Nov 02
Man Utd 4-3 Hull City: United Make it After Late Drama
United completed a victory against giant killers Hull in, what could have been, emphatic fashion but for a second half where the team conceded two goals to lend some drama to the occasion.
Fergie started with Anderson and the returning Carrick in central midfield, whilst Nani and Ronaldo were stationed in the wings. Gary Neville made a return to the musical chair that is our right back slot and Rooney partnered Berbatov up front.
It would have been reassuring for Tevez to have started the game but we all know Fergie seems to prefer Rooney over the Argentine — especially on current form. [As an aside, it should be noted that the only way Tevez is going to play at anything approaching his pre-season form is by making him play regularly -- something he's not getting lately -- and it's a sort of a Catch-22 situation for the manager.]
Hull have impressed all around with their ability to mix it with the small and mighty of the Premiership, so they were always going to have a go at us. However, as with first season over-achievers — like Wigan and Reading in the past — we’ve brushed them aside. And the first half performance showed just that.
True to type, Ronaldo returned to his goal scoring ways. Another brace follows the one against West Ham and he looks approaching his prolific best. It looks more like a confidence thing for him as he seems to be enjoying playing now. I know there seems to be too much being made of his body language lately, but his demeanour looks to be in direct correlation with his confidence and form.
A word on Berbatov, again: he may seem the most languid player on the pitch, but has undeniable class, and, more importantly, he heads the Premier League assist table (6 assists already); I suppose they were all from open play. He’s a top, top buy and I absolutely love the player.
Nani seems to be improving and looks to be showing a lot of improvement, and we seemed to lose a bit of shape after he was taken off.
Carrick’s return was welcome too, and if he can take more leaves out of the Fletcher book of making surging runs into the box, then he’ll become undroppable; he’s already very important for our ball retention, but if he adds goal scoring threat to it, it would be bloody awesome.
Of course, this was a side that was dominant and led 3-1 at half time. Upon resumption, they were 4-1 ahead. Then why the final scoreline? Were they just plain bored? Did they forget that the game extends beyond 45 minutes and that the second half was not a training exercise? Did they contrive to fluff the 4695 ridiculous chances that were on offer? At least Fergie seems to think so:
“We’re a bit low after that performance. We didn’t take our chances and that’s annoying. We should have scored 10 or 11 but we frittered our chances away and we’ve almost been left embarrassed. The only positive from today is that we’re creating chances. We’re playing some fantastic football at times. Ronaldo could have scored four or five. I don’t know how many chances Berbatov made today but we could have scored a lot of goals.”
Michael Carrick, who after returning from injury also makes a return to the press, thought it was due to some poor defending.
Those were the cracks that I thought I shouldn’t paper over. United must not go on one of those very frequent switch off modes where they invited the opposition after clobbering them, as if to say, ‘Hey, looks like I roughed you up enough. Now, come on. Hit me!’. It isn’t good for the heart, really.
On the whole, however, I suppose there’s been good football played till now and I believe some team will get absolutely spanked by us, someday. Significantly, Liverpool and Arsenal dropped points which also helped push us to number three. Despite Liverpool’s performances in the season so far, I still think Chelsea is the machine we’ve got to worry about.
Next up, Arsenal at the Emirates with a fair few injury worries. Considering Arsenal’s current situation it looks like the best time to be facing them.
Anyway we’ll discuss the gooners later on during the course of the week. At the moment kindly, excuse me as I head off for wee little nap to rest my tired eyes.
Related items from Red Rants:
- Rooney Out For A Month
- Man Utd Blog 2007/2008 Home Kit
- United Betting: Rooney to score, United to win?
- West Ham v Man Utd: Live
- Porto it is then…
Tags: Match Reports
Craig Mc (195)
RedDevilEddy (170)
Opti (136)
Moscow is my heaven (96)
Ian (95)
@Red Diablo: What really pisses me off is how some games are released in Europe before North America when they are made here. I had to wait three days after the North American release date to buy FIFA 09 here in Vancouver and the game is developed a mile away from my house. Just pisses me off as I am kid when it comes to this stuff and I am incredibly impatient in general. I still have to wait two weeks for Gears of War 2 but at least Tom Clancy’s End War is out on Tuesday. That game looks to be the bomb for sure. Voice activated control of military tactics in a WW III scenario is just making me wet thinking about it. Hope it doesn’t disappoint.
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@colver: Veloso is overrated but versatile. He would not be a bad pickup as he is friends with our Portuguese contingent and that would create more harmony on and off the field but there are better players out there. Man I would really like to see Marco Senna. He was the player of the tournament at EURO 08 in my opinion. I think he has a lot to offer. Problem is getting him and making him want to come as well.
