9 Men Chelsea No Match For United

Chelsea 2 - Manchester United 3
Scorers
Chelsea: Mata (44), Ramires (52)
Manchester United: Luiz (og 3), Van Persie (12), Hernandez (75)

Red Cards
Chelsea: Ivanovic (63), Torres (68)

Team: De Gea, Rio, Evans, Rafael, Evra, Carrick, Cleverley (Hernandez 65), Young, Valencia, Rooney (Giggs 74), Van Persie

What a farcical game. Referee Clattenburg sent off two Chelsea players and we bearly beat a 9-men Chelsea.

The game started off really well for us. Van Persie smashed a shot into the upright and Luiz turned the rebound into the net. Van Persie got his name on the scoresheet a little later after turning in Valencia's cross.

We played brilliantly and were fully deserved of the two goal advantage. It was a far far cry from the previous games where we started slow and had to claw our way back into the game. But pound for pound, Chelsea is probably the better team and when they finally shook off the shock of conceding two early goals, they started to play the game.

And boy did they play the game. They were so damn good that it was just a matter of time before they got back on level terms. We were left chasing shadows and that's a gross understatement. De Gea was called into action numerous times and he did a masterful job at that.

We were under such enormous pressure that frustration finally got to Rooney as he fouled Hazard right outside our box. From the ensuing freekick, Mata pulled one back for the home team. The half time break did nothing to break the relentless pressure that Chelsea put us under.

On the 52nd minute, Ramires levelled the scores. Kentona and I were left shaking our heads and wondering just how many this rampant Chelsea team would put past our defence. We weren't bad on the night, but they were THAT good. We had looked good for 30 minutes, but once they realised they had a job on their hands and gotten those shock goals off their system, they were, to paraphrase Robert Palmer's hit song, simply irresistable.

Just as the game probably would have gone out of our reach, Van Persie made a spectacular pass that sent Ashley Young off to the races. Ivanovic was possibly a tad bit unlucky to get a red card as he clumsily brought Young down while in the process of avoiding contact. It wasn't a cynical tackle but according to the letter of the law, he was rightfully given his marching orders. Personally, abit of common sense could've helped.

Even with ten men, Chelsea looked like the better team. That was when the game turned on it's head. Evans came into contact with Torres and Torres fell like a sack of potatoes. We feared the worst for Evans but the referee instead gave Torres his second yellow for a dive. Much has been talked about with regards to diving in the previous few weeks and Clattenburg took a stern approach to it today. The replays were non-conclusive and once again I felt a common sense approach could have been the order of the day. If it happened to United, I would have been screaming bloody murder.

You would think that against an opponent with nine men, it would be easy pickings for us, yet it wasn't. It took an offside looking goal by Hernandez to settle the game. Left to chase the game, Chelsea threw caution to the wind and left themselves open at the back, but we just could finish off the game. If anything, Chelsea looked damn threatening when they came forward, but with only nine men, it was just one giant step too much for them.

I'm just glad we won this game to close the gap to a single point. We started off brilliantly but had to ride our luck before everything just went our way. The result was good, the process was bewildering and I'm left worried at how we're going to cope with Arsenal next week.

United Nearly Pays The Price

Manchester United 3 - Sporting Braga 2
Scorers
Manchester United: Hernandez (25, 75), Evans (62)
Sporting Braga: Alan (2, 20)

Team: De Gea, Evans, Carrick, Rafael, Buttner, Fletcher, Cleverley, Kagawa (Nani 46), Rooney, Van Persie, Hernandez (Giggs 80)

Great comeback victory, but honestly if we hadn't won, this one would be on Fergie. All that nonsense of not wanting to repeat the debacle of last season, and he rests Rio and Evra. Fittingly, Buttner and Carrick were at fault for us slipping into a 2-0 hole.

Lucky for Ferguson, our attack was much stronger than our defence on this day. Riding on the back of Hernandez's heady play (pun fully intended), we managed to claw a victory, but just. Even while leading 3-2, we were playing like a bunch of girls, giving possession away and generally playing like we were having our periods.

