Manchester United myth has already been busted ahead of Premier League restart

The idea that United's momentum will be gone when the season resumes has already been knocked down by Bayer Leverkusen.

German football has never been so popular on these shores and after successive weekends of Bundesliga feasts on BT Sport all eyes are being drawn to Borussia Dortmund.

It's not difficult to see why. For English viewers - and Manchester United - there is the chance to watch the thrilling Jadon Sancho, even if he's been limited to two cameos off the bench so far, as well as the most exciting crop of young players in Europe, with Erling Haaland leading the line.

Dortmund's 4-0 win against Schalke and their 2-0 success at Wolfsburg have set up their top-of-the-table clash with Bayern Munich perfectly and viewers will be tuning in in their droves for that on Tuesday.

But Lucien Favre's side haven't been the best team in the Bundesliga over the last two weekends and they aren't the most relevant team for United to be watching. Sancho could have half-a-dozen shockers between now and the end of the season and it won't change the club's desire to sign him this summer.

Instead, that mantle falls to Bayer Leverkusen and the way they've taken to the Bundesliga's own Project Restart has to be encouraging for Ole Gunnar Solskjaer and United.

They've been the form team in winning 4-1 at Werder Bremen and 3-1 at Borussia Monchengladbach and in Kai Havertz they've had the form player as well. Those victories have moved them up into fourth place and victory at home against Wolfsburg on Tuesday will send them third, for 24 hours at least.

The reason this is so relevant for United is that Bayer Leverkusen were the Bundesliga's form team before the lockdown as well. In the space of 180 minutes they've shattered the theory that all momentum from March will have evaporated.

United will hope they can repeat that trick in the Premier League. Under Solskjaer they were 11 games unbeaten before the season was halted, winning nine of them, and it looked a matter of time until they overhauled Chelsea in fourth.

In recent weeks the idea that form or momentum will have no bearing when the Premier League restarts has been floated regularly, but in Germany Bayer Leverkusen are proving that's not the case.

The similarities are quite striking, in fact. This isn't a team at the top of the table winning every week and simply continuing what they've been doing all season. Under Peter Bosz Leverkusen have been infuriatingly inconsistent for most of the season. The head coach who took Ajax to the Europa League final in 2017 before losing to United in Stockholm lost his job at Dortmund because his side could thrill one week and capitulate the next.

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This season they began with three straight wins, scoring 10 goals in the process, then won only two of their next 10 games. That inconsistency might sound familiar to Old Trafford regulars.

In December their season hit rock bottom, losing three successive games, including defeats to mid-table fodder Cologne and Hertha Berlin in the space of five days. You could call it their Burnley moment.

Between those three straight defeats and the 2019/20 season being suspended they conjured up a run of 12 wins and a draw from 14 games, scoring goals for fun. Two months without a game has done nothing to halt the head of steam they built up.

United's own Year Zero this season came with that tepid Old Trafford defeat by Burnley in January. Since then they've been unbeaten in 11 games, winning nine of them, with the brilliant Bruno Fernandes pulling the strings.

Just like Leverkusen's renaissance has coincided with Havertz's return to form, so the signing of Fernandes rejuvenated United. If the Portuguese midfielder can copy the imperious German youngster and hit the ground running again, then perhaps United can maintain their own momentum.

For an example of how to do just that they could do worse than tuning in to Bayer Leverkusen vs Wolfsburg on Tuesday.