Being a Manchester United fan comes with some responsibility: you just have to taunt every single Liverpool fan you come across and if you attend games, make the atmosphere incendiary - it would really help players. In return, you are the fan of a club who has a divine right to domestic success and your team plays some of the nicest football out there. Or not.
There was huge anticipation ahead of the Barcelona - Man Utd game in the Champions League semi-final. Many bloggers or journalists or drunk ‘experts’ (call them what you will) made everyone believe that this would be the game of the season. In all fairness, the game wasn’t all bad. Messi was outstanding, Xavi and Iniesta had some blinding moments and even Thierry Henry looked on form. The only problem is that these were all Barcelona players.
Continue reading “A disgruntled fan’s views on the Barca game”
Sir Alex must have been behind plenty of transfers in his time in football. It adds up: a new centre-back every three years or so, countless midfielders, even more goalkeepers and a few strikers, but one position he has not touched in a while has been the right-back position.
Continue reading “Should United keep Brown?”
Since Peter Schmeichel left Manchester United after that game, it always seemed that we had a weakness to find good goalkeepers and bring them to the club. Sir Alex tried everything: Mark Bosnich, Tim Howard, Roy Carroll, Fabien Barthez. Nothing seemed to work. It looked like Schmeichel left a ghost behind to haunt everybody who tried to replace him successfully.
But then, after becoming utterly frustrated and bored of experimenting with goalkeepers, he went for the sure choice: Edwin van der Saar. The Dutchman nearly joined United in 1999 before he opted to move to Juventus, but he then moved on to Premier League side Fulham and Manchester United had no problem snatching him from the Premier League strugglers. Suddenly, Schmeichel’s ghost vanished.
Continue reading “On Kuszczak and Foster”
One thing we ought to have learned yesterday is that Ferguson is a tactical genius (in case anybody ever doubts him anymore). I doubted him. Reading the line-ups before the game, I was shocked: Ferguson was being experimental!
Continue reading “Man Utd 2-0 Bolton: Ronaldo Usurps Best”
It was a very bizarre weekend, the one that just passed; it gave Man Utd fans a lot to think about. The defeat at Portsmouth was one thing: a rather infuriating encounter which will have given their fans cause for pessimism. But the blows which Arsenal and Chelsea suffered were of another nature, a sort of a remedy after such a poor display for the Old Trafford faithful.
Continue reading “The need for a right-back and a forward | Title race blown open”
Behold! Squeaky bum time is approaching and approaching fast for Manchester United and if you think that I am talking about the remaining five fixtures that Fergie’s men have left in March, you are gravely mistaken. Nay, it is not March which worries me, but April… that is a different story.
Of Manchester United’s eighteen possible fixtures left, nine of them would be next month. Aside from the four Premier League fixtures, they could have an additional four Champions League games and, if they get past Portsmouth on Saturday, the FA Cup semi-final is conveniently placed between the two legs of the Champions League quarter-finals (in place of a Premier League fixture against Middlesbrough).
Oh, did I mention that they will also be taking on Arsenal and Chelsea?
So onto the actual fixtures:
Continue reading “Manchester United’s tough, tough April fixtures list”
