Aug 22
Man Utd v Wigan
Will be a very short preview this. I think a lot has already been said post-Burnley that all we can hope for is a response from the side. We travel to Wigan who under Roberto Martinez are committed towards playing a positive, attacking brand of football. On the plus side, it means we should find more space when we have possession. However, a depleted defence could be under severe pressure if Martinez’s tactics work.
Speaking of which, Rio Ferdinand will now be out for a month. This is a worrying trend. Ferdinand from the second half last season was stricken with a lot of niggling injuries, be it his back or groin and I am a bit more worried about his increased propensity at picking up these injuries. Jonny Evans also spoke about the likelihood of undergoing surgery on a troublesome ankle, which means we will be without our main centre backs. However, for now, Vidic will return and Evans will play through the pain. Brown is also thereabouts and O’Shea floats in and about.
I would like Richie de Laet to get a start at right back with Vida and Evans in the centre. Evra would take his customary left back berth. Carrick and Fletcher will play in midfield, with Valencia on one wing and if Nani is fit he’ll be on the other. Up front it will once again be Berbatov and Rooney. Ferguson admitted that his strikers haven’t been upto much and they need to step it up.
I will end this preview here.
Prediction: 2-0 to United.
Related items from Red Rants:
- Rooney Out For A Month
- Man Utd Blog 2007/2008 Home Kit
- Sky Sports Fixture Update
- The need for a right-back and a forward | Title race blown open
- West Ham v Man Utd: Live
Tags: Site News
Opti (541)
Stephen (479)
RedDevilEddy (459)
Craig Mc (345)
Moscow is my heaven (272)
Ps we will not sign Essien, Chelsea are wankers not stupid.
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@Grognard: The Thin Red Line was a WW2 film I always thought was underrated and was over shadowed by the highly overrated Saving Private Ryan.
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@Red Ranter: +1 on that review of the movie, big score for Q and Pitt did better than ive seen him do anywhere else. you know rr you could probably have a much more profitable web site if you devoted your linguistic prowess towards cineofiles instead of we nerdy internet hooligans.
but please dont leave us 
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@Natzca: there should be a sticky or need to know section…
+1
at least a link to a wiki explanation or something.
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@Craig Mc: boars head anyone?
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@Grognard: grogy i agree but i think ando is still being stifled by the instruction to play further back than he should if instead of our modified 442 433 we were in the diamond with fletch in the holding role protecting our center halves and ando up front behind the strikers he would show those moments more often. i cant help but think that he is wasting his time and talent tracking balls back to our own goal line. if he were up front the whole game with berba roon nani and valincia i think his talent would shine.
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@Grognard: your in for a treat and i have the same problem with pit… he ruined burn after reading for me idk why he just did i couldn’t believe his character. but terintino pulled what he wanted out of him and it worked.
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@gator: Anderson is crap, all this talk about potential is masking the fact he has not produces, if he was Scholes people would say he is rubbish and is simply not as good as the underrated Gibson.
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I think Scholes still produces better performance than Anderson…
It is still difficutl to win a ball from scholes…
but the problem with him is that he only see the horizontal side of the field…
verticle passes r very less
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Grog – Quote “I love NANI ” –
. So when did this miracle Nani love arise for you then Grog? Last time I checked you thought he was a softie, content to sit on the bench, without a fight 
. You also thought he had not much of a brain, his decision making being piss poor! Aaaaah Lil Man Nani, everyone is coming round to his enthusiasm, and anyone who isn’t, I have one thing to say to you RESISTENCE IS FUTILE 
, so give it up! .
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I just watched the game again on MUTV
. Valencia and Nani were blaze trailing those wings, with Mad Pat and Red Nev backing up with gusto. How come Nani was always shadowed by 2 defenders though, and Valencia only thought to need one defender to cover him? Some times I noticed Nani was surrounding by 3-4 Wigan players 
. Maybe the Wigan lads thought they knew Valencia from training ground when he was their player. Thought they had the measure of him with just one marker – 
– they came unstuck with that one! is cross made the 1st goal for the Roon.