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@Aron84: We are creating enough chances. It’s our finishing that stinks. I don’t know what our percentage is on scoring from good chances but I bet you it’s less than 20% which of course means 2 goals in 10 chances. That’s not good enough in the EPL. Most games you will be lucky to get that many good chances to score. The team needs to hit over 30% for the scoreline to look more respective to the actual dominance on the pitch.
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Everybody is looking at the midfield and other areas of the team for letting Hull’s score three goals. Actually if you look at the replays two of the three goals were Evra’s responsibility. In the first one he was not close enough to the guy who scored (admitedly it was a very good cross) and in the other one Mendy dummied him far too easily. He is a very good attacking full back but he has always been defensively suspect and it showed on Saturday.
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@Aron84: I agree with the RB point. Wes was brilliant at RB last season. He’s a good defender (nevermind the bollocks that he is a weak link). He’s even progressed in terms of attacking play in the RB position (not great, but still good enough), and has a good understanding with Ronnie. Why screw it up by getting Neville games ahead of him? Beats me.
About the topic of the hour – the defensive midefielder, Senna is great but he is out of the age bracket now. Abrahomovic would have Essien killed before he can move to United. Getting DeRossi is unlikely. I see no ‘readymade’ product for us to buy from other clubs. We’ll either have to mould someone existing to play the role, or take a gamble by buying someone unproven, or get someone from the resreves (Gibson I dont see as United material, but maybe I’m wrong in that).
About the game, getting Carrick off was the first BIG folly. Getting Giggs on for him, was the second BIGGER folly. Getting Nani off was the BIGGEST problem I had with the whole match. How I miss Queiroz!!!
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Rooney’s temper is getting just getting more out of hand. Someday he’s gonna kill an opponent and get a life-term or something, and we’ll be screwed.
Why not send Rooney for some meditation and Yoga to the Tibetian monks for a week. Tevez can play a full game, Fergie can check out if Berba and Tevez can click, and hopefully the shaven madman comes back a little more at peace with the rest of the world.
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@Rahul:
Rooney was acting like a rabid dog out there, wasn’t he? Maybe Coleen wasn’t giving him anymore action.. I heard that’s what marriage can do for your sex life. 
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@Gabriel:
Yes, rabid he was.
In the last minute of the match he dove into what was a vicious challenge on the flanks. Though he got the ball, it was pretty apparent that he was too ablaze with anger to do anything else.
Having said that, he played 2 exceptional (no.. genius) passes in his ‘Enter the Dragon’ mode after the yellow.
Pray Fergie, counsel the boy!
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@Gabriel: Well maybe Rooney was a thug to Colleen in the sack also
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@Rahul: Rooney doesn’t need counselling from Fergie mate. What he needs is for Fergie to do what Capello does with him, make Rooney realise 1 strike and YOUR BENCHED
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@Craig: That would work too!!
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@Rahul: sorry but I don’t agree. Rooney was just frustrated on Saturday because nothing was going his way. The fans and media are pressurising him to score his 100th goal. The sooner he scores this the better because this is starting to get out of hand after only 2 games without scoring. When he sees Nani blaze a shot over the bar with him standing in space or Berbatov waiting until he has a defender on him when he was clean through is going to make him frustrated
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@Liam: I know he was frustrated, just that his way of venting out his frustration is becoming more aggressive in tackles n stuff. which is risky!
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Damn I forgot about Lassana Diarra. He would be a good option and is playing well below his level at Portsmouth.
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@Liam: That does not excuse his childish behavior. Honestly I wish people would be less selfish and concentrate on the big picture. You don’t want any actions taken against Rooney because you want the team to win and to hell with the laws of the game and common decency and fair play. Rooney is out of control and he needs to be sat down by Fergie as a strong message that his temper tantrums and yellow cards will no longer be tolerated. It’s bloody well time he grew up and got the pugilist attitude that lives in his family out of his system.
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@Grognard: Keane was getting sent off well into his 30s. Hell, Eric Cantona kicked somebody over the advertising boards! Did Fergie try to change them? NO! It was their passion that made them the players they were. For every moment of madness you got 10 moments of brilliance. People seem to always need something to criticise him for
it was a bad tackle, get over it. Countless other players have made them and countless others will make them. Rooney is just observed through a microscope and anything bad that he does is blown way out of porportion. Would the same big deal have been made if let’s say Paul Scholes or Steven Gerrard had made it?
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@Liam: Cantona kicked the guy over the hoarding, and got himself a long vacation. He didn’t repeat the thing again. Keane was a midfield general, his job was to track those s.o.b’s down and stop them at all costs, so it was part of his job description to make hard tackles. Paul Scholes does get panned for his tackles (maybe not by Fergie, but by most others). Screw Steven Gerrard.
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