For 38 minutes Old Trafford was quiet and Ipswich Town were winning. Then Marcelino Nunez slipped over 65 yards from his own goal, and the afternoon fell apart for the visitors in a way that ended 5-2.
Bruno Fernandes scored three of them. He also set up the fifth. A week on from being named the PFA's men's player of the year, the United captain answered the only question that really mattered at kick-off, which was whether anybody in this team was going to take responsibility after the 2-0 defeat at Hull.
Ipswich started it better
Gary O'Neil's side had beaten Sunderland on their return to the Premier League and they arrived without any of the caution promoted sides usually bring to Old Trafford. Julio Enciso should have scored early, holding off Bryan Mbeumo and Luke Shaw on a run from halfway before Senne Lammens stopped him.
The goal came anyway. Abdul Fatawu, relegated from the Championship with Leicester last season, got past Shaw far too easily on the wing and Leif Davis met the cross with a half-volley that Lammens never moved for. Fatawu and Davis combined again minutes later and only a save kept it at 1-0.
The slip, and then the flood
Nunez was standing near the halfway line with the ball rolling towards him and no United player close. He lost his footing. Matheus Cunha broke, squared it, and Fernandes finished. Nothing about the goal was earned, which is often how these afternoons start.
Six minutes later Harry Maguire shot from a corner, the ball struck his own arms on the way, and Jacob Greaves diverted it into his own net. It stood. Under the current law an accidental handball only disallows a goal if the scorer is the one who handled it, and Maguire did not score it. O'Neil was not impressed afterwards. "It doesn't feel like a goal," he said.
Greaves then chopped down Cunha inside the box two minutes and 45 seconds after the own goal. Fernandes took the penalty. 3-1.
His third arrived from the sort of position he has lived in for six years: Kobbie Mainoo shot, blocked, Mbeumo shot, blocked, Fernandes arrived last and put it away. He then tried one from the centre circle and put it on the roof of the net, which felt about right for the mood.
113 goals in 330 games
The fifth was his pass, a ball over the top for Mbeumo whose shot hit the crossbar and spun down over the line. Ipswich got a late consolation through Chuba Akpom, on at half-time, after Enciso cut it back.
United had 33 shots. That is their highest total in a Premier League match since October 2016 against Burnley, and it included Mbeumo somehow hitting the bar from two yards with the goal open after Marcus Rashford squared it. Ipswich did not have a single shot between the 49th minute and injury time.
Fernandes' hat-trick was his third for the club and takes him to 113 goals in 330 appearances. Last season he broke the Premier League record with 21 assists. Michael Carrick, who needed this one badly, kept it simple afterwards: "I was very pleased with them."
Where it leaves both
Had United lost, they would have become only the fourth top-flight side in English history to lose their opening two games to newly promoted clubs. Instead they have three points and a captain still setting the standard in a squad that has otherwise been rebuilt around him.
Ipswich have six points from two games and a first-half performance to build on. They also have 40 minutes of collapse to explain. O'Neil will focus on the first bit. Everyone else will remember the second.
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