Berba and Fletcher were like men possessed, who had been inhaling helium all day before the game. I think Fletch thought he was playing Rugby, the way he kept forcefully PUSHING the Wigan players full in their backs – it was such FUN being at that game. We need to do Arsenal now, and I will be happy!
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@Grognard: Black men have sported dreads since the begginnig of time. Your right that it is popular right now, but dreads aren’t going anywhere. Dreads are meant as a symbol of black pride and embracing your heritage.
And to clear something up, Anderson does not have dreads. His hair is braided with extension(too be honest it’s a female hairstyle.
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It’s true that we don’t know what we’ve got until we lose it, but it’s also true that we don’t know what we’ve been missing until it arrives.
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Everton accept £24 million bid from City for Lescott.
My God, if Lescott is worth that amount of money Ribery would be a steal at £60 million…
City and Real are ruining football, making it more than a beautiful game and the best sport ever. They are making it Wall Street or sumthing, for fucks sake somebody has got to end this shit!!!
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@Footy4Eddy: you know you’d love it if we had that money… even more so because with 24million, we sure as hell wouldn’t be buying lescott. but it shows just how much spending Hughes has to do just to make his team competable with the rest of the top four.
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@owen: I hate you
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@Johnsom33: i hear that on the dreads and andersons extensions make me cringe he should just braid what he has. extinsions ARE for females. maby he would shoot better if he pulled them out?
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@gator: rio was poor with braids.. without became a solid leader…. brown was a bit part player with them… without made the right back slot his own… anderson with braids aimless wonderer who couldn’t hit a barn door… without? only some time well spent at the barbers will decide!
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@Footy4Eddy, Manchester City won’t be able to continue over spending like they have done. They wont achieve what they want and they will be a big dissapointment for player, manager and the owners. It is not easy for them to displace any of the top four teams in EPL.
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Didn’t know that Terry Hall was (is) a United fan!!!
Respeck!!!
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@Craig Mc: If I lived in England again I would wear a fucking mask. No it’s not because I’m butt ugly, but because everyone is under surveillance!!
What with the fucking CC cameras and the fucking Speed cameras and now the video evidence to try our beloved CB, it would feel like my privacy is being compromised.
What you say, big brother!!
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Eddy I agree the transfer fees this summer are just insane. But there is still good value to be found.
Real have inflated the prices of “galacticos” in line with their transfer strategy. Manchester City have inflated the price of the B-Premiership stars-by that I mean players who have done well in clubs outside of the top 4.
If we avoid those two segments of the market we can still find good value. Also by now everyone has realised that City and Real have done their business for the season so we are not competing anymore with them for players so I think we have a reasonable chance of snapping up the stars those clubs have ignored.
For example Valencia have money problems and failed to sell either Villa or Silva to Real for crazy money. While they may be hoping that Real come back next summer for them they could be tempted by the prospect of money now rather than later. If we put in a £30 million bid for David Silva I think we’d have a good chance of success.
But outside of that there are still lots of good players out there. I just don’t think our scouting network is very good. We rarely unearth gems. We pay over the odds for players who do OK outside the top 4 (and like I discussed City have inflated that market segment and that is part of the reason we got ripped off for Berbatov). We also pay top dollar for youngsters that have already been discovered by everyone else such as Nani and Anderson (you could also add Ronaldo but that particularly gamble came off in a BIG way).
I like our “new policy” of looking for good value. But given the mediocrity of our central midfield I absolutely refuse to believe that our scouts cannot identify a single player who could improve our midfield who would be available at a good price.
As for City. Their project isn’t sustainable. Not so much because of the transfer fees they pay but the way they allowed wages to spiral out of control. However I think before they are forgotten they will break into the top 4 for a season or two. Not this season but perhaps the next season. But I never see them winning the Premiership or anything in Europe because they fail miserably at attracting world class players and haven’t unearthed any future stars either-everyone they bought is pretty much playing at full potential.
No disrespect to Mark Hughes but I think they’d be taken much more seriously if the Arabs had managed to get a top drawer manager with more pulling power.
Compare this to Chelsea. Even before the money arrived they had some very good players. And they spent their money wisely on the hottest prospects such as Essien, as well as world class players like Carvalho.