Honestly I know I should be celebrating the result, but I just can't help but be pissed off at Ferguson and his decisions today. Other than not playing our strongest 11, he further compounded it by bringing Hernandez off the pitch when he could've had a chance at a hattrick. Again after all the nonsense of resting players for the weekend against Chelsea, he chose to take Hernandez off instead of Van Persie or Rooney, both of whom are almost guaranteed to start at the weekend.

I know Ferguson has been instrumental to bringing United to where it is now, while I would shed a tear for his past achievements, I wouldn't be sorry to see the great man leave in the summer. His loyalty to players like Carrick, Giggs and to a lesser extent Scholes is really wearing my patience thin.

I absolutely dread the prospect of facing Chelsea this weekend. Given the way we've been defending, I pretty sure we'd get murdered at Stamford Bridge. Our attack might give a good account of themselves, but the defence sends more than shivers down my spine.

Better Late Than Never

Manchester United 4 - Stoke City 2
Scorers
Manchester United: Rooney (27, 65), Van Persie (44), Welbeck (46)
Stoke: Rooney (og 11), Kightly (58)

Team: De Gea, Rio, Evans, Rafael, Evra, Carrick, Scholes (Anderson 70), Valencia (Nani 75), Rooney, Welback (Hernandez 78), Van Persie

This was a busy weekend and I've been unable to update the blog. It's probably going to be the same for the next couple of months. Thankfully, I'm still able to catch the game and belatedly share my thoughts. Although I caught the game over at Kentona's place, I spent much of the time playing with his baby daughter and only caught the important moments. With time at a premium, I'm going to do this point form.

- Damn, our three-pronged attack of Rooney, Welbeck and Van Persie was just awesome to watch. Everytime we go forward, we looked really threatening. We scored 4 on the day and really looked like punishing Shawcross and his merry men.

- Damn, as good as our attack looks, our defence looks like it could concede everytime Stoke attacked. Rooney scored an own goal and Kightly sliced through our midfield like a hot knife thru butter. Carrick was left flailing his arms in defeat as Kightly ran past him like he didn't exist.

- Everytime Scholes and Carrick lineup as our midfield pairing, it sends shivers down my spine. Scholes can no longer track back and Carrick is just worthless. Rooney did more at both ends of the pitch than the two combined. I suspect Scholes so hates playing with Carrick that he was on a one-man mission to get himself sent off just to send a message to Ferguson.

- Welbeck has to be our Heskey. He's great at everything, except putting the ball in the net. The majority of chances fell his way, and he only converted one. He's beginning to look like our version of Suarez or Giroud. That said, he does every other thing so well that it's easy to overlook his one major flaw. At least for him, youth is on his side.

- Rooney looks like a new player playing in a deep position. So good that he scored a unique hattrick. Ok, aside from the tongue in cheek comment, Rooney really seems to be thriving on his new role. He covers back well and links up even better with the frontmen.

- Winning this one was huge. Chelsea had beaten Spurs and Shitty kept up the pressure with a last gasp winner. We still look terrible in certain areas of the pitch, but the decision to play Rooney deep seems to be working. Hopefully once the injuries clear up, things would look better and brighter.

- On a separate note, I'm going with Rio on his decision not to wear the Kick it Out t-shirt. Although I may not entire agree with it, I'm going to defend his freedom to choose. Let's just hope he has chosen wisely.

Defenders Lead The Charge

Newcastle 0 - Manchester United 3
Scorers
Manchester United: Evans (8), Evra (15), Cleverley (71)

Team: De Gea, Rio, Evans, Rafael, Evra, Carrick, Cleverley, Kagawa (Valencia 55), Rooney (Scholes 80), Welbeck, Van Persie (Giggs 87)

Man, I'm a bit pissed off that I was pretty high on cough syrup while watching this game. I reckon we played really well, but since I was basically tripping, I hadn't the foggest what was going on most of the time. That said, in my heightened state of delirium, it was immensely pleasurable to watch us pound the living daylights out of Newcastle.

