Dull game ends with a 1-0 home win; Sunderland is poor and Manchester United are
average.
Old Trafford was packed, the
surface was heavy but it would match the expectations of a home win. Roy Keane enjoyed a warm welcome to Old
Trafford; obviously prawn sandwiches were off the menu.
Ferguson made two changes from
the side that won last week; van de Sar kept goal; Brown, Ferdinand, Vidic and
Evra made up the back four; Nani and Eagles occupied the flanks with Scholes
Hargreaves and Anderson making up the midfield, Tevez was again the lone
striker.
Keane used his six million pound
man with Jones up front, the five man midfield; which signified his intent; was
Chopra on the left, with Wallace, Etuhu and Yorke inside, Leadbitter operated
on the right; Gordon took his place between the sticks and was protected by
Nosworthy and Collins at fullback with Higginbotham and McShane inside.
The first five minutes are nondescript;
neither side dominant with both sides feeling each other out, Nani firing an opportunistic
shot wide is the only goal mouth actions in the first five minutes. Not to be out done Etuhu skins Scholes and
advances towards goal but fires off a poor shot.
Nani plays in Evra on the left as
the fullback makes a pacy overlapping run, the cross is fired in from the
byline but Andersen is beaten by the defender.
Ten minutes in the home team
start to exert pressure which would be applied throughout the remaining 80 or
so minutes of the match; Eagles and Evra combine only for Higginbotham to head
clear.
McShane feeds Jones but the
finish isn’t worth six million.
Manchester is keeping the ball well and
looking for the opening but are obviously missing a target up front. Sunderland
are content to keep possession, although basically involves side to side or
backwards.
Gordon does claim Nani’s free
kick rather easily.
Manchester United is better than Sunderland but the lack of a striker seems to have
incapacitated the champions, whenever they get near the area they lose possession
or take poor shots at goal.
Eagles wins United’s first corner
on the half hour.
Nani, Tevez, Eagles and occasionally
Andersen; the latter being pretty poor; make attempts to get inside or behind Sunderland but they are just unsuccessful, van der Sar is
pretty much a spectator.
Andersen picks up the loose ball
and finds Tevez, the Argentinean forces in a low shot which Gordon saves well,
from the corner Gordon saves again from Eagles.
For the last fifteen minutes Sunderland have to defend but United lack any cutting
edge up front so it isn’t too onerous a task.
A late Manchester
free kick produces a training ground move which goes wide off Sunderland;
Scholes shot from the short corner is well held by Gordon.
Ferguson introduces Saha at the half, Andersen;
mostly poor; has been brought off. Keane
keeps his side the same.
Saha provides United with the
target they have been desperately seeking up front; he gets in on goal almost
immediately but is dubiously flagged offside.
Nosworthy and Gordon combine to
lose the ball, Tevez finds Eagles but he delivers a poor cross.
Sunderland have a rare forward
foray, Wallace finds space on the right and delivers a good pacy ball in which
is neatly cut out by Ferdinand.
Sunderland’s defence messes up
but Tevez can’t execute, his shot is poor; Gordon turns the ball aside after a
smart turn and shot from Saha; the ball is delivered into the near post by Nani,
Sunderland are lucky Vidic’s flick goes just over.
Van der Sar delivers the ball quickly
forward and Saha sees his #### held by Gordon.
The game briefly opens up as it hits
the hour mark, Sunderland enjoy a spell of possession before the home team
clamps down again and makes it hard for Sunderland to get a touch.
Eagles comes off for
Fletcher. \
Hargreaves has freedom to come
forward; as his defensive duties are limited; and unleashes a powerful shot
which Gordon does well to parry; he gets the ball under pressure from
Scholes.
Murphy comes on for the six
million pound man; Jones.
Evra, full of running throughout
the game; wins a corner kick; Nani delivers a good near post ball, Sunderland are at sixes and sevens, Gordon flails and
Saha heads the ball in the net.
Nani ends a promising run with a
weak shot; Hargreaves fires over from range; Brown sees his shot cleared by the
arm of Collins but the referee don’t award the spot kick; Gordon punches
Tevez’s shot and Scholes almost gobbles up the rebound.
Getting three points when you are
not playing well is required form in Manchester. The home side looked average without their
key players; Saha did cause problems but still Manchester’s possession yielded few chances
even as at the other end their defenders had little to do. Nani played well in spurts, Tevez looks out
of place in his current position; a centre forward he is not; Andersen was
poor; Eagles didn’t convince whilst Scholes and Hargreaves looked decent.
Keane will be unhappy with his 9
million pound ‘keeper, he was culpable for the goal, as were his
defenders. The work rate was good and occasionally
Sunderland strung some passes together and looked OK, the away side was just
not good enough to trouble Manchester
in any area of the pitch. Yorke looked
good when he got the opportunity to pass the ball through the middle but spent
too much time defending to be effective.
Atkinson did let the game flow,
he forgot to book Evra’s hack on Chopra even though he booked Leadbitter, he
missed Collins’ hand ball, and it was fairly obvious as the fullback actually
raised his arm to block the shot.