Buying players who were never quite good enough to make it at a big club or be snapped up by one, is never going to win you titles or trophies. At best it can get you fourth place.
So much for wanting to be biggest club in the world. Keeep dreaming City
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@colver: I think “good value” is not a term that should be used when talking about United in the transfer market. It really seems to insinuate the idea of “cut-price” or “bargain-basement” or “we can’t afford the top talent”. And when it comes down to United, I don’t want anybody that could be categorized as such.
We have the ambition to become the best team and after Ronaldo’s sale, we should have the money.
If the marketplace determines that the likes of Lescott goes for 24m, then that’s the price it takes to acquire someone of his caliber. Of course, if you want someone better or more valuable to you than Lescott, you’ll need to spend more!
We are not a Wigan or a Portsmouth, or a Liverpool, come to think of it, so why are we so concerned with value and less concerned about talent??
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@Grognard: I’ve been thinking a lot, lately, about our down years (perhaps 1969-SAF) and without a real, firm understanding of what issues created this abyss I decided to do a little research about our managers.
These are the combined stats of post-Busby to SAF managers compared to SAF himself.
Winning % – SAF = 58.44, Others = 44.54
Goals scored per game – SAF = 1.80, Others = 1.53
Goals allowed per game – SAF = 0.89, Others = 1.10
Trophy’s won – SAF = 28, Others = 10.
Without question SAF has been the dominant force in recent United history – these stats don’t lie and paint the familiar picture of success we have all grown used to.
I then took a look at the past two seasons to see if there was any validity to the claims that SAF was “loosing it” through age, senility etc., etc. – and I found this.
Combo of 2007/8 and 2008/9 seasons.
Winning % = 67
Goals scored per game = 1.86
Goals allowed per game = 0.64
So in fact, instead of loosing it, he’s actually getting better!!
It doesn’t show the entire complexion of his abilities but certainly the ones that matter the most.
If we were to concentrate our efforts on what it is that ails our team, I do think that it’s the squad of players and perhaps not our manager that need an overhaul.
Why we haven’t delved into the transfer market beats the shit out of me. I can assume this or that and probably one day things will become evident. But to pin our poor performances on SAF does go against every grain of logic as I see it.!!
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@owen: Don’t believe everything you read at Newsnow. Look at the source for crying out loud. Is it the Guardian, or SkySports or the BBC? No. It’s a unscrupulous rumor creating blog.
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@colver: It’s amazing how the rumour mongers work. They see Carrick is in the dog house so automatically they create a fantasy story to link him with a move to another team. It’s such BS.
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@gator: Well I hope most of your customers do not watch the movie because then they will stop eating prawns.
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@owen: Oh please. Arshavin, Fabregas, Gerrard, Lampard, Ballack are all better than him and they also have a more physical presence in a game and are as easy to phase out of a game with a shove and a tackle. Modric is light weight entertainment. Put him up against a tough good team and he disappears like the illusionist David Copperfield. Jesus this site is full of bandwagon jumpers of late. Three games into the season and we are crowning Spurs as the champs I guess.
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@owen: It’s called rotating. He rests his players too. Obi Mikel needs some time to play and so he gave him a chance. One of the problems Chelsea has had in past years was that they rarely rested their starting eleven. Ancelotti said a month ago that players were going to get more rest because he feels English teams have seasons that are too lengthy.
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@RMJ: He’s a slow starter slow in the middle and slow at the end. In fact, you’d have to try really hard to prove to me that he isn’t perpetually slow. Slow starter, slow footed and slow to get the hint. If he doesn’t smarten up and wake up, what I can guarantee is Fergie won’t be slow to put him on the first train out of Manchester.
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@RMJ: And yes, we have five mediocre and very average midfielders. Chelsea however have 3 world class midfielders and if you count Deco, Joe Cole, Malouda and Zhirkov, then that would be 7. Our midfield is a joke compared to theirs and Barcelona’s. Arsenal has Arshavin, Nasri and Fabregas, Liverpool has Gerrard and Mascherano who are world class. Who is world class on United? Please tell me.
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@Stephen: Actually I think Jones could not only clean his boots, but with that hair, he could buff them and shine them up very well.
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@Stephen: Saving Private Ryan was overrated? I think your point of view is overrated.
