even more quiet than it normally is. The pumped in crowd noise that we will get
as we watch the game on television will actually provide a much more atmosphere
than you normally get at a game at Old Trafford where it is invariably silent
unless they score. Needless to say, over the years they have scored
a lot of goals against us but not too many recently as relatively speaking we
have done quite well there over the last few years with two 1-0 wins in recent
memory. However, today we are playing them at a time when they have been
playing particularly well, having won their last four games by more than three
goals, so it’s gonna be quite a tough one.
Ole is of course, at the wheel and he has stumbled upon a first 11 that looks
decent, Mason Greenwood has emerged to give them a cutting edge upfront and
also, Paul Pogba has decided that he is going to play because after all, there
is a transfer window coming up. The man who has changed everything there is of
course Bruno Fernandes. He has come in from Sporting Lisbon and seems to have
provided the spark that they needed from a creativity point of view, either
scoring or assisting a goal in virtually every game that he has played. Of
course, this has not gone unnoticed in the media who have hyped him up as the
second coming of Maradona. It’s a curious phenomenon that seems to affect
Manchester United players more than anybody if they have a decent initial impact.
Who remembers Federico Macheda or Adnan Januzaj? Of course, I’m not comparing
Fernandes to either of those two because it does have to be said that Bruno
does look a very good player.
One question I posed going for into the restart was that I wondered if the big
clubs were going to get all the decisions still, bearing in mind they didn’t
have their usual 65,000 spectators in the ground to influence officials. The
answer appears to be a big fat fucking yes as United have broken records this
season for the number of penalties that they have been given including one of
the most ridiculous ones of all time that got given against Villa last week
when Fernandes basically trod on the Villa player and fell over and got given a
penalty.
The weakness for Manchester United is around the centre of defence where they
have Maguire and Lindelof, protected by Matic. None of these players are
particularly quick which will hopefully play into our hands a bit if we are not
running on fumes after our recent exertions. Luke Shaw has managed to nail down
the left back berth which is probably a marketing stunt to sell XXXL replica
shirts in foreign territories and Nathan Redmond will have his work cut out
against the best defensive right back in the country, Aaron Wan Bissaka.
Hopefully, David de Gea will be having one of his chocolate wrist matches.
Away we go and we start the game pretty well, playing the ball about and
looking to put pressure on the United midfield whenever they get hold of it.
It’s our midfield who create the first chance though and not in a good way, as
JWP does a passable impression of the Steven Gerrard slip and under no pressure,
allows the ball to run under his foot Martial is clean through on McCarthy but
McCarthy shows his growing confidence of the last couple of games by making
himself big and pulling off a good save with a strong left hand.
Whereas United fail to take the gift a chance, we then create one of our own as
United are popping the ball about the back and de Gea plays the ball into Paul
Pogba who turns with the spatial awareness and athleticism of a pensioner with
a zimmer frame, unaware that Danny Ings has hunted him down waited for him to
turn. Ings nicks the ball to Redmond who takes a good touch before
putting over superb cross to Armstrong who was unmarked. He took a
touch before half volleying it past de Gea for 1-0. This goal summed up Ralph’s
philosophy superbly. Because of the ball win high up the pitch, when the cross
came over from Redmond, Armstrong’s marker Luke Shaw was nowhere to be seen
because he was half a mile up the left wing when Pogba gave the ball away.
Having got in front we then continue to play well for five or so minutes but
then we seem to drop off a bit and all of a sudden Pogba and Fernandes were
able to get their head up and have time to play. We had a warning
when Shaw saw that there was a burger van that was open at the far end of the
ground and burst forward from left back. His ball across was met by Rashford
(who has been recently doing a lot for the hungry) and he stuck it in the net
but he was about 3 yards offside.
left and Wan-Bissaka managed to wriggle his way away from three challenges, one
of which should’ve cleaned him out and the ball eventually found its way back
to Pogba, who swung it into the box where Martial produced a superb bit of
centre forward play to hold off Stephens and poke the ball to Rashford who
smashed into the net from the left hand side. Good goal to be fair but totally
preventable from our point of view.
