Rooney Seals Passage To 5th Round Of FA Cup (Manchester United 2 - Portsmouth 1)

We rested Ronaldo while Rooney was placed on the bench as we faced Portsmouth in the 4th round of the FA Cup.

It should have been a routine win had it not been for a couple really bad linesman decisions. Early in the 12th minutes, Vidic thought he had scored from a corner. He headed the ball beyond the goal line before Mendes could clear it. It was as clear as daylight but the linesman's view was probably blocked and play was waved on despite the protests from the United players.

Early in the second half, Larsson was brilliantly put thru by Neville and he volleyed a sensational shot into the goal but was flagged offside. The TV replays once again showed otherwise.

Beyond the 2 incidents, we were dominant throughout the game. A combination of poor finishing, brilliant defending by Sol 'Judas' Campbell and an utterly in-form David James conspired to thwart all our efforts on goal.

For almost 80 minutes, the feeling I got was that the Football Gods had decreed a goalless draw, despite our best efforts. Cue Wayne Rooney off from the substitute bench.

After some piss poor passing from the Portsmouth players had gifted us the ball, Giggs drove down the line and cut a beautiful ball back to an unmarked Rooney for a simple tap in. 6 minutes later, in the 83rd minute, Rooney scored again. This time, there was nothing simple about the goal. He took the ball outside the box, took a look up and sublimely chipped David James. Old Trafford erupted in spontaneous euphoria. Shades of Eric Cantona. It's moments like this that I wish our jerserys still had collars.

Unfortunately, Arsehole Wanker was right. We've been having the penchant of conceding late goals and right on cue, we conceded a late deflected goal from a Mendes drive in the 87th minute. It not only took away the gloss of victory, but also gave us a few nervous minutes to see out.

The lads need to learn to concentrate until the full time whistle blows. While Ferguson didn't look bothered by the late goal, happily soaking in the Old Trafford atomsphere, even allowing the luxury of signing autographs before the final whistle, it must still have bothered him somewhat that Wanker was spot on in his assessment. Perhaps it's time to send the lads to 'concentration camp' (South Park reference S5E11).

Positives to take from the game
Giggs rolled back the clock today. He was at his best, twisting and turning opponents, probably breaking a few ankles in the process.

Carrick was not Mr Invisible today.

Evra looks good going forward, but I still cringe when he's defending. However, he might turn out alright.

Rooney looks like he's back to his best. He's playing like the burden's off.

Not So Positive
Might be missing the midweek game against Watford since I'd be on reservist. !@#%^ army!

Arsenal Sinks United With Two Late Strikes (Arsenal 2 - Manchester United 1)

As mentioned in the last game review, I was attending the 'wedding of the year' and caught this game at the hotel room after it was over.

Thankfully I had plenty of alcohol before watching this game. It was a scrappy affair with neither team really able to play their usual brand of exciting soccer. Baring the last couple of minutes of the first half, where Rooney and Larsson have superb chances foiled by Lehmann, the entire half was a non-event.

Early in the second half, Rooney scored his first headed goal after Evra had made a nice, determined run to cross a sweet ball to him. After the goal, I had assumed the worst result would be a draw and promptly fell asleep. As long as we made ground against our closest rivals, Chelsea, it was good enough for me.

Unfortunately my sweet dreams were dashed when the entire room of soccer fanatics I was watching with, screamed goal twice in a span of 10 minutes. Arsenal had clawed their way from behind to win with a last minute headed goal from Henry, after Van Persie had equalised earlier. I'm glad I had taken a large dose of alcohol to numb the effects of this defeat.

The only silverlining I can draw from this defeat is that we still did manage to gain ground on Chelsea by improving our goal difference. Of course getting a more concrete gain in points would have been ideal, but I'm taking this moral victory as part and parcel of supporting United.

Having lived thru the 80s, I'm just glad we're in today's position. At the same time, I pity my glory-hunting Liverpool fans who cheered so loud when Henry scored the winner. I'm sure they would love to be in our position, with a 12 point advantage over our rivals and 6 above anyone resembling a football club.

Na na na na na na, na na na na na na.

January Transfers : We Have Gone Insane

Bid for Owen Hargreaves
Yes we have indeed gone insane. United formally put in a 30 million euro bid for Owen Hargreaves. That makes out to roughly £19.7 million, slightly more than what we paid for Carrick.

Is Hargreaves really worth that much money? More importantly, is he that good? Or is it just because he is English? My head's spinning right now. To make matters worse, he's not even fit, still recovering from a broken foot. If we get him during this transfer window, it wouldn't be till somewhere in March before he regains full fitness. Then there is the problem of getting used to playing with the squad and the style. And we haven't even addressed him settling down to playing in different leagues. A fully fit Carrick certainly took his time to adapt.

What's really obvious here is that we're getting desparate as the transfer window draws to a close. I don't understand why we can't wait till the summer to get Owen. He'd have the entire pre-season to get used to playing for us. Haven't the lessons of bringing in Vidic and Evra in the January window been learnt?

Personally, if that brain dead board of ours diligently put a bid of Scott Parker, we might get him on the cheap. And I have no doubts he'd be a better player than Hargreaves. The silverlining here is that Baynern Munich hasn't barged yet. But £20 million is alot of stupid money being flashed out there and I'm sure the Bayern board is infinitely smarter than ours.

Rossi To Parma
Not quite AC Milan yet, but Rossi has been loaned to Parma till the end of the season. If one recalls, we raided Parma when they disbanded their reserve system to save money and got Rossi.

