Sitting in my seat, scanning the latest edition of Red Issue before kick-off, we were shown the new Hublot scoreboard. Manchester United 0 Blackburn Rovers 0. What the fuck?
A few moments earlier, as I’d climbed up the stairs I’d been confronted with one of the things I detest most.
Having a look around, it’s something Arsenal, Chelsea and Liverpool also sell, amongst other teams I imagine, but I find it so cringey. I’m not in to the NWAF business. I know enough birds who know their shit where football is concerned and these women also wouldn’t be seen dead in this pink crap. Why the fuck does our club sell it? Embarrassing.
So, the day didn’t have the greatest beginnings…
…but then the team-sheet was read out and Tim Howard got a clap whilst Phil Neville got a cheer. Things were looking up.
Within the first fifteen minutes, you had to hope United were going on to win this. Park had a goal-bound cross/shot brilliantly saved by Howard, before a shot from Tevez minutes later resulted in a goalmouth melee. Another few minutes passed and Tevez ran the ball 20 yards down the field, only for his shot to be blocked. With 25 minutes played, Ronaldo’s shot from distance didn’t look as though it was going to trouble the keeper, however somehow it beat the keeper and came back off the post, Tevez flagged offside as he got to the rebound. Two minutes later Ronaldo had a shot saved by Howard, then out for a corner. Half an hour played and Ronaldo neatly flicks the ball over the defender’s head, for Carrick to control on his chest then volley goalwards. Sadly, it finishes on the wrong side of the post.
Then, finally, the break through. It had to come sooner or later following our dominance and Arteta was the man to help us. Initially missing his tackle outside the box, the Spaniard turned and could Carrick with his trailing leg. Slow motion replays make it look more sinister than it actually was, but it was a definite penalty.
John O’Shea, who wasn’t as bad as he has been, cringingly ran over and hugged Carrick in celebration. There’s something so classless about celebrating the winning of a penalty, particularly when you’re not desperate for a goal. We weren’t losing, it was the first half, so there was plenty of time.
Ronaldo scored for the 11th time in the league this season, making him the second highest scorer, despite missing the first month of the season and not playing particularly well yet. He managed to track back a total of zero times yesterday. On the odd occasion or two he’d pretend to track back, chasing the player who’d just taken the ball off him to the half way line, before giving up and letting Fletcher or Carrick have a go. Yawn, so tired of him irritating me.
Wes Brown on the other hand, playing at Old Trafford in the league for the first time since the opening day of the season, showed fantastic grit and determination. I think it’s safe to say that after his 56th minute substitution, Brown won every challenge, whether he was favourite for it or not. In the air or on the ground, he put 100% in to everything, including bombing down the wing and knocking in a ball or two. Great to have him back!
Everton rarely, if ever, looked dangerous. Unlike Liverpool, who allowed Tim Cahill to roam around the box from corners and set-pieces in all their recent games over the past fortnight, Nemanja Vidic, who has arguably been the best player in the league so far this season, took it upon himself to man-mark the tricky Aussie. From the few corners and free-kicks Everton won, Vidic stuck to Cahill and that was Everton’s goal-threat dealt with. Van der Sar, who claimed the English league record for minutes without conceding a goal, after breaking Petr Cech’s Premiership record earlier in the week, had little to threaten his record.
All in all, a very good day in the end. Having played the same amount of games as Chelsea and Liverpool, if only for a day, United have found themselves five points clear. We’re an impressive 10 points ahead of Arsenal, who have played a game more than us.
Carrick was interviewed after his Man of the Match performance, questioned over whether he’d prefer a Chelsea or Liverpool win on Sunday. He nonchalantly responded by saying he didn’t really care, that it didn’t effect us. Whilst most of us will be hoping for a draw today (preferably through Liverpool taking an early lead, only for Chelsea to equalise in the last ten minutes), it is nice to see the confidence in our lads.
Don’t forget about the Denis Law t-shirt competition!