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@gator: Nah. Anderson is being stifled by his lack of talent and his lack of intelligence. He’s a stupid player and he is a very slow and very poor learner. Talent is not limited by the part of the pitch they inhabit. Rooney was not tailor made for LW but he played well there anyway. Great midfielder can play anywhere in the midfield and as far back or as far forward as they need to. Anderson has severe limitations due his abilities or lack of. It’s time we stopped making excuses for him.
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@Craig Mc: Craig, I’m not even dignify that with a rant. If you constantly ignore my posts and don’t read all the Nani love I produce, I can’t help you. That’s really really unfair.
Loving him does not make him immune to my criticism. Only Riquelme is immune to criticism from me.
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@Grognard: SPR was the very best WWII flick there was.
I was in Normandy 3 years ago, went to the beaches, and the reality of what that movie portrayed made the hair on my neck bristle with fear.
Spielberg is a master of making movies, this was his masterpiece!!
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@Johnsom33: There’s no boundaries on bad taste mate. I couldn’t care less about cultural or racial pride. Ugly and tacky is ugly and tacky in my world. Life lesson 101 from the upcoming book titled “The World According to Grognard”. Soon to be a major motion picture.
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@Craig Mc: He punched him and deserves to be punished. It amazes me how we can crucify Michael Ballack for sweet fuck all but Nemeanja is an innocent bystander. Remember what I said about being a hypocrite mate?
Still, three cheers to Vida for showing some Keano style grit.
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@Redrich: No question about what Fergie has done is not just great as far as United is concerned but he is arguably the greatest club manager in the history of football period. And nobody is questioning his results over the past few years. But look at the way the team is playing. The style of play, lack of pace etc. It’s not pretty and it’s not United football. Our defense has been better than even during the Schmeichel years but our midfield and our overall play would have been considerably different over the past six years without Ronaldo. Ronaldo was a god.
This year Fergie goes through a major transition without the world’s best player, without the energetic Apache and lets not forget, he;s a year closer to 70. We honestly cannot expect the man to perform the kind of miracles without Ronaldo and without spending the money that we got from Ronaldo. It’s just not going to happen. Unless we play Wigan another 35 times.
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@Redrich: Totally agree mate. SPR is an immense well crafted and highly emotional masterpiece where the Thin Red Line is nothing more than a beautifully photographed and highly pretentious, overly indulgent poem. Mallick is a surreal and overrated director bloated by his own ego and self importance. I think he must have sucked Kubrick’s dick at some point of his life.
I have never been to Normandy but it’s a must see destination for me on my dream trip which is to visit all the great epic battlefields of Europe. Hallowed ground indeed. I consider myself a military history expert and WW2 is my expertise as well as the age of Napoleon. The opening and closing 20 minutes of SPR are the most gut wrenching and highly charged minutes of violence and the horrors of war I have ever seen. No time there for endless poetry and close up shots of flora and fauna. In fact, I rate Saving Private Ryan as my third favorite film of all time behind the Return of the King and the Godfather. Definitely the greatest war film of all time only because I refuse to categorize Schindler’s List as a war film. I would also rate about 40 other war films above a thick boring film like a Thin Red Line.
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@Grognard: Playing Wigan every week would be good!!
But seriously, the role of management can only be assessed over a period of time because of the up and down nature of a teams individual talent. If SAF is directly responsible for assessing this current squad and concluding that it’s good enough to compete in all competitions, I would have to challenge his judgement there.
However I do believe we are dealing with a much more sinister force that just an error in judgment. Its because of this that I try to solely focus on what I see as our weeknesses – ie our CM and our Forwards, and question why, why, why… haven’t these areas been upgraded!?
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Well I saw Inglorious Basterds today and i must say it was quite enjoyable even if it is high fantasy and a total butcher job on history. For what it is it is a highly enjoyable and very funny homage to a style of film and a style of publishing that was very popular in the 60′s and 70′s. Tarantino is a very stylish director and he has a n eye for specific types of details, especially when it comes to dialog. Quite graphics and intensely violent yet funny in the way these atrocities are carried out. Sort of like a Zombie picture. For me this film is a homage to the B Movie king Roger Corman. I expected something like the Dirty Dozen but the film is closer to a bad taste and satirical take on the Dutch film Black Book (a film I highly recommend).
