By Ben Dinnery

7th Sep, 2022 | 3:02pm

Expert: Erik ten Hag playing 'mind games' with Anthony Martial amid Man United latest

Erik ten Hag may know exactly when Anthony Martial will be fit enough to return for Man United but is instead choosing to play “mind games” with the media.

That is the view of medical expert Ben Dinnery, who runs the Premier Injuries site and has a background in injury and data analysis.

Martial, 25, has not featured since his first apperance of the season when he provided the assist for United’s second in the 2-1 win over Liverpool on 22 August.

The French attacker is struggling with an Achilles problem and is not expected to return for the Red Devils’ clash against Real Sociedad on Thursday (8 September).

As quoted by The Mirror last Friday (2 September), Ten Hag explained: “I cannot tell at this moment [how long he will be out].”

Dinnery claims that either the new manager is using “smoke and mirrors” to keep the media in the dark or Martial could have an overuse injury.

“The initial thoughts were that it was just going to be a single time-loss game,” he told Football Insider’s Adam Williams.

“But Ten Hag has come out and said there is no definitive timeframe.

“There are a few ways you can take this. First and foremost, we don’t know a lot about how Ten Hag handles the media and the updates he provides.

“He certainly hasn’t been forthcoming on a lot of players with regards to their absence from the squad.

“Aaron Wan Bissaka, Phil Jones, Luke Shaw Axel Tuanzabe. These players have just sort of disappeared with little or no reference to them at all.

“This could be a very conscious effort to fix his attention on those players that are available.

“There could be some mind games, some smoke and mirrors. Ten Hag may have a very good idea of when Martial will return but doesn’t want to tell us. That is definitely a possibility.

“It also depends on the type of injury. It could be a knock that has evolved to be more serious than we thought.

“But if it’s an overuse injury, that fits with what the manager has said in terms of not being able to provide a timeline. It responds to training load and is assessed on a day-to-day basis, so it’s hard to say when a player might return.”

In other news, pundit salutes Man United star who’s “better than Kevin De Bruyne”.