Mail Sport visits cramped, concrete pitch where Hojlund brothers played as kids

The Oresund Strait comes into view at Skodsborg, stretching out from Denmark to the Swedish coastline beyond. A couple more stops and the train pulls into Horsholm.

It is here, in the hushed calm of a middle-class suburb 15 miles north of Copenhagen, that Rasmus Hojlund’s remarkable journey began.

Stroll along Stadionalle, where Hojlund studied at Valerodskolen and first played football at Horsholm Usserod Idraetsklub (HUI) opposite, and very little stands out about the cluster of low-set grey buildings on either side of the road. The Hojlund family home is a short walk from here.

It was always on the cards that Rasmus and his younger twin brothers – Oscar and Emil – would turn out to be footballers.

Their dad Anders had one season in the Superliga with Copenhagen outfit B93 playing alongside current Denmark coach Kasper Hjulmand.

Their mother Kirsten was a top sprinter for the country’s leading athletics club Sparta, which might explain why Rasmus can run the 100 metres in under 11 seconds. He also excelled at swimming, but kept jumping the gun. Tennis too.

Anders worked in construction as a carpenter and he converted the basement of the house into a mini pitch so his three sons could play indoors when the rain lashed off the Oresund.

‘I had a lot of tournaments against my brothers on that pitch,’ nodded Hojlund when the 20-year-old was interviewed by Manchester United’s in-house TV station following his move to England in the summer.

Those childhood battles on the cramped, concrete pitch at home in Horsholm could be re-enacted at Parken Stadium on Wednesday night when United face FC Copenhagen in the Champions League again.

It came close to happening at Old Trafford a fortnight ago as Rasmus came off three minutes before