Dec 30
Manchester United vs Wigan Athletic: Preview
Betfair is the official Manchester United betting partner and we here at Red Rants have partnered with them to offer a free £25 bet when you register. Unlike other betting sites, Betfair allows you to place bets when the game is running and choose the odds at which you want to play. What allows you to do these things is you’re betting against other fans, not the bookie, so if you want better odds than are currently available, for example, you can place an order for a better price (but bear in mind that if your price is unrealistic your bet is unlikely to be accepted). So, give this a run if you’re up for it.
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The games come thick and fast during this time of year and later today Manchester United face off against Wigan Athletic at Old Trafford in their last match of 2009. United find themselves in a favourable position in the Premier League, if they win this match that would take them back to within two points of Chelsea at the top of the table. Considering our form of late and the less than convincing performance over Hull at the weekend, we must look to push on and continue the title fight.
Due to Edwin van der Sar’s absence for family reasons, we wish him and his family well; Tomasz Kuszczak will continue his stint in goal and hopefully continue his fine form.
Wes Brown and Nemanja Vidic both returned from injury against Hull and after assessing their fitness it is expected both will retain their respective places in the United side. Rafael also returned to the side and should start at right-back, while the ever present Patrice Evra will play in his usual left-back slot. The usual list of absentees continue to watch from the sidelines, those being Rio Ferdinand, John O’Shea, Jonny Evans and Gary Neville. Fabio and Ritchie De Laet will again find themselves on the bench.
With the defence slowly returning form injury, this gave Darren Fletcher and Michael Carrick a chance to prove their worth in their natural positions. So expect to see them both in a settled midfield line up, Valencia will no doubt play against his former club and Ryan Giggs will continue to gain match fitness after being substituted at the weekend. If Giggs isn’t deemed fit to start then another player short of match fitness, Ji-Sung Park will be given the nod.
Up front we have the usual suspects, Wayne Rooney will look to furthermore make up for the mistake that so nearly cost his team and Dimitar Berbatov should be in line to start once more. Michael Owen is expected to be on the bench once more. It looks like Sir Alex Ferguson will stick with an unchanged line-up, the first time this month.
Since being humbled by Tottenham 9-1 the Latics have come back fighting and proved tricky opponents. Wigan boss Roberto Martinez is optimistic of his side’s chances,
“We know it’s a monumental task but we’ll enjoy it. We’re going to go there and try to nick it. Their home record is outstanding and they’ve got such a big squad but we’re all excited to be going there.” While also showing his admiration for Sir Alex, “It’s a tough challenge but it’s always great to go head-to-head with probably one of the best managers ever in world football,” he said.
Wigan go into the match with no real injury worries, Mohamed Diame is the only player missing. Despite their good performances of late, they are without a win in four. The record in all competitions against Wigan makes good reading for us, we have won all 10 previous encounters, scoring 30 goals and conceding just four. The omens look good indeed.
The main threat will be from Hugo Rodallega; the Colombian has scored seven times this season and has proved to be a key player since his arrival form Necaxa last January. However, they have conceded 39 goals in 18 league games so a clean sheet looks unlikely.
Wes Brown is in a positive mood ahead of the match,
“We’re in a confident mood now and hopefully we can keep that going against Wigan,” he stated “We’ve got a good squad, me and Vida (Nemanja Vidic) are back now and we can hopefully go on a nice little run and keep winning.”
After a tough few weeks it seems as if the wheels are back on, so three points it is.
Prediction: 2-0 United
Probable Line Up: Kuszczak, Rafael, Brown, Vidic, Evra, Valencia, Fletcher, Carrick, Giggs, Berbatov, Rooney.
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Betfair is the official Manchester United betting partner and we here at Red Rants have partnered with them to offer a free £25 bet when you register. Unlike other betting sites, Betfair allows you to place bets when the game is running and choose the odds at which you want to play. What allows you to do these things is you’re betting against other fans, not the bookie, so if you want better odds than are currently available, for example, you can place an order for a better price (but bear in mind that if your price is unrealistic your bet is unlikely to be accepted). So, give this a run if you’re up for it.
