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.