entertaining win, but there is an awful lot of work to be done to keep the good times rolling in with any kind of consistency.