United 4 : 1 West Ham

West Ham have been United's bogey team for some time now. For a team that was battling relegation till the last day, they did extremely well to beat United last year and had beaten United at home in their home fixture this season too. With such a reputation preceding the Hammers, United were bound to be nervous going into this fixture at Old Trafford. The fact that two of their star men this season, Rooney and Vidic, were unfit to play in this one made things more interesting going into this must-win tie for United. But United weren't going to get distracted by any jinxes in such a crucial tie especially after the mighty delight of making it to Moscow. So, a scoreline of 4-1 in the end pretty much sums the ruthless efficiency with which United got the job done.

First half was one eventful period of the match. United had their peddle on the gas right from the word go. Christiano Ronaldo, the man of the season so far, wasted little time in letting his opponents know that he meant business. His goal came as early as in the 3rd minute and that was one goal that could describe the confidence with which he's played all of this season and gone on to be voted the player of the season - he drove the ball in from the half-line, kept pegging, cut-in from the right and unleashed a furious shot past the goal-keeper. West Ham weren't doing too badly on the other side. United had to make one goal-line clearance and were lucky to survive a hand-ball claim against Brown. Second goal came pretty soon after that for United - Hargreaves, playing on the right-back, where he's been doing pretty well, put in a smart left footed cross which, courtesy of some poor West Ham defending, found Ronaldo who smartly thighed it into the goal. Just as it was beginning to seem that United had settled any nerves that existed before the start, there was some real delight to follow - Tevez came up with one of the goal's of the season - a 25-yard scorcher that had enough swerve and pace to easily bamboozle the West ham goalie. So, there you were, within 30 minutes, the match seemed to have been put to bed and United had probably started thinking about Wigan already. But there was more drama to follow - Nani's immaturity seemed to explode unnecessarily and had to be sent off for head-butting the Hammers' skipper Lucas Neil. That was followed by a brilliant Dean Ashton bicycle-kick goal to make the tie more interesting. With United down to ten men, there were fears of seeing a West ham revival.

Following the Ashton goal, United settled down to play the holding game - most of the second half saw United doing that. But West Ham didn't seem to be doing too much to make use of the advantage they had been provided with. United kept the odd attack going and they did score the fourth through Micheal Carrick around the 60th minute. That fourth goal pretty much put the game to rest and United calmly saw through the remaining of the match with little hassle.


United will now head to Wigan where they'd be playing the last game of the season. If they win there, the title would stay at Old Trafford. The focus now is on Chelsea who travel to Newcastle for their penultimate fixture. They need to win that to keep the pressure on United. I'm hoping Kevin Keagan's in-form team will do some damage to Chelsea's title hopes.