What a tremendous display, albeit for 45 minutes.
Again, there’s good movement on and off the ball, with Ronaldo and Nani giving width and speed while striking fear into wide defenders. Tevez and Berbatov – oh, the sublime Berbatov – providing menace up the middle, overlapping, and occasionally swinging wide – a sheer joy to watch.
Again, there’s a let-down in the second half, albeit much less stark this time around.
You can definitely forgive United for letting up on the accelerator for this mid-week encounter, to some degree, but the two significant defensive gaffes – poor off-side trap that allows Boa Morte in alone on Kuszczak, for example – seem troubling. Mind you, the fact that any real defensive lapse seems out-of-character points to the solid partnership across the back-four for much of the past two plus seasons. But this season, these sudden and extreme miscues may become more costly, as you can begin to suspect that it will take 90+ points for the Premiership title. Obviously, we’ll see in the days ahead - these are still early days.
Instead of focusing on “possible” issues, I much prefer to play some of the games more delightful moments over and over again in my head… Tevez’ Gazza-like flick over a defender… Ronaldo and Anderson playfully interchanging back-heel moves… and yes, THAT move by Berbatov to set-up the second.
As Fergie said “I'm going to have to see it again to understand how he [Berbatov] did it," the United manager said. "You'd pay double the money to watch that - fantastic imagination, control and balance." [Daniel Taylor’s Berbatov dazzles for United to help Ronaldo strike back, The Guardian, October 30, 2008]
Thank God this Second Edition has a much happier ending and bea-u-ti-ful weather to match. Wonder what the weather will be like for the Hull match? I truly hate three-quells.
No comments:
Post a Comment