Manchester United vs Middlesbrough match report: Ben Gibson is Boro's hero as hosts go out of League Cup on penalties

Ben Gibson scored the winning penalty to send Championship side Middlesbrough into the quarter-finals of the Capital One Cup at Old Trafford. A cup tie against opposition from a lower division hardly brought Louis van Gaal and Manchester United respite from the questions that surround their attacking intentions and efficiency as a goalless 120 minutes against Aitor Karanka’s impressive team left them facing a penalty shoot-out.

Rooney was one of nine players rested from Sunday’s Manchester derby but he was introduced in the second half and missed one of his team’s penalties. Michael Carrick and Ashley Young also failed from the spot.

James Wilson, the teenage forward who has struggled to impress Van Gaal, started a game for the first time since January. Jesse Lingard, Andreas Pereira and Memphis Depay all featured behind him, the nucleus of the young attacking arsenal that Van Gaal believes paints a rosy future for his club but, in the present, they struggled to find their attacking rhythm. Indeed, Lingard was fortunate to survive an early studs-up challenge he committed on Grant Leadbitter without seeing even a yellow, let alone red, card.

Instead, it was the visitors who almost struck first, from Stewart Downing’s 17th-minute corner. From Jack Stephens’ failed overhead kick the ball dropped kindly to George Friend at the far post and the full-back shot tamely into Sergio Romero’s hands when a goal looked the more likely outcome.

The 10,000-plus travelling supporters hardly needed any excuse to raise the decibel level and had already made their mark on the game, collectively using their mobile phones as “torches” in a show of solidarity with the region’s steelworkers who have recently lost their jobs.

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After a goalless Manchester derby on Sunday that was as moribund as any in living memory, the home supporters, in contrast, were in desperate need of something resembling entertainment but the half-hour came and went with an off-balance and wide shot from Marouane Fellaini the only attempt on goal.

After 34 minutes, a short Fellaini pass presented Wilson with a sight of goal, albeit one obscured by a defender whose presence was enough to ensure the forward’s shot was saved comfortably by Thomas Mejias, but at least it represented his team’s first on-target attempt of the evening.

Still, United appeared just as likely to concede, as score, the opening goal. Kike lobbed Daniel Ayala’s long ball directly at the United keeper on 39 minutes and, before the interval, Romero was required to make a magnificent save to tip Downing’s blistering 18-yard left-foot shot over the crossbar.

Van Gaal had seen enough in that toothless first half and Rooney’s absence from the first team was to prove short-lived, the 30-year-old coming on at the interval for his young replacement Wilson who had hardly enjoyed the luxury of stellar service in that first period.

United were also clearly sent out with an instruction to be more direct and ambitious. After 53 minutes Depay attempted a 30-yard effort which Middlesbrough’s deputy goalkeeper almost allowed to slide under his body and there were similar efforts from Pereira, Fellaini and Lingard, all of which were dealt with far more efficiently by Majias.

Events at the other end of the field were becoming far more bizarre. Kike’s 59th-minute shot struck the post and was somehow turned into his own goal by Daley Blind, only for the move to be cancelled out by an offside flag and seven minutes later a back pass from the same United defender bounced awkwardly and was missed by Romero but travelled inches wide of the goal.

It was a passage of play that breathed new impetus into the tie and the final minute of normal time alone brought three excellent chances – Mejias saving from Lingard’s stinging shot, Leadbitter running clean through but failing with an attempted chip of Romero before the home keeper again saved well from Downing.

Man of the match Ayala.

Match rating 5/10.

Referee L Mason (Greater Manchester).