A look back at the Manchester United farce

So I wonder who felt the most embarrassed on Sunday morning? Twattenburg, his linesman, Gomes or Nani? It won’t be the latter, he’s probably still patting himself on the back for being a sneaky, cheating cnut. The ref should be wondering why he didn’t see the handball, blow for the handball or find a way to disallow the goal – loss of advantage, ungentlemanly conduct, unsportsmanlike behaviour, any one of those would do (in fact put one of these with the deliberate handball and you’ve got a case for two yellows & sending the little cheat off as well disallowing the goal) – but no, he’s probably believing all the shameful ‘letter of the law’ defences that have been put up by the refereeing community and placing his freshly minted match DVD on the shelf next to his Christmas cards from Roy Carroll.

“Play to the whistle” has always been a mantra in this country, whether the same is true in Brazil or not I don’t know but whatever the case, Gomes is not without blame. Clattenburg wasn’t the only one who didn’t know what was going on. The farcical manner of the second goal was nearly matched by the quality of defending for the first. How did Assou-Ekotto end up being the one challenging Vidic? Hopeless.

We’d shot our bolt by the time the whole handball incident occurred, our hopes of getting an equaliser disappeared with Van der Vaart as he limped off, his tight hamstring has severely dented our hopes for Tuesday too. In this game he once again displayed his uncanny ability for finding space in dangerous areas but he suffered from the same malaise as Bale, Lennon, Modric, Jenas et al in that none of them was capable of finding a final ball good enough to turn all the positive play we produced into something substantial. Countless cutbacks, corners and crosses were delivered, all were missed by a white shirt or booted clear by a red one.

We had more of the possession and won most corners but United had most shots and attempts on goal as we allowed their midfield time in front of our back four. The spine of our side is suffering. Injuries up front, at centre back and in midfield mean that we’re nowhere near producing our best. Four wins, three draws and three losses after ten games isn’t calamitous but is likely to cause a minor tic in anyone of a pessismistic disposition. Add the facts that we’ve scored only 11 in those ten games and that our last league clean sheet was on the opening day of the season then the tic might in danger of becoming a twitch.

By MF

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