Comments on: Manchester United vs Milan – Post Match Thoughts

By: K9

K9 — Fri, 04 May 2007 07:52:56 +0000

There are times when you wished Fergal wouldn’t resort to that godforsaken 451 which has never really clicked for us. Rooney played almost no part in the game against Milan and was up front all alone. No amount of brilliant First-touching could win you a goalscoring opportunity when youre alone against 4 defenders, that of the quality of Nesta.
Kaka, for me, has shown what it takes to be a truly world class player. He outpaced Vidic by a mile and was simply unstoppable. But the real threat, the man who undid United, was neither Kaka nor Gattuso. It was a 32 year old dutchman by the name of Seedorf. This fellow played like there was no tomorrow. One touch football at its very best. Look at his passes and his movement on and off the ball. Full marks.
As for Heinze, I generally make it a principle not to abuse reds or ex-reds, but I think I’ll make an exception here. Remember the flicked on header that equalized for Germany against Arg in the world cup? Guess who missed his man and was stranded midway. Our left flank on the back has pace, the ability to cross and nothing else. The pair of Gabby and Evra arent defenders. I guess it puts that much more credit into the bag of Gary Neville for being what he is…
Lastly, there was one thing that we missed sorely in the team that was drenched on wednesday. Nope, not ronaldo’s trickery or ferdinand- I believe it is called heart. There was no drive. No passion to close down and to irk the Milanese. The one player who truly showed some drive and desire was probably EVDS. None other. It was the most terrible part of the defeat that we went down tamely. Manchester United. It was gut-wrenching to watch. If there are to be any transfers over the summer, then please Fergie, buy a man of heart. Oh how we miss you Keano…

By: Reddy

Reddy — Fri, 04 May 2007 01:42:23 +0000

we lost.. AC won.. n that was becos they were betta.. its dissapointing, yes.. but lets remember this is the same team dat was expected to win ntg b4 de season began.. i wud say a domestic double n cl semi-final wud really blow all early season expectations apart.. agree wit me or not.. it has still been a good season.. we need a few new players.. prob nani or ribery and hagreaves with rossi comin back.. tho after y’days match i wudnt mind kaka comin in 4 united.. imagine dat.. an attacking midfield wit ronaldo n ribery on de flanks n kaka at de center… explosive pace.. it wud be wicked..

By: Red Ranter

Red Ranter — Thu, 03 May 2007 12:46:41 +0000

Okay guys, I wouldn’t berate the team and demand wholesale changes. Carrick still needs time, it’s just his first season and he’s mostly been good. Ronaldo is suffering from trying to believe the media hype that he is the best player. He is far from that yet. I personally think Ferguson should have held off the comment made that he’s actually as good as Pele and Maradona. Potentially, yes. But he is not the finished product. Ronaldo needs to keep his head down and continue improving, and defeats such as this can only spur him on to do better (and more importantly, give him a taste of reality)

Saha is a decent backup if we get a quality striker over the summer. Remember the reason our game was fluid for a good part of this season was due to his presence. (He was there in the first half and contributed well. Let us not forget that.)
This team has potential. Not everyone can win the CL every other day. So let’s not get too worked up about this defeat. The league is the priority at all costs and it will bring a lot of happiness at the end of what has been a brilliant season for the Reds.

By: sam

sam — Thu, 03 May 2007 12:44:27 +0000

i think our defence was strangely poor, would have done better if we had neville and ferdinand back. what was ronaldo doing?! he needs 2 learn 2 play as part of the team. and you were right about smithm, he should have come on, replacing perhaps ronaldo. we should have played 4-4-2 from the beginning.
but…. you could tell we were tired, and the referee was too lenient on milan tackles.

By: karan

karan — Thu, 03 May 2007 12:36:54 +0000

Saha’s been poor ever since the turn of the new year, and I don’t just mean with his performances. His attitude sucks ass. The guy’s a bloody wallflower, and we need winners. I hope we take the money if we get a good enough offer in the summer. Let’s hope Fergie is given enough of a war chest to add the few players we need badly. We just lacked fight against Milan, and it showed…badly.

By: Sagar

Sagar — Thu, 03 May 2007 11:55:38 +0000

I have to agree with you, I was dissapointed that a half fit Saha was brought on instead of Smith.

Saha is not a supersub and never will be. It takes time for him to get into the game.

Smudger on the other hand could have come on and lifted the team spirit with his hard tackling style and never say die attitude.

By: Kaka Blows United’s Treble Dreams at of cats and dags

Kaka Blows United’s Treble Dreams at of cats and dags — Thu, 03 May 2007 10:58:34 +0000

[...] did my share of post-match analysis on Soccerlens. Go ahead and read it. On the subject of soccer and Man Utd, I suggest you read this excellent post [...]

By: Hugo

Hugo — Thu, 03 May 2007 10:57:36 +0000

dont even start comparing Carrick to Gattuso, they are completely different types of player

Carrick has shown how good he is in enough matches this season to desrve him keeping the shirt – so dont be rediculous in blaming him for not performing – surely Ronaldo was more culpable with too many tricks and backheels etc that didnt come off!

Yes I believe we should get rid of a few players (Richardson and Silvestre among them ) but what really showed last night was we had no real options – yes Smith should have gone on alot earlier than Saha eventually did but even then I agree that last night proves we need Owen Hargreaves in conjunction with Carrick and Scholes.

Hardly anyone turned up in a UTD shirt – maybe the long campaign is getting to them but hopefully this weekend we can put the EPL to bed (yes Arsenal will take at least a point off Chelsea – they are looking even more jaded than Utd) and then we can rest people for the Cup Final.

There were no midfield options and no really creative players available to feed the likes of Giggs and Rooney (Carrick and Scholes were very well shackled)

Both Heinze and Evra have made significant mistakes recently and had awful performances – but one match doesnt undo their great performances over the last year (or three in Heinze’s case)

By: Chris

Chris — Thu, 03 May 2007 10:23:51 +0000

Sell 5 or 6 squad players?

What happens when the season goes tits up and 2-3 of the world class players we have get injured? Who’s going to cover for them?

By: Mark Crisp

Mark Crisp — Thu, 03 May 2007 10:01:57 +0000

Ah, what can you say? We were completely outclassed. I can’t remember us creating one real chance to score. What would Utd be like if we had have bough Gattusso? Carrick is not in the same league. Kaka….what a talent.

Rooney/Ronaldo were never allowed to get into the game because our midfield was A.W.O.L. Credit goes to AC though. They were the best team Utd have come across this season.

Having three defenders out on the run up the game did not help at all. I am certian we would have stopped at least one of those goals with a full defence.

It has to be a wake up call for Fergie. For too long this team has got away with “average Prem. players” Carrick,Fletcher, O’shea, Richardson, Heinze, Saha, Smith. Now is the time to offload many of these and bring in some real quality. We could easliy sell 5 or 6 players this summer. Raise Â£15 million and buy 1 world class youngster. We cannot get away with this.

It’s stil lbeen an excelleent season. We wil lwin the Prem. this season and we have an F.A cup final to look forward to. 2 or 3 world clas players in the sumemr and offload the deadwood and we can give it another good go next season.