We are still not really on it despite the equaliser and we get punished again a
few minutes later as Fernandes gives a simple ball to Martial out on the left
and he just heads direct for goal, bursting past KWP and smashing a shot past
McCarthy before anyone got across from the centre. Fuck off, 2-1 down and a big
lesson. If you give good players time to play like we have been for
the last 10 minutes, then they will kill you. Pogba and Fernandes
have looked very average when we’ve got around them.
We now have a case of having to try and stay in the game and the way we try and
stay in the game it’s by invoking the dark arts. By that I mean a few niggly
fouls to break up play, like JWP bear hugging Fernandes in midfield. Oriol
Romeu, as he tends to do, took it too far and absolutely clattered Greenwood in
a tackle that Paul Wotton would’ve been proud of, the ball being as it was, in
a different postcode. VAR had a look and nothing to see here. I
can’t help but feel we got a bit lucky there and it would have been interesting
to know if the outcome would have been different with a crowd in the ground.
We managed to get to half time without any further damage which was a job that
we absolutely had to do because if we let another one and then we are
completely fucked.
The second-half starts and it’s kind of in a holding pattern. United are not
piling forward and we are not really creating much either but we are looking
confident, not panicking and gradually getting back to the stage where we are
on top. United are still ridiculously dangerous on the break though and
Rashford plays a 1-2 with Martial at full pace and looks like he must score as
he connects from 6 yards but Bertrand has taken Greenwood out of his pocket for
long enough to get across from left back gets a foot in, to deflect it for a
corner. From the next United attack, Shaw twists his ankle and so he’s off to
be replaced by Brandon Williams who looks about 12. We send on our own
12-year-old looking player at the drinks break with Smallbone coming on for
Armstrong, whose energy levels have disappeared as the second-half went on.
Oh shit, another United break as Stephens tits around with the ball on the
halfway line and loses it to Martial who leaves Stephens in his wake and goes
past Bednarek who falls over in comedy fashion. On he goes, only to
get to the edge of the box and smash it miles over the bar.
We’ve made it to 80 minutes and are still in the game and now United look like
they’re beginning to get a bit nervous and not go forward as much. The
disappointing Pogba and Maradona Fernandes are replaced with a very average
Fred and McTominay and you now feel that if there’s going to be another goal,
then it’s going to be for us. Bertrand finds Redmond out on the left
and is then taken our horribly late by Wan Bissaka but the ref plays on and
Redmond cuts in and hits it and it takes a really good save from de Gea to keep
it out. Is it coming?
It’s panic stations for United as they have made all their subs and Brandon
Williams has gone down injured after an accidental clash of heads with KWP. The
game is stopped despite us having the ball and the referee decides to give
United a free-kick, which he hadn’t given before he saw the blood. We
are already over 90 and this is going to add at least another 3 or 4 minutes.
Ralphs last roll of the substitution dice was to send on Michael Obafemi on for
Romeu on 87 minutes and it’s not abundantly clear what formation we are
playing. You can’t really tell from the TV and you can’t expect Gary Neville to
actually tell you anything insightful about what’s going on as he is too busy
awarding the Man of the Match award to a Manchester United player and talking
about the “in-play” league table (United are 3rd) when Redmond wins a corner.
Over it comes from JWP, flicked on by Bednarek and there is Michael Obafemi at
the back stick to bundle it into the net. You fucking beauty. One replay all we
need to know that it’s not going to get disallowed by VAR and we have a
deserved equaliser. There is about 30 seconds to go and that is that.
Oh I fucking love it when that happens. 96th minute equaliser at Old Trafford,
in Fergie time, to knock them out of the Champions League places, to make Gary
Neville cry…. more on Gary Neville later.
Make no mistake, we totally deserved to get a point from that game. Apart from
that 10 minute spell when they scored two goals, we were better or at last
their equal. The start of the game was absolutely superb and
Armstrong’s goal owed much to preparation done beforehand in identifying Pogba
as a potential area where we could win the ball higher up the pitch. Great
tackle by Ings, superb cross by Redmond and Armstrong was customary decent
finish. The wobble was horrible where we stopped pressing and allowed United to
play and they scored two goals which had a lot to admire from their point of
view but from our standpoint, they were pretty poor. Not clearing
out Wan Bissaka on the first and on the second goal we did nothing to halt
Martial’s run into the box. Having stayed in the game for the rest of the first
half and the majority of the second, we came strong again for the last 10
minutes and deservedly nicked equaliser.