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Agreed.
Unnecessary behaviour from O’Shea.
Let’s hope for a good 3-3 today.
A draw and an entertaining match.
lets hope for lots of injuries and suspensions today
lets hope vidic enjoys the next 7 days rest
he deserves it
lets hope liverpool enjoy 3 games played before united kick a ball again
Scott a bit harsh, I think we really need to give Ronaldo some time off, after playing near 50 games last season, then playing for his country, then having surgery, then recovering early from surgery and being thrown straight back into the team, then playing pretty much every game since, even when ill, be it because he’s selfish (one way to look at it) or he wants to be in the game to help the team in every way (another way) even when Ronaldo plays shite, he takes two of the opposition players with him whereever he goes and the day they stop double marking him, he’ll be back on fire ‘cuz 1v1 he tends to finish on top.
Tell you what, Vidic, what a monster, not only did he have Cahill in check, Fellani barely won any headers at all despite being (what seems) a foot taller than him!
Just heard this think its great,
to the tune “when johny goes marching down the wing”
Hes half a girl and half a boy TORRES TORRES
he looks just like a transvestite TORRES TORRES
He wears a frock
He likes the cock
he sells his arse on albert dock
fer-nan-do tor-res
carrahgers bit on the side
That pink shit is terrible. I think i’d rather kill myself than wear those horrible ‘girly’ things. The worst thing though is the fact that chicks actually buy them and wear them.
I can understand O’Shea.With the Portsmouth cup exit fresh on everyone’s minds,when you are not taking your chances you tend to get very nervous.Especially if you get at halftime 0-0 it’s very easy to get frustrated in the second half.It’s classless to celebrate a penalty only if it’s harshly given.Anyway,i think that the 9 games in a month sort of showed in the second half.It’s understandable.What’s comforting is that United can win games even on nights like this.This 8 day break comes at a great time.The players(especially Nemanja) will have a chance to recharge their batteries.We will need a fresh team to beat West Ham away.Nonetheless congratulations to the lads for a terrific January.They won 8 out of 9 and they have won 12 out of the last 13 games in total.And i think it will be a while before the players have another 7 day break.I don’t think Ronaldo needs a rest.He just needs to realise that last season’s achievements won’t be repeated.I think recently he is starting to get to grips with that.
All we want at Anfield today is a 22 popped hamstrings and 22 straight reds. Other than that a gruelling draw would do.
Scott is cracking up he’s cracking up he’s cracking up he’s cracking! ….
Im not one for celebrating winning a penalty but it was O’shea the kop killer so i’ll let him off.
Vidic has been rock solid all season what a class defender he is, Vida Carrick and Giggs have been world class of late and Berbatov is showing his class aswell we’ve got the likes of Evra and Rooney to come back soon, happy days.
That is one of many differences between us and the dippers. United can hold on to a one nil lead!
It will be a dull boring game today with both teams just cancelling each other out. Haven’t got the creativity or class to do anything else.
this was on a liverpool comment page
a poem wrote by a liverpool fan
it doesnt have a name so i think i’ll name it
GOTTA LOVE THE CONFIDENCE
The Rafa-lution is wearing thin,
Sir Alex Ferguson is sporting a large grin,
The fans are tiring of Dirk Kuyt,
The journalists fear your sanity is slight.
You think that football is a game of chess,
But your rotation policy just creates an awful mess,
Your zonal marking cannot work,
Your substitutions are beserk.
You want the freedom to buy and sell at will,
But your team selections make our chances nil,
You’ve never understood the English game,
Your post-match excuses sound really lame.
After 5 years, I think the jury is in,
And I’m sorry to say, Rafa, the Premiership, you’re never going to win.