Related items from Red Rants:
- Manchester United vs Wigan Athletic: Match Preview
- Man Utd v Wigan
- United Try to Tighten Grip on Title Trophy Tonight at Wigan
- Wigan Athletic v Man Utd: Preview
- Brucey We Owe You One!
Tags: Manchester United News
Opti (541)
Stephen (479)
RedDevilEddy (459)
Craig Mc (345)
Moscow is my heaven (272)
@CraigMc: Do you realise that we’ve had one of the best games of the season, everyone’s happy in here…EXCEPT you? That’s what happens when you start supporting certain shitty players over the entire team. Relax mate, enjoy the win and the new year!
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David May is so bloody honest. He has just said in post match discussion on MUTV, and I quote him – “We have had so many BELOR PAR performances this season, and this was against one of the lower teams, and I will reserve judgement until I see if we can do this against the big boys coming up soon! I love you May-sie, as honest as the day you were born. So all of you in DENIAL – take note of what the PROS are saying!
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@CraigMc: What a load of crap. You’ll make yourself believe anything just to keep your vigil going won’t you? Valencia was fantastic today mate, not just ok. I’m not a big fan of his but let it be known right here and right now, I am fair and I call a spade a spade. He was magnificent as was the “WORLD CLASS” Rooney and Rafael may help me stop fantasizing of Philip Lahm, if he continues to play like this. Bro, you are losing your war against Valencia and Rooney I’m afraid.
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@CraigMc: Well what does that say about you when Nani has zero good games and you build him up to be George Best?
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@antsBoy: I am honest mate, and just putting things into PERSPECTIVE, but all you rah-rah boys just go right ahead deluding yourselves
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@CraigMc: I bring up Nani because you say valencia’s performance was ordinary yet we all know if that was nani it would be ‘ In your face people! what a goal!2 assists…suck on that fergie!etc…Nani makes one assist and has a complete tossers performance and we know what we get! Your point regarding Valencia are so biased its unbelivable… 2 assist and a goal mate??thats ordinary? And thats only what resulted in a goal, the whole game he was dangerous, I think you dont want to admit that he had a good game, but yea no one can force you too but….
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@Grognard: Tell someone who cares Grog!
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@CraigMc: You really didn’t watch the game today did you? I could hear the THE WHOLE GAME. Although I imagine you watching the game in the dark with the sound down waiting for that ever tinier glimpse of Nani sitting behind the bench and then boom. Freezeframe……..
That’s gross man. Stop doing that.
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@CraigMc: It just makes no sense to me mate and it’s also not catchy enough to be a winning insult.
DIRE: Definition
1. Also direful disastrous; fearful
2. desperate; urgent a dire need
3. foreboding disaster; ominous a dire warning
Now those all fit Park and Anderson and Foster but I swear, I do not see where DIRE fits Valencia. At his worst, he has been far from dire. Sorry mate, I’m just confused. Perhaps if you would be so kind as to explain your meaning of it?
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@Taehr: Yeah right, anything you say mate. Watch Valenci-DIRE in the big games eh! By the way where have I ever told YOU or anybody else not to like whatever player you want to like eh? You can ALL like and give accolades to who you like, but trouble is everyone else doesn’t have to agree with you – right? I don’t care if it is me against you all – I am just saying it how I see it. I wouldn’t have Valenci-DIRE in my team, and you wouldn’t have Nani in yours – so bloody what mate – diddums, we disagree – big deal!
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@Grognard: Dire to the people of Salford mate means WOEFUL, bloody awful – that’s how I see Valencia. What amazes me is that we have been so poor this season, that people have lowered their expectations to believe that players like Valencia are the second coming of CR7. I certainly don’t get it, but hey – I am just a punter so fret not eh?