Evans lead the way with a header from a Van Persie corner, and Evra followed with another from a Rooney corner from the other side, and all these happened while I was waiting for Newcastle to romp all over our midfield. Tactically we kinda crowded out the midfield with Rooney and Kagawa along side Cleverley and Michael 'only lateral passes' Carrick. We squeezed out Cabaye and Tiote.

Add to that, we completely dominated the first half and probably could have had more had Welbeck been more clinical. Speaking of which, does Welbeck remind anyone of Heskey? I mean he does everything required of him and more, except putting the ball into the net.

As with all games, Newcastle gradually found their way back into the game and started to cause problems, many of which were self-inflected, especially by De Gea who flapped and flopped at the high balls coming into the box. He's been playing in England for slightly over a year, and he still can't command the aerial threats.

Just as Newcastle looked likely to pull one back, Cleverley scored a superb, albeit unintended, goal to put the result beyond the barcodes. He must cherish playing Newcastle. Having scored his first against Newcastle in the mickey mouse cup a week back, he pops up to score his second in United colours with a cross that inevitably floated into the net.

The result brings us back to the second on the table, ironically on goal difference above Shitty. Too bad we have to endure a bye week of uninteresting internationals, just as the team looks like finding some sort of remedy for the piss poor level of play of the past few months. At least the fortnight rest will be good remedy for my persistant cough.

United Continues To Suffer From Poor Starts

CFR Cluj 1 - Manchester United 2
Scorers
CFR Cluj: Kapetanos (14)
Manchester United: Van Persie (29, 49)

Team: De Gea, Rio, Evans (Wootton 79), Rafael, Evra, Fletchers, Anderson, Cleverley, Rooney, Van Persie, Hernandez (Welbeck 83)

It took a last gasp save from De Gea for United to come away with a victory in Romania. Like most of the games this season, we got off to another slow start and nearly paid the price.

Cluj were defensively tight and were advertised to be the experts at the counter-attack. Well, it was supposed to be common knowledge, except that Evra obviously missed out on the scouting report. Sougou, the two goal hero at Braga, found himself with so much property that if he were in Singapore, he would be the richest land owner. He eluded Evra on the left and found Kapetanos with a sweet cross and all he had to do was to put it past De Gea.

In the words of Ferguson at a half time interview....'it was shocking!'.

The only saving grace is that Cluj is a pretty terrible team and we practically dominated the entire game. With Carrick, Giggs and Scholes all left at home, we started with a midfield consisting of Fletcher, Cleverley, Anderson and Rooney supporting the two frontmen.

The midfield battle was comfortably won as we imposed our will on the game. It wasn't a surprise that Van Persie equalized. Rooney's freekick from the left was looped over the keeper with a lucky bounce on Van Persie's shoulder.

Van Persie got the winner early in the second half with Rooney providing once again. Rooney seems to be thriving in the supporting midfield role with most of everything good United did coming from him. On this occasion, his long raking ball released Van Persie who took a delightful touch to direct it past the on rushing keeper.

With the lead and the momentum on our side, you would think we would have gone on to really plaster the Romanian goal, yet the opposite happened. We shifted a couple of gears down and just stopped playing football. There was a whole lot of nonchalant passing the ball all around midfield. The good thing is that Cluj is built around the counter-attacking game and it kinda put them off their game plan.

That said, without a two goal cushion, there was always an element of luck, and that nearly came for Cluj in the dying seconds in injury time. De Gea made a superb save right at the death to preserve the lead and the points.

Once again, we were our worst enemy. I suppose at least the midfield looks much better today than it has in a long long while, but I suspect a huge portion of that is down to the quality of the opponents. Sadly I think we're going to see Carrick and Scholes back on Sunday at St James. Ben Arfa is going to have a field day with that pairing.