I share Mario's sentiments for once
Disgrace. The one word I would use to sum that up. Disgrace. Where was the fight? Where was the passion? Where was the bottle?
Where was the invention? Where was the stirring comeback from the men in the famous red shirts? Most importantly of all, where was the DEFENDING?! Time and again City’s little maestro David Silva bobbed and weaved, passed and probed. Time and again he was given the space to work his magic. Time and again he tore us apart.
“No sense of injustice. No sense of what might have been. We were poor. We lost. I’m angry, and have a sinking feeling. That’s where I’m at” I tweeted at approximately 15:55 on Sunday 23rd October 2011, a day which, amongst United fans, will “live in infamy”. It wasn’t just the humiliating 6-1 scoreline. It was the manner of the defeat. Outplayed, outfought, destroyed.
A Darren Fletcher goal appeared, briefly, to lend an air of slim respectability to proceedings. It was a time to hold the fort. To engage damage limitation mode. To defend like Champions do. Twelve minutes later it was 5-1. Almost every man had been committed forward, and as David Silva threaded the ball through for Edin Dzeko to thump home a sixth I was frozen, staring at the scoreboard. How could it possibly be 6-1 to Manchester City? At OLD TRAFFORD? Surely not? Surely the scoreboard was the wrong way around? Surely? No. We were picked, no, ripped apart.
United were abject. Poor from defence to midfield to attack, poor all over the park. The only players able to walk off knowing they could have done nothing to stop the slaughter were United’s young Spanish goalkeeper David de Gea, given no chance with any of the goals by the depressing defending in front of him, and English talisman Wayne Rooney, the only man who seemed to care. European Cup winners Rio Ferdinand and Patrice Evra were atrocious, seemingly uninterested. Only Rooney showed any hint of passion, at one point screaming at his England colleague in disgust.
Ferdinand is seemingly in a slow decline, distracted by his Android application, his fashion range, his “twitfam”. No longer the defensive behemoth he once was, he has lost a yard of pace, seems slow to react, looks unable to control a defence as he once could. Evra, meanwhile, has been locked in some sort of struggle for form since the French World Cup disaster of 2010, largely unnoticed as, with defenders, it is harder to gauge and recognise poor form. Is it time for both of these stalwarts to be eased to one side, along with the alarmingly poor Anderson?
Investment is clearly needed in central midfield but, since that is a line trotted out repeatedly all over cyberspace, I won’t bore you by delving too deeply. I can only point you to my June article on how United needed to find some fight, a Roy Keane-esque leader to battle for supremacy in central midfield. Investment is needed in January, an experienced leader like Daniele De Rossi or a young protégé like Cheik Tiote or Yann M’Vila? Only Sir Alex can decide how to respond to this, and he has to get it right or we may well see a few more nightmarish matches like today’s demolition derby.
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the game for me just never got going they can a bit more of the ball in the first half but neither said tested the keeper and there goal just came from unfocused defending.
but before fergies words could sink in evans had chucked us into the abyss and we sank without a trace.
we kept letting them get behind us and as fergie said 4-1 was where we should of stop pushing everyone forward.
hopefully this result gives them a kick up the arse as we had been in a slump before this game.
from the kick off i never got the feeling we were going to win and it seems the players felt the same way.
Well done City = from all your new friends on the KOP!!!
Small club mentality: Can I ask why a bin dipper has been allowed on this site?
Leave matters like this to big clubs mate cos you no longer support one. 😉
First off i’d like to say well done to man city for an absolutely brilliant performance and also for highlighting what everyman and his dog knows… Uniteds midfield is atrocious! Ferguson i hope to fuck you took notice of little david silva and the destruction he caused!! Why in sweet jesus cant he see what an out and out playmaker brings to a team. Before ye go on about defence or lack of for being the reason lets go back to the first 20 mins where we totally dominated the match yet we failed to create any chance of note also look at the last three matches all of our weaknesses were shown up today it was coming all that was needed was a good team….SO TO END I’LL SAY IT AGAIN, FERGUSON I HOPE TO FUCK YOU TOOK NOTICE
Problem is that SAF is kind of too slow to react, and too stubborn to admit what we are missing and desperately need, or he has become too much of an optimist, certainly unrealistic to expect Anderson to replace Scholes. If he saw the defensive problems why didn’t he give specific instructions to defenders before the game? Surely the signs were there for everyone to see. Isn’t it his job to deploy tactics, or does he leave that to Rio and Evra? Where is the manager? Why only blame the players when his tactics or no tactics are 50 % to blame?