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@CraigMc: Ah come on Bro, you know this has everything to do with Nani. It burns you to the core to see Valencia play out there instead of Nani because you believe (as I do), that Nani is a better player and that he has been treated unfairly. Well here is the thing, I think Nani has way more skill than Valencia but his temperament, his attitude and his lack of a solid work ethic in games as well as his lack of smarts at times keeps him from impressing for United. He seems to rise to the occasion for his country but for us, he is usually quiet for the whole game but is then always able to make that one winning play that lasts five seconds but that you rave about for a month. Fact is he has never played hard or well for 90 minute ever. He has his few short spurts of genius and that is it. Valencia worked his ass off tonight so that even if he hadn’t had a goal and two assists, he was not going to be in the manager’s doghouse for lack of work ethic. Like I said earlier, it’s time to call a spade a spade and although Nani is very talented indeed, he is a lazy moody slacker who just does not fit well with this club. There i said it. Now I will whip myself for my blasphemy. I like Nani a lot but even I have to ask myself sometimes….WHY? As for you, well it’s become a religion and I cannot help to think that you would be better served to have selected a much better player to lust over.
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@CraigMc: Your hate is out if control today haha.
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@CraigMc: On that we can definitely agree on. I want us to beat somebody good like this.
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@Traverse: I watched the GAME, watched it, not just listened to it – but I WILL REPEAT, seeing as you are so good at listening, listen to this as I repeat it – WE WERE PLAYING WIGAN, and if Valenci-dire can’t be specatacular against the little minnows, then who can he be spectacular against – NOBODY mate, because he is just about there in most games!
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@CraigMc: No you dont and fair enough your right noone can make you like Valencia , I bet if he scored 15 goals + this season( which he might! hed be DIRE or whatever the hell you say but to say hes shite in a game he made THREE goals,or every game for that matter, thats….hmmm…
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@Johnsom33: Johnsom mi man – it is just putting all the rah rah ism into perspective mate, until we can give this kind of performance more consistently, and against the big boys. I think our best game was against Chelsea, but we couldn’t put the ball in the net. So NO I am not confident our strikers are that good in the BIG GAMES.
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@Taehr: One thing to say in reply mate – WIGAN, WIGAN, WIGAN. It was WIGAN not Barcelona or Real Madrid mate!
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@Grognard: I’m sorry Groggy but you are wrong, however if you want to play psychiatrist – you just go ahead to your hearts content mate.
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@CraigMc: Is that the best you can do mate? Come on!
I expected a little more fight from you or at least some intelligent and passionate rebuttal. Instead I got something similar to the old schoolyard comeback “I know you are but what am I?” Pretty lame mate, but I think I know why? Simply put Bro, you have no ammunition to fight back with. Tonight you have been exposed. Your anti Rooney and Anti Valencia vigil has been drowned, and it appears that it has squashed the fight right out of you. Hurts to be wrong. You are often very correct but your anti Rooney campaign was comical to say the least. I know you still haven’t seen the light, but at least you are getting a strong dose of humble pie because as far as Wayne is concerned, you were always alone in the wilderness with that crusade. The jury at least is still out on Valencia, despite his solid performance tonight. So you still have some hope. May I suggest you start an anti Anderson, Foster and Park campaign if you want to recruit followers or believers. It’s called the safe option. I admire your guts to go after Rooney though. That took courage to go after such a good player. 
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@Grognard: We’ll see if I am losing my war when the BIG games come along then won’t we Grog
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@CraigMc: Thanks for the explanation bro. Still, as much as I have seen Valencia play this year, he is far from dire. He is frustrating at times and annoying but he has also had more than his fair share of solid games and moments. If you really want dire, I would pick on Park and Anderson. For they truly never offer a positive in any game the play.
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I want one answer for my question…
How Wigan Beat Chelsea????
Plz answer me
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@CraigMc:
Yah right. You go with that if it makes you feel better mate.
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PIG – 8 By now he has nothing to prove as to being a
goodgreat shot stopper. Would be great if he was kept as no.1 even when Edwin comes back to really give him a chance.Evra – 7 Usual Evra. Needed the rest.
