Van Gaal has big selection decisions to make for Manchester derby

Van Gaal has decisions to make on Wayne Rooney and Marouane Fellaini ahead of Sunday's derby with Manchester City, and Sam Allardyce and West Ham face a test versus Stoke

Manchester United manager Louis van Gaal is searching for his team's first away win the Premier League. Laurence Griffiths / Getty Images

Three successive victories followed by two draws achieved through last-gasp equalisers.

It has not been entirely comfortable, but there is perhaps at last a sense of normality returning to Old Trafford. The next step is to win a game away from home, something United have not achieved since a 4-0 victory away to Newcastle United almost seven months ago.

Robin van Persie has scored, while Marouane Fellaini produced probably his best performance since leaving Everton in the summer of 2013 to beat Cesc Fabregas on Sunday.

Wayne Rooney will be back from suspension for the derby with Manchester City on Sunday – assuming there is nothing too sinister in the sight of him limping at a sponsors’ function after damaging a foot in training. And for almost the first time since taking charge, Louis van Gaal will have a real selection dilemma.

The most intriguing, perhaps, is at the front of the team.

Falcao has been underwhelming since his move from Monaco, so he could be the man to step down as he continues his recovery from a thigh problem, allowing Rooney to partner Van Persie. Or Van Gaal could set up United as he did before Rooney was sent off against West Ham by leaving out Juan Mata, a player who has played an awful lot, given it was widely rumoured in the summer that Van Gaal was not overly impressed by him , and using Rooney deeper.

That all assumes, of course, that Adnan Januzaj is left out, despite looking sporadically threatening against Chelsea.

Rooney is a thoroughly modern player, if only in that he is so praised by his apologists and so condemned by those who feel frustrated by him that it is almost impossible to get a real grasp on how well he is playing.

His record in derbies is superb. Not only has he scored more than any other player in Manchester derbies but, in games since he left Everton in 2004, United average 1.7 points per game with him in the side and 0.3 without.

City seemed to inspire him, but that does not disguise the worry exposed by his last kick for United – at Stewart Downing as he failed to keep up with him well enough to foul him properly. The explosive speed of his teenage years is gone.

The other big selection issue is in midfield: does Van Gaal stick with Fellaini, or does he go back to Ander Herrera who, having been disappointing against West Brom, was left out last Sunday?

Van Gaal has acknowledged he underestimated the need for muscle in the Premier League and it may be that he sees Fellaini as the solution, if only in the short term. There would be something rather baffling if Fellaini, having so disappointed last season under David Moyes, a manager who knew him as well as anyone, suddenly develops into a key player under a manager who seemed prepared to sell him in August. But it would not take many more performances like the one he turned in on Sunday to make him indispensable.

Sam Allardyce at times seems indispensable, as well, to West Ham.

The manager was in his element after the victory over City. No manager enjoys explaining how he set up his team to win a game so much as Allardyce and, as he carefully deconstructed his own genius in targeting Eliaquim Mangala, he was like a replete cat licking its whiskers beside a churn of spilled cream.

It seemed churlish to ask what had gone wrong last season when City beat West Ham four times, on one occasion scoring so many (six, in the League Cup semi-final) that Edin Dzeko lost count.

Still, Allardyce deserved his moment of satisfaction and, easy as it is to poke fun, the transformation he has wrought at West Ham this season has been remarkable.

The switch to a diamond, with Stewart Downing operating behind Diafra Sakho and Enner Valencia, has made them both good to watch, while Alex Song has been superb at the back of midfield. Struggling at Barcelona, it turns out, doesn’t make you a bad player.

West Ham sit fourth in the table, above Arsenal, Liverpool and Manchester United, dreaming perhaps, if not of Champions League qualification, then certainly of the Europa League.

On Saturday, they go to Stoke without Sakho, who has damaged cartilage in his ankle.

It now seems he will not be out for the month that was predicted when it was thought there was a break. Still, given he has contributed six goals in six starts since his £3.5 million (Dh20.6m) move from Metz, this is a major test of the depth of West Ham’s squad and whether anything above mid-table is a realistic aspiration.