hard to swallow that this 1 player fergie rejected to sign ends up destroying him single handedly…. i mean few years back valencia literally laid him on a plate for manutd to pick up and carry home….fergie due to his love for god knows whoo…rejected him….now when hes in dire need of sum1 who can sparkle in a atrocious midfield…he has no1 t look upto….i sincerely hope that after seeing this match, scholes reconsiders his retirement cuz from the looks of it…ferguson is NEVER gonna learn….!!!!!
Where are the Michael Carrick bashers now? I knew as soon as Fergie starting leaving Carrick out of the team that this would happen eventually. It is a team game and you cannot just string eleven guys together without any consideration of the balance of the side. Gradually the team has lost confidence in their ability to retain possession.
Last week against Liverpool United were equally poor in midfield, it was like watching a tennis match seeing us constantly give the ball away.
Put Carrick back in the team and United will start dominating again against domestic opposition. Just like he should be in the England team.
What the team needs to get to Barcelona’s level is another Scholes to play and complement Carrick, not someone to replace Carrick. Maybe Cleverley can do the job ALONGSIDE CARRICK, but players like Anderson and Fletcher are not at Carrick’s level. We already beat Barcelona a few years ago with Carrick at the heart of the team alongside Scholes.
Those of that demanded that Carrick should be dropped are getting what you deserve. Before Carrick joined we went three years without a trophy and I fear the same will happen again.
Carrick wouldn’t have made any difference. It’s a team game as you said, the entire team is to blame including SAF.
Whenever the back four looked up for someone to pass to today (and against Liverpool last week, many games this season) there was no-one willing to come for the short ball. That is something Carrick will always do. First and foremast, he retains possession and links the play better than anyone else.
Carrick will always shield the back four and bring other more attacking players into the fray with his probing passing.
It seems so obvious to me…I struggle to comprehend why others don’t really “get it” with Carrick..? (much head scratching)
Four PL titles and three CL finals in five years…and most of you have your head buried under, thinking Carrick was not part of it.
Carrick played against Basel when we drew 3-3. He is poor.
sad day, but we are United, we will bounce back … in the end, the blue ulcers have very little (if even that) to do with football – they simply have BOUGHT what they´ve got & if this game shall go the way that everything goes the Piteh way upon what Bernstein buys, then it is more or less understandable to create United of M FC … Blue ulcers have spent some 2 bil (incl. salary & taxes) in less then 2 ys, scouse some 130-140 mio gbp only from the end of Jan – this is all comical.
YES, we were poor today, the pooriest even, though beaten BY MONEY spent (NOT ONLY!) on players (Bernstein knows!!!) sad day for the game – I was even told by gooners´ fans that they probably didn´t feel as bad some weeks ago as we do now cause it is NOT ONLY A LOSS OF THE FOOTBALL GAME – plenty of you with ounce of brain know that – this states that EVERY MAFIOSO EQUIPPED WITH MONEY CAN BUY EVERYTHING … BUT NOT TO GO TOO FAR – YES, WE WERE VERY VERY POOR …
Rip evans….jones should hv been started….or atleast jones could b used to mark silva…..sell rio..evra ..with all respect they r past there best way behind…derrosi…sneijder modric bale costa fellaini rodwell could b answers
AHA !!!!!!
Now you know how it felt to be a Gunner earlier this season! We at least could only put out a mostly reserve/kids team….. but what is your excuse? I am not trying to purr over the result (although I cant deny some pleasure, as well as initial disbelief).
You should recognize that firstly SAF has been complacent, or his hands have been tied by his Directors, and secondly that City are the one team that is now head and shoulders above us all, and are likely to remain there for a very long time.
You will now be playing catchup, and may well sink a little further before you can try to be kings again.
Sorry….. but ask Liverpool, Spurs, us…….. we have all lived on our reputation well after we justified it….and now its your turn.
Do you think the puerile games with banner and stuff are now beginning to undermine Man Utd. City proceed with dignity to dominance. We won’t be raising a silly banner we will just take the Trophies and turn Utd into a feeder club for the mighty blues