Vidic – 7 Didn’t do that much, but Wigan were rather poor in attack has to be said.
Brown -7.5 A few good tackles preventing dangerous Wigan opportunites.
Rafael – 8.5 Great going forward, superb crosser of the ball (actually better than Valencia) and scored a goal. Improved in defence too.
Park – 6.5 Good running and kept momentum of attacksm, but poor passing.
Carrick – 7.5 Good goal. Good energy and passing.
Fletcher – 7.5 Good energy, good closing down and passing.
Valencia – 8.5 3 assists + 1 goal. Should stick to low crosses from now on, as he can drive them in; normal “high” crosses, less so.
Rooney – 9 Vintage Roo. Improved passing augurs well for us.
Berbatov – 8 Goal, assist, could have scored more but was wasteful early on. Good energy (for him) and made god runs (that Park failed to spot more than once)
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@CraigMc: Really?? I didnt know that mate! Im not saying it was Barca! but your saying he played Ordinary which he didnt! whether we were playing wigan, barca or Orlando Pirates…he can only play wats infront of him and today he was great…whether you like it or not anywayz he could have scored 5 goals and still played shite to you so ill leave it there goodnyt lads! And On to LEEDS!!!!
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@CraigMc: Well lets see now mate. How many big games are there in a season? 6 maybe 8. That means there are 30 games where the player does show up and plays well. I’ll take that. I too like players who show up for big games but the EPL season is not a sprint, it’s a marathon. If he shows up for all the games that are not big and plays well, then I think he more than pays for himself. Anything else on top of that is gravy. You see, I would be more upset if he didn’t show up for Wigan and Wolves but had the occasional good game against Chelsea and Arsenal. Nothing i hate more than when a team or player plays well against good teams but loses against those teams that should be a pushover. If we win the league this year, it will be because we managed a 38 game season better than the rest and not how well we did against Arsenal, Chelsea and Liverpool.
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Valencia was good today But when i compare his performance with Lennon against Wigan,I concluded than Valencia has not done any miracle today.That day against Lennon ,Their left back was given 0 rating by Goal.com but today it is 3 .
So there is no reason that we get so excited today.We played much better against Chelsea but were not able to produce a goal.
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@Grognard: That good player has been playing SHITE for most of the season mate – end of! If that isn’t calling a spade a spade, then what is. Anyway, I see that this thread is BUZZING with all your retorts to my sparring with Rooney and Valencia comments – but I never take it to heart or get offended – I bloody love it. If I can fight tooth and nail woth all the DIE HARD Rooney fans on the terraces, sabre rattling with them all, and still coming out holding my corner – then that is BANTER of the highest order mate. I can tell you at the end of that game, even the Die Hard Roon fans told me they had had so much bloody good FUN during the game
I enjoyed their comebacks, as I do everyone’s one here. As Delia Smith shouted to the Norwich crowd, “Come on lads, lets be having you”. 
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@owen: Aaaah Owen mi man, an HONEST United fan, and a TOP GUY. Well said Owen, and of course you are right
.
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@Grognard: You really believe Valenci-dire will show up in 30 games and play tops –
you slay me Groggy 
.
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@Taehr: Could have, would have, should have, scored five goals
, thats the story of My beloved Man United’s season mate. Could have, should have, would have 
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@NicoQB: Nico FFS Bro, you are not trying to bring some sanity to this debate are you?
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@Grognard: It does Groggy – I feel soooooooooooooo good
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@Grognard: Park did so much better than Valencia when he came on for him in the Hull game. I think most United fans agree with that!
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Can’t resist any more… CraigMC, your random USE of caps LOCK makes you LOOK really stupid.
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@CraigMc: Oh so we didn’t get 3 points for that? Oh that’s ok then. Cause it’s only Wigan it doesn’t count. The same Wigan that beat Villa and Chelsea this season. Oh cool. I can’t wait to see how many of our games don’t count this year.
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@RM: That, and what he’s saying….
