It was 7.15am last Sunday morning when Chido Obi pulled on his Manchester United tracksuit, added a black winter beanie hat, and headed out to do some extra training.
The 17-year-old routinely gives up days off to work on his craft and on this cold Manchester morning he was out working on his movement and his finishing with personal coach Kudus Oyenuga.
Given defeat byTottenham on Sunday made it 10 games where Manchester United have failed to score this season, how badly they need a scorer, a ray of light, amid the doom and gloom of slipping to 15th in the table.
Within a week of this wintery weekend session the pair were left toasting a FA Youth Cup hat-trick against Chelsea – taking his tally to seven goals from three cup games – two first-team training sessions and a Premier League debut.
Much of the discourse around Chido Obi, who recently made a personal request to club officials to abandon ‘Martin’, his middle name, from his name in all commentaries and media reports, has been about the club’s attempt to temper expectations.
Having arrived from Arsenal last year in a move driven by United’s head of academy Nick Cox and head of academy recruitment Luke Fedorenko, numerous sources at Carrington have spoken about keeping a lid on the hype around one of the country’s most exciting young players.
Chido Obi is a Manchester United prospect who is getting his first exposure to senior football
United badly need a goalscorer – and this 17-year-old has managed plenty at youth level
He has caught the eye of Ruben Amorim and was given his debut in Sunday’s loss to Spurs
After his hat-trick against Chelsea, Under 18s boss Adam Lawrence chose not to speak to a gaggle of reporters eager to quiz him on the potential of Obi. The player, too, has so far managed to avoid interviews with in-house channel MUTV.
Technical director Jason Wilcox has watched him extensively, while Darren Fletcher, a key conduit for Amorim between the academy and first team, has been among those championing his development.
His form at United rankles with those at Arsenal who felt they had made a compelling pitch for Obi to stay, only for him to inform them in July that after two years he wanted to head for pastures new.
Arsenal made a lucrative contract offer and first-team boss Mikel Arteta is understood to have intervened to try and map out his vision for the player’s future, which included training with the first team and playing Under 21s football this season where the schedule allowed. It proved in vain.
Depending on which side you ask, the topic of money takes on greater levels of significance. From the player’s side it is understood money wasn’t the determining factor to head to Manchester but rather the feeling he had a better shot at cracking the first team. There are numerous figures at Arsenal who would dispute that.
He has a chance to make them pay next week, when United face the Gunners in the FA Youth Cup quarter-final, which will be held at the Emirates Stadium. Obi has seven goals in three games so far in this year’s competition.
Such a contract, and national headlines from specific games like when he scored 10 goals in a 14-3 win over Liverpool Under 16s for Arsenal in November 2023, ramped up pressure on Obi to a level United staff felt was unfair and unsustainable.
Early calls to accelerate him to the first team were ignored and he found his way at Carrington with the Under 18s at first, netting, by his standards, a routine 14-minute hat-trick on his debut against Nottingham Forest. He scored within 14 seconds of kick-off that day at Carrington to underline just how dominant he is at Under 18 level, where he has since gone on to become the record scorer in the Under 18 Premier League with 37 goals in 26 games.
Arsenal made a lucrative offer for him to stay, and Gunners boss Mikel Arteta is understood to have intervened
Obi netted, by his standards, a routine 14-minute hat-trick on debut against Nottingham Forest
By late October he had been handed his Under 21 debut and was the only player to come off the bench on Sunday
By late October he was handed his Under 21 debut against PSV Eindhoven and now he finds himself firmly in the mix for first-team minutes after becoming Manchester United’s 252nd graduate from academy to first team.
Sources around the first team speak of the player’s humbleness and the impression he has made on Ruben Amorim and his staff across the last three weeks, the time period where he has really stepped up to become more of a factor in the senior side.
What began as Obi helping fill out numbers in first-team recovery sessions the day after matches has now become more focused, with first-team staff gathering a lot more data on him by analysing him in full sessions.
After his hat-trick against Chelsea last Wednesday night in the FA Youth Cup – in which he pulled out Marcus Rashford’s iconic temple celebration, as well as kissing the United badge – he was drafted into first-team training on both Friday and Saturday.
Others, such as James Scanlon, who scored twice in that win over Chelsea, featured in those sessions too, but it was Obi who was given the nod to be the attacking option on the bench at Tottenham.
The young Dane, who has also represented England at youth level and is eligible for Nigeria, has been integrated into the first team for meals and also has also been included in their gym sessions to further ease his integration.
Joshua Zirkzee is providing something of an older brother role for Obi, sources say, while fellow Dane Patrick Dorgu has been key to helping the 17-year-old settle in the first-team dressing room.
Watching Obi at close quarters, it is clear he offers Amorim and his staff a different profile to any of their other forwards, a genuine threat running in behind that is improving all the time.
Amorim has gone from using the forward to make up the numbers in recovery sessions to tracking him in more detail
Obi made headlines when he performed Marcus Rashford’s celebration and kissed the United badge following a hat-trick against Chelsea
Joshua Zirkzee has taken on an older brother role with Obi in United’s first-team ranks
His scoring capabilities need no introduction and Mail Sport has watched on at both Under 18 and Under 21 games extensively this season, where a lot of the focus has been on Obi’s press and helping shape him into a complete forward that can take the Premier League by storm.
He is not all that vocal on the pitch and that may need to change if he is to become one of the league’s best young strikers.
After playing 90 minutes for the Under 21s at Altrincham in a Premier League International Cup defeat by FC Nordsjaelland on January 21, it was Obi that was out on the pitch with U21s boss Travis Binnion long after fans had left and team-mates had gone inside.
The pair spoke at length about his positioning and the areas of improvement he can – and needs to – make before stepping up to the highest level. It was a good sign that was not lost on scouts in attendance.
Amorim knows the potential he has on his hands. It was why it was Obi, and not the six other academy products on the bench at Tottenham, that he turned to bring on with his only sub, making him Manchester United’s third youngest Premier League appearance-maker – behind Angel Gomes (16y, 8m, 20d) and Shola Shoretire (17y, 19d) – in the process.
‘With 10 minutes left, I said to Jaap (Stam), “Why doesn’t he (Amorim) put one of the young guys in?”,’ former United goalkeeper Peter Schmeichel said on Viaplay over the weekend.
‘He put the young Danish guy, Obi, on in the 90th minute. Why isn’t he put on in the 80th minute? Give him a chance.
‘He’s a player who can score goals. Give him a little more time on the pitch. It’s a classic Manchester United story; a young guy who nobody knows, who steps up and makes himself a hero.’
Former United goalkeeper Peter Schmeichel urged Amorim to use one of his youngsters earlier against Tottenham
Obi is now set for more first-team involvement and will hunt a first Premier League goal
Manchester United are crying out for goals after a 10th league game this season in which they failed to score, and now their best attacker in Amad Diallo looks set to be out for the remainder of the campaign.
Obi and his team pushed to join United in part because they felt he had the quickest route to first team football in the North West, rather than in north London. For now his brother Chukwuemeka Obi is plying his trade at West Ham but he remains one to watch moving forward, too.
‘Thanks to the gaffer and the club for making a dream come true for me and my family,’ the player wrote on Instagram after his Tottenham cameo.
Tottenham marked chapter one for Obi in a United shirt. Now the target is a senior goal; a historic one at that. He has five months and three days to become Manchester United’s youngest ever Premier League goalscorer. That really would show Arsenal exactly what they are missing.