Today really illustrated the value of teamwork. You could look at every player
individually in the midfield and you could be quite justified in saying that
they didn’t have the best of games individually. Also, Ings and in particular
Adams were pretty quiet up front. As I said, we made mistakes in defence which
led to the two United goals but the performance today was all about how we
played as a team, the commitment and desire – harrying and pressing and not
letting it United’s good players, play the game at the pace they want to play
at. You can tell that we are a horrible team to play against – we run
more, we tackle more, we niggle more but not too badly (apart from Romeu,
obviously). We’ve been a soft touch for quite a while and we’re not any
more.
and Pogba was pretty anonymous as was Mason Greenwood. Whilst we’re talking
about United, I hope Luke Shaw is okay. When you turn your ankle and all your
weight is on it and you weigh as much as he does, it’s always going to be quite
serious.
The big threats were Martial and Rashford which made sure that KWP and Stephens
had tough games. Ryan Bertrand did an absolutely magnificent job on Greenwood
and behind them all, Alex McCarthy was flawless, having absolutely no chance
with either of the two goals.
Ralph had a genius day. If you send a sub on and go for it with two minutes to
go and it’s that sub to get you a goal then you are a genius. It was a great
moment for Ralph, for Obafemi and everyone connected with Southampton Football
Club to see the ball hit the net in the last minute and shut the fuck up Sky
Sports.
a problem with Gary Neville usually as he talks a lot of sense and it seems to
be a decent character but he caught a dose of the Carragher’s tonight, being so
unquestionably biased throughout, it was actually painful to listen to. Having
said that, it did make the moment when Obafemi’s goal hit the net even sweeter
than it was anyway. During the game, when Saints were attacking, Gary only
wanted to talk about the United front three and when Romeu put in that bad
challenge on Greenwood, that was all he wanted to talk about from when it
happened around the 40 minute mark until about 15 minutes from the end. This is
a guy who played with Roy Keane for years. When Rashford, admittedly
accidentally, raked Stephens achilles, Gary said nothing. When Wan Bissaka
bodychecked JWP and didn’t get booked, Gary said nothing. When Wan Bissaka took
out Bertrand after the ball had gone, Gary said nothing. He predictably picked
a Man United player for Man of the Match and called him the match-winner.
Surely you know the match is an over until the final whistle blows Gary? Fergie
time and all that? Oddly enough, Fergie time didn’t get mentioned, like it
always does if United score late. Fuck off Gary!
In the studio was Kelly 9-0 Cates (of course, Mr Dalglish’s daughter) who is
actually okay when Liverpool aren’t playing – there is a theme developing here.
In the neutral corner was Eniola Aluko who was even handed and mixed up
horrible cliches with some quite decent insight.
Matt le Tissier clearly saw it as his mission to redress the balance a little
bit and he didn’t disappoint, putting together a very sketchy defence on the
Romeu challenge on Greenwood which will have the United faithful watching in
their millions from all over the world, frothing at the mouth. Twitter was
spectacular after the game because of course, if you think that Romeu’s
challenge wasn’t worthy of a red card, you must be a flat earther.
Sky tried to bait Ole Gunnar Solskjaer into talking about Romeu’s challenge and
the fact that they had 10 men on the pitch when Saints scored but he was very
magnanimous and chose instead not to make excuses but to praise the opposition.
I like him. Doesn’t mean that I think he ever should’ve got the job or that he
is the right man for the job but I like him. In complete contrast, Harry
Maguire was a bellend. He was a bellend with a bucket full of salt on it. I
think the point he was trying to make was that because we have nothing to play
for, we could play with some freedom but he totally missed the fucking point
and it sounded like he was saying that as we had nothing to play for we
should’ve just rolled over and died rather than press them in their own half
for a vast majority of the game.
Ralph was delighted at the end and so he should be. City at home, Everton away
and United away usually gets us the square root of fuck all in terms of points
but we’ve got five which sends us into our next game in really good form.
Next up is Brighton have managed to get just enough points to make them safe
for next season. They are the sort of team that usually leaves St Mary’s with a
draw or a 1-0 win so that is something for us to try and put right. It will be
tough, simply because they have had an extra two days to prepare for the game
and we will certainly be rotating players but would you bet against us at the
moment?
League 1 Minus 10 
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