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@CraigMc: At least you are having fun with it mate. Cheers to you for that.
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@CraigMc: He’s already had a number of good games mate and has 7 goals. I’d say he has played well in 75% of his games but has really struggled in 25%. That’s a decent return, even though you and I would prefer something a lot better than that. Don’t get me wrong, I’m still on my Milos Krasic crusade. As far as I am concerned, he is what I would like to see patrolling the RW in the future
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There was a lot of English hype but I still feel that Foster is a better keeper than PIG. PIG is still not commanding at taking anything above head height in the area and doesn’t communicate with his defence as well as Foster. Foster gets more distance on his kicks and I think you can see that the defence knows this and occasionally there are mix-ups when it comes to PIG sweeping up through balls. In fairness to PIG this may because of the constantly changing defence as well as a lack of playing time. I think that Foster’s mistakes have more been through errors in judgement/nerves rather than actual deficiencies in his game. PIG’s flaws have been evident throughout his United career whereas Foster generally has been much more solid and looked like a Utd no 1 in the past when filling in (e.g. Carling Cup final) which I think is the defining difference between the two.
PIG deserves his chance, and I certainly commend his attitude. He hasn’t done much wrong but he looks like Almunia a fairly consistent goalkeeper but with flaws in his game that can cost you a match, whereas Foster I think has the tools to succeed here long term but needs to sort his head out. That said, at this moment in time we definitely should be looking to invest into a long term keeper with the VDS situation.
All that said, PIG is quite comfortably the number one at this time though I don’t think Foster is a bad a keeper as is made out a lot now after a run of bad games after being solid beforehand and I don’t think much has changed with PIG from when we bought him i.e. he’s a competent keeper when given a run of games.
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@CraigMc: Park did sweet fuck all and for him, that was an improvement.
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@Grognard: Park’s endeavour made the second goal vs Hull. I’d hardly call that sweet fuck-all.
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@Dan: Top post mate. I agree with you.
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Did the Wigan die?
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Wow! What a game! Loved it. Honestly, staying awake till 1 30 in the night to watch this game was worth every minute of waiting. It is games like this that give you that warm fuzzy feeling inside eh? The one that RoM was describing.
Observations:
1. Valencia was excellent. This was the first time I noticed him crossing with his head up. Usually it is run past the defender and cross without lifting his head to see who is there.
2. Till the 20th minute I was cursing Valencia because none of his intended crosses could actually connect. He was fantastic after that. Valenica puts in a great defensive shift too, something Ronaldo never did.
3. Rooney loses possession very easily because he tries too many special things which look like magic when they come off but he looks like an idiot if they do not. This was his magic day. Again, in the initial five ten minutes he lost the ball more than anyone.
4. Rooney by the way is world class and deserved two more goals.
5. Rafael is an excellent crosser of the ball.
6. Park is less intelligent than all of our other players. His brain is just too slow. I noticed atleast three times when Berbatov was in a better position and calling for the ball. I noticed Rooney is similar great positions too and calling for the ball but Park never passes to them. I noticed tons of times when some player tries something but Park is just not on the same wavelength and hence possession is lost.
7. Welbeck is dumber than Park. I just do not see what Fergie sees in him.
8. Brown is one hell of a tackler. Loved his tackles today.
9. What happened to Vidic? He asked to be taken off? Madrid calling? I despise those goons like none before.
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@owen: You are as good as your opponent makes you out to be mate. If the LB was given a rating of 0 it shows how damn good the opposing winger was. That said, this is still Wigan and are still shit. I thought Kirkland was the most useless of the lot and was rightly substituted. He just could not save anything at all.
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Oh, seems Chris Kirkland was playing with a bad back.
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Perfect win for United, what more can you expect, but still a lot is required. But we need a good striker in this transfer season. Someone like Bent or K Jones.
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Rafael doing that blowing kisses/beating heart thing towards fabio. I bet Gary neville never did that to phil. I’ve heard rumours they shook hands once in 1998.
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