This is the first film I have ever liked Brad Pitt in. He has always been like Tom Cruise and Leo DiCaprio an actor that despite his talent, always rubbed me the wrong way. In this film he takes a great comic turn in his character that really elevates the film and makes it highly memorable and very entertaining. I have no problem with the fantasy element and the raping of history as this was an intentional tool of Tarantino’s and he pulls it off well. I do have a problem with the length of the film as he takes numerous scenes and really drags them out far too long. A tighter cut of the film would have been far greater and more Diane Kruger 9preferably naked) would also have been a much needed requirement. Christ she is just too gorgeous. No wonder she got the role of Helen of Troy. She could launch my ship any day.
A great film and a fantastic performance by the German Jew Hunter played buy Austrian Actor Christoph Waltz. He’s just awesome in this movie.
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@Redrich: Fergie will do a good job with this team. They will win a lot of games and be highly competitive. But they are not good enough to win the league or win in Europe. And for me, that’s all that counts. When you are number one, I do not believe in rebuilding, I believe in reloading.
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@Grognard: Sounds like this flick is worth a viewing.
Tarantino is a bit heavy handed for me, although I loved Pulp Fiction immensely and still watch it with great glee and snickering!
Some of his other efforts, notably the Kill Bill series, became tedious and overly reliant on violence.
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@Grognard, I guess you are right about carrick and Anderson in the sense that there’s been more hype than delivery! Lots of fans credited a lot if our last three seasons to Carrick’s arrival too, “steadying the ship” and “drops the ball on a six pence” were popular opinions. I have never been convinced, he is a good player but not good enough for us. Anderson after his debut has been found out, he has failed to improve and in fact after his injury has been worse! We both agree that both are not good enough, but i think there’s more to come from Anderson, he needs to play a few games continuously. I still hope we can have some one come in for him/them and we bring Silva, I just think Fergie’s hands are tied and i would rather see anderson being given more chances than gibson! Hope I am wrong about us not being able to spend though
!
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I have to eat humble pie today and officially apologize to ben foster. The guy was immense, he saves we spectacular especially the header that was looping above him, fucking great save. Keep it up ben.
But my main man Berba proved his doubters wrong, the guy was class throughout.his sleek cheeky pass thatt scholes hammered above the goal would have been a contender for goal of the season, but his goal, well that just speaks for itself.
Another player who totally impressed was one darren fletcher.I think without a doubt our midfield conbination should be fletcher and anyone other midfielder, but darren fletcher should always be in the game.If anything we seem to not loose when he is playing.
All in all great performance, one concern though, it seemed like wayne rooney dint want to pass to berba, he was always looking for other options but never looking for berba, hope i’m wrong though.
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@Redrich: I personally love Kill Bill and it’s my favorite Tarantino flick (I consider the two one log movie split in two in order to make money). I love the violence when it is done with style and a sense of humor. What I love about his films is the great dialog but sometimes his scenes run too long and get too wordy and for me that’s a bit self indulgent. Still, Basterds is a fun summer flick, not to be taken too seriously but full of merit nevertheless. Although Hitler would disagree by saying NEIN NEIN NEIN NEIN NEIN NEIN.
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@Venu: I like Carrick but he just seems to possess no pulse most of the time. When he is on his game he is quite good but that is one out of every five games and that’s just not good enough. He occasionally has quietly effective games but all I can say is that Xavi and Iniesta don’t go through a season having quiet but effective games. They take games by the throat and shake them up. Frankly, the best word I can use to describe Carrick is “boring”. Park is “useless”, Fletcher is “bland”, Scholes is “tiresome” and Anderson is “nauseating” as well as “exasperating”.
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@spizzy: Don’t be so premature with that apology. I praised him too but I’ll be damned if I let one good game change my opinion of him. Stop being so fickle mate. Nothing worse than a bloke who is so easily swayed and who jumps on and off the bandwagon so much he has to check himself for bruises. Foster has to give me quite a few games before I get off his back and accept him as the heir to EVDS.
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