Is Scott McTominay ready for the step up to the Manchester United first-team?

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After an impressive pre-season tour with Manchester United’s first-team, the Daily Record believe that young midfielder Scott McTominay could potentially be part of the senior squad this campaign.

The 20-year-old was awarded his United debut as a second-half substitute against Arsenal last season, making his first professional start during the final day victory over Crystal Palace at Old Trafford, and made enough of an impact to earn a spot on the pre-season tour of the United States.

Since touching down in America he’s seemingly gone from strength to strength too, putting himself about against some of Europe’s best before scoring his first senior goal against Valerenga last week.

And speaking just last week, United’s assistant manager Rui Faria was full of praise for McTominay, as the Daily Record reports: “Scott is a good professional and a talented kid.

“He knows what he needs to do to have a career and a proper future. We can see that playing football is something that he loves. The tour was very important for the kid because it helps his motivation and belief.”

It has been quite the six months as far as McTominay is concerned, getting presented with his big opportunity by manager Jose Mourinho in the top-flight and ensuring that he didn’t let it pass by.

The emergence of the youngster is the latest in a long-line of recent academy graduates – look no further than Marcus Rashford – and, perhaps due to Rashford’s meteoric rise in becoming one of the more indispensable first-team players, it has made Mourinho more open to playing young talent.

McTominay is an aggressive player, most comfortable acting as a box-to-box midfielder, and after undergoing a massive growth spurt in the last 18 months he is now an imposing six-feet three-inches.

He’s almost Michael Carrick-esque with the way he conducts himself on the field, distributing play nicely, yet unspectacularly, in the middle of the pitch, although after being deployed in a striking role during the recent pre-season matches he has also shown a natural eye for goal and ability to find the net.

Naturally there are areas of his game that need vast improvement – he rarely takes risk and can be considered defensively weak – but Mourinho seems to have seen enough to warrant further action.

There is any awful long way to go for McTominay to even begin being considered for a future role within United’s first-team, but at Old Trafford there is no better place for him to develop even more.