Ruud Van Nistelrooy impressed by Romelu Lukaku's start to life at Manchester United

Ruud van Nistelrooy has been impressed with Manchester United's big-money summer signing Romelu Lukaku's start to life at the club.

Lukaku joined United from Everton in an initial £75m ($96.5m) deal with high hopes that he could provide the firepower up front to help the club to a first league title since 2013.

After three league games so far, the Belgian international has three goals as United sit atop the Premier League while he also scored a consolation goal in the 2-1 defeat to Real Madrid in the Uefa Super Cup.

Van Nistelrooy, who scored 150 goals for United from 2001 to 2006, likes what he sees from the 24-year-old so far and believes it was crucial that he got off to a good start to help battle the pressure that comes with a huge price tag.

"He's done great," Van Nistelrooy said following United's legends match against Barcelona, as quoted on FourFourTwo. "To score in your first games here after you have been transferred for a lot of money, it is nice to get that pressure out of the way and get your first goals in."

"He has done well. Not only scoring but also providing, making his runs and doing his work. So it looks good for the season. There's always pressure to score here – but that also makes it interesting, dealing with that.

"The goals are expected and if you don't score there is a lot of talk about you not scoring. Then there's pressure on the next game."

Jose Mourinho's side are the only team to win three out of three games so far and the Dutchman is optimistic of his former club's chances of challenging for the top honours this season.

"They had a great pre-season and continued that at the start of the league," he added. "The only team with nine points, 10 goals and none against. They have had a wonderful start."

"The Champions League will start now so I'm very excited to see how they will do there. They look impressive at the moment and they can challenge this season for the big ones."