Posted by: Gordon McCabe | 31 Jan 2009 17:18:15
haha, keane’s out the squad again…it just gets funnier and funnier this season, the entertainment now is not about whether we’ll win the title or not, it’s about predicting which one of the three other self-destructing top four will end up in 5th…Berba for £10million more and we were gettin called over-spenders by degenerate scousers…bring on the champs league, might be bit more of a test for us
Agree with the words in defence of Ronaldo & O’Shea, but in truth the criticisms were right. Agree even more about how awesome Vidic, Carrick & Giggs have been this season. But now it’s a good moment to savour the aesthetic pleasures of Berba’s passing. Don’t you just love those grass-skimmers that he curves round defenders with the outside of his foot, tantalisingly close, but so-far-away, straight to the feet of a team-mate with perfect weight, opening up space on the flank or through the middle. He’s getting better and better, hence the smile on his face.Oh and finally, I love the Torres song. Hope he doesn’t wipe the smile off our faces today though.
I gotta say.. Pink scarves and hats, who gives a fuck? If people want to wear them then fine. Some girls are girly and like pink.. Least they go the game..
O’shea, classless celebration of the penalty award but I think he’s done alright deputising for patrice.. He’s been a part of this astounding run of clean sheets.
Ronny, looks to me like he’s getting back to what we expect of him, keep showing him the love cos it’s only going to be to our benefit..
Come on United
vidic will get ya15 – love it! fucking drag queen Torres, looking forward to seeing Rio deal with him when the dippers come to OT.
Scott – there was another instance in the game where Ronnie was looking around at his team-mates whilst an Everton player was running with the ball, a ball he could of easily won had he made the effort, that really irritated me. Great to see Brown back. Looking forward to the return of Rooney and Evra at West Ham next week.
Vidic bets player in prem this season? I;d argue that with the much underrated Phil Jagielka.
Anyway you deserved the win yesterday (despite on another thread your flawed analysis of the Lescott incident – you claim Arteta had no intent but made contact so = penalty. Ferdinand had no intent but made contact with Lescott = penalty ) and from this point on you should win the league (rather you then the other lot from across the Stanley Park). Sadly as Moyes said it looked ‘one game too far’ for our boys yesterday and as such I can only see us losing to the Norwegians on Wednesday.
Loved the Torres song – fair cheered me up after yesterday! Good luck for the rest of the season and hopefully Terry will snap the Spanish Tarts leg today.
Blue – Arteta’s contact was enough to make Carrick fall over (he did try to stay on his feet). Lescott made the choice to go down. Rio wasn’t pushing on his shoulder, forcing him to the ground, he just was making contact. Lescott did what Ronaldo would have done in that situation and if Ronaldo had done that against Everton you would have laughed off United fans claiming it was a pen!
Naa…. I think its all a bit harsh on O’Shea…..
I think what it basically shows is the hunger of the lad….All of the home-grown lads like Gazza and O’Shea have it built into them…. The passion and will to win for the team is I think makes them react like they do sometimes. After all the criticism of him this season, he’s come in when our defence looked completely awful when we were conceding goals for fun against Hull and Blackburn and Arsenal (3, 3, and 2) and at a time when there was no Ferdinand and Evra has helped Vidic and the rest the clean sheets record is amazing. He’s played in 10 of the last 12 games hwen we’ve set our record and this shows his value….I just think it was his passion and hunger coming through….
Thats all!
@Blue: vidic has been the best defender this season by a country mile. Good luck on wed. Just to digress, how come there has been no fuss over wright-phillips kicking an opponent? Needless to say if that was rooney……..
@ Blue: I’ve been very impressed with Jagielka this season, I have to admit (although it *is* a little easier to do with him being a United fan
), but would he do as well without Lescott, Baines and Hibbert as Vidic had to do without Brown, Rio and Evra, setting records along the way? He’s absolutely immense for you’s, granted, but I think Vidic is a clear winner between the two. Good luck against the red$hite!
@PeeJay: 3-3!?! This is Liverpool-Chel$ki we’re talking about here mate
! The best we can hope for are a couple of deflected goals from Fat Frank and Xabi Alonso, otherwise we’re in for another no score bore.