"Much ado about nothing" - that was the feeling you would have got after watching Man United put to rest any claims their city rivals Manchester City were making of threatening the supremacy of the Red Devils over the city of Manchester. The Red Devils came up with quite a clinical performance to silence all that City had to say since their Arab owners had declared to take Premier League by storm (of oil money!). The score obviously doesn't tell you the exact fashion of United's victory but believe me Manchester derbies are tough ones to win and United's display made a mockery of several pandits' prediction that it would the beginning of City's domination of United at home!Man City had been deemed the most likely team to challenge the dominance of the 'Top 4' this season thanks to their ownership change which brought-in Talismanic players like Robinho. But City haven't really lived up to their own expectations so far - and have been lying in the middle of the table for most time. Having said that, their league-double against United last season, which was shocking to say the least must have given them some confidence of challenging the European champions at home. On the other side, Sir Alex Ferguson was not going to be the one to let last season's derby debacle go unavenged. So United pretty much went in full strength - young Rafeal on the right back was probably the only eye-bro-raiser. And how well the champions showed who're the Manchester bosses is a story to tell. Man United were on their money all through out. They won every minor battle there was to win on the field and kept going closer and closer to the goal right from the start. Rooney, Ronaldo, Evra, Berbatov all had shots on goal - only failing by small margins. The possession was controlled by United for most part of first half. But the first goal looked elusive and in contrast, United could have conceded at the other end when a Steven Ireland's shot hit the post. United made up for the missed chances well in time before the break - Rooney poached on an easy chance when Carrick's shot was only palmed into Rooney's path by Joe Hart. United deservedly went into the break with the lead.
Second half wasn't too different to start with, with United controlling the game well. But neither of the teams came really close to scoring. And around the 70th minute there was a bizarre sending off - Ronaldo, instead of heading what looked like a sitter of a ball to score off a corner, just tried to block off his face using his hands. Howard Webb straight away went for Ronaldo's second yellow inspite of him indicating he heard a whistle! So United were left with close to 25 minutes of defending to do with 10 men. And how well United achieved that is a testament to United's character. City couldn't really utilize the advantage and United defended well and smartly held on the ball whenever they got the possession. Rooney almost had his 2nd goal towards the end when Joe Hart had come into United's territory but made good ground to stop the shot. But in the end it didn't really matter.
With that United have achieved a difficult away victory and some ground on their main title rivals Chelsea who lost at home to Arsenal this time. Things are looking up for United again!
Glory Glory...
2 comments:
Was that another infamous tricks of Ronaldo? Looks like a handball to me. What? Did he do a volley-ball smash into the net or something and ref. didn't see it as usual? Ronaldo must be offering something to the ref. after such games, don't you think?
Naah..it was just a reactionary thing...I think he was honest on that one. I can see what he meant. He thought he heard a whistle then realized there's no point heading the ball and tried to avoid the ball hitting his face. The fact that the he kind of had a free header there proves it.
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