Rooney's Royal Goal to the rescue

Reading 0 : 2 Man United

Wayne Rooney rescued United from what looked like another slip-up through a smart goal to keep United ahead in the race. Reading surprised everybody by employing an attacking approach all through the match. It had to come from a side managed by an ex-United player, Steve Coppell who seemed to have thought that attack was the best form of defense against United. And it seemed to be working for Reading for much of the 90 minutes.

For a change, United didn't look as potent as they've been lately. Ronaldo and Rooney struggled to take their chances. Ronaldo in particular, with the confidence of a hat-trick behind him, seemed to go for the goal from all angles. But every time he seemed to struggle to hit the target and was evidently getting frustrated with himself. With Reading playing an attacking game, it looked like an end to end encounter and an entertaining one at that too. In fact, Reading seemed to have better chances in the first half - at one instance, they almost scored only to be denied by some desperate defending by Nemanja Vidic. The best chance of the half for United was the Owen Hargreaves strike off a free-kick that almost sneaked into the top corner.

United looked determined to score in the second half. But it was pretty much the same story with their attacks. Ryan Giggs came close to scoring off a parried Hahneman stop, but it wasn't to be. United seemed to be getting frustrated with not taking their chances. The dejection could clearly be felt by looking at Ronaldo who almost seemed to come to tears for wasting the chances - just shows the kind of perfectionist he is! But when the goal did come around the 77th minute, it was such a relief. And it came off the famed right foot of Wayne Rooney - he smartly flicked a Tevez pass past the keeper. You could see from the celebration as to how relieved he was specially as he hadn't been among the goals the past few matches. Later, Ronaldo made amends for all his misses by scoring the second in the dying moments, on a counter attack.


It was a tough victory to say the least and I think much of the credit should go to the United defense for keeping the spirited Reading from scoring. Tough victories such as this, away from home show why United indeed are the title favourites.