Let's hope Rossi gets the playing time he desparately needs. Whether he's willing to return after the spell remains to be seen. He has afterall expressed interest in playing in Italy, specifically mighty AC Milan.

Dong FangZhou Gets Work Permit
After spending 2.5 years in Royale Antwerp, Dong FangZhou has finally gotten a work permit to play for United. How good is the Chinese international remains to be seen. What's astounding to me is that he's scored 30 odd goals in 60 plus games for them. That's a pretty healthy goal ratio.

I'm curious to see how he pans out in the physically more intimidating EPL.

Oh, and how many extra jerserys we can sell in China.

Carrick Celebrates His First (Manchester United 3 - Aston Villa 1)

This was an utterly convincing victory. At least in the first half it was.

Right from the kickoff we stamped our authority and were all over Villa. Villa, who hasn't won in 12 outings, were shocking in defense. In the 10th minute, they twice failed to clear the ball and Park punished them with his first goal of the season.

A couple of minutes later, Park squared the ball back to Carrick at the edge of the penalty area. With no semblence of any form of defense, Carrick was left all alone and all the time in the world to control the ball and punish Villa's utterly dismal defense.

In the 34th minute, Park was yet again the torn at the Villa's defense when he stripped McCann and found Carrick with a pass. Carrick took a moment to look up and found Ronaldo at the far corner with a sublime cross, which the newly crowned player of the month of December needed no sencond invitation to head United into a 3-0 lead.

To be honest, we could and should have puniched Villa with more goals. Such was our dominance and Villa's ineptness .

Early in the second half we took both feet off the paddle and were duely punished for our complancency when Baros slashed right thru our left flank and placed a sitter for Agbonlahor to put into an empty United net.

That goal woke United up and we again pushed forward with purpose, but without reward this time, despite coming close a few times. Tactically we were also naive, trying to play the ball thru the middle after having been successful in tearing the Villa defense via the flanks in the first half. Whether this was a delibrate attempt to see if this new tactic would work or not remains a mystery to me.

Whatever the case, this was a good win against a team we had struggled to beat a week ago.

What really concerns me is that the entire midfield is very reliant on Paul Scholes. Everything in midfield goes thru him. The players don't seem to be looking for Carrick enough. I'm just concerned that when Scholes is rested (you can't expect him to play every single game), there is no one able nor experienced enough to take up his load.

Next week we face Arsenal at the Emirates. I probably wouldn't be able to catch the game, since I would be attending the 'wedding of the year'. Let's hope vengence is on the minds of the lads next Sunday. I sure would love it if we beat the gooners in their new stadium.

Ole To The Rescue (Manchester United 2 - Aston Villa 1)

I practically missed this one due to the 'stag party of the year', and only caught a few moments of the game. I'm torrenting this game, but chances are it'd only be completed by the year 2010 at the current rate it's moving (or not moving).

Larsson scored on his debut. From what little I've seen from the game, he's truly a wonderful player. He's got more up in his brain than our entire strike force put together. Yes, I'm thoroughly impressed with the glimpses I caught. I wonder if there is any chance at all of actually signing him for the remainder of the season instead of just 3 months?

When the chips are down, Ole is the one to count on. He's still as clinical as before. An instintive strike in the dying moments brought us thru to the 4th round.

United Fails To Beat Spirited Newcastle (Newcastle 2 - Manchester United 2)

On paper this was supposed to be a game which we should have won convincingly, especially given the kind of injuries Newcastle was facing. But as we all know, there are no such things as easy games in the EPL, especially against a team who has Titus Bramble injured. There hasn't been a more convincing case of addition by subtraction here.

We started the game playing better, but failed to take our chances. As the game wore on, Newcastle, led by Parker, grow in confidence. With the crowd behind them, they deservedly took the lead in the 33rd minute with a stunning strike by James Milner.

That goal galvanised United out of their slumber. We attacked with purpose and were rewarded in the 40th minute when Scholes danced thru the entire Newcastle defense and scored.

Both teams traded punches with neither able to beat the opponent's keeper. The game was flowing and it was end to end stuff. Probably one of the best ends to a first half I've seen this entire season.

Given what had transpired in the first half, the second half was a let down. Scholes gave us the lead in the 1st minute when the game resumed, and United went back into sleepwalk mode. I personally fell asleep until Newcastle scored the equalizer with 15 minutes left in the game. 19 year old Edgar, a youth defender brought up into the first team only because of their injury problems, scored from way way outside the penalty box.

I was expecting a avalanche of United attacks, but it never really materialised. It was more of a cough and splatter kind of response. All credit to Newcastle who defended stoutly and played well.

In truth we lost 2 points in a game we tried to sleepwalk through. However given the schedule, we've done well in this festive period. We took 10 points out of 12 and I don't think any team even came close to that record. And on top of that we're 7 points ahead of Chelsea, who has a game in hand. Let's hope they continue with their piss poor defending against Villa tomorrow.

Ole's Stamp Of Approval

If Ole says he's good enough, that's good enough for me!

From Football365

"It is a joy to be in the same dressing room as Cristiano," revealed Solskjaer.

"He is always smiling, which just shows how happy he is.

"His finishing is excellent and he produces crosses which strikers only have to move to get on the end of.

"The thing is, he is always practising. He always stays after training for half an hour, or sometimes, an hour just practising. Sometimes I wonder if he is doing too much. I certainly cannot do that at my age."

Good to know Ronaldo is happy here as well as training hard. When was the last time we read/heard about a player training extra hard? That's right, the legend, Cantona. This time round we have a 21 year old doing it. I'm sure Ole left out the names of the others who stayed back as well. This team is hungry, and it's showing!