VIEW: United vs Milan (a). 3-2
All the noise before was about Beckham vs. United. For me
it was nothing to do with Beckham. It was all to do with 2007.
I’ve talked about that night before; the night I saw my championship-potential team, striving confidently in the quest for domestic glory, have
their crown of un-entitled arrogance torn off them and be humiliated and taught
that things aren’t quite the same in
Well tonight, we exorcised those demons spectacularly.
We started off shockingly and deservedly found ourselves
trailing for the majority of the first half after Ronaldinho (who incidentally
is still a bit good) slotted in on 3 minutes. The assist? Although it took a
deflection to reach the goal scorer, it was of course from Beckham’s free-kick.
I hadn’t even started tucking into my pancakes and the headlines for tomorrows
back pages, describing Milan’s Beckham inspired and utterly (*something
completely over-the-top*) victory against his old team, had already been written.
As the half drifted and the home side appeared to be the more dominant, things were not looking positive. I remember thinking that
as long as we could grab a goal at some point we should be Ok for Old Trafford.
Well we got that goal, and WHAT a goal; the ball bouncing in off Scholes’
standing leg, nut-megging Nesta in the process. As much as we were still
technically in it with the score only at 1-0, it was obvious that it would take
that sort of ridiculous goal to get us back in the game.
After halftime and a whole lotta hairdryer, we started to
perform brilliantly; but it was only after Nani was subbed off on 64 minutes and replaced
with
that a true impact was felt.
perfect cross about 2 minutes after coming on being met perfectly by the head of Rooney - as well as generally sparking us into action and providing the added imputus and much needed resolve that helped us see off our ageing opponents.
Rooney was awesome, obviously; and the newly consistent
and thoroughly reliable midfield trio of Fletcher, Scholes and Carrick (who was pointlessly sent-off) ran the
show as they have been so formidably over the past few weeks. But a player we
can’t rule out in terms of his contribution and an alert performance that
kept us in the game, was Van der Sar. His miraculous saves from goal-bound
Ronaldinho, Ambrossini and Pato shots were nothing short of life-saving, and
unfortunately for him, an annoying deflection and a piece of genius from
Seedorf denied him from the cleansheet he deserved.
But like I said, the agenda was written before the
kick-off. Sure, Rooney’s status as truly worldclass would arguably be cemented
if he performed in this ‘big match’ (even though he continuously plays well
against Arsenal and
are they not big matches?). The Ronaldinho skeptics were also out in full show,
as were undoubtedly those watching with intrigue at how Beckham would react
against the team he supports. In summary, Rooney is undeniably worldclass,
Ronaldinho is STILL worldclass, and Beckham…well, Beckham confirmed what we all
thought. He cant and shouldn’t be starting a game of this magnitude anymore. As soon as he made it obvious that
football was not his priority by trying out the ‘exciting new challenge’ of
American soccer, we knew he was no longer serious about this game. He blagged
the loan-spell with one of
ever teams, not once, but twice; however that is clearly one too many for this
fallen idol. He had it all, went in search of so much more in Madrid, got a lot less
than he anticipated (fame and money aside) and so decided the best thing to do
was capitalize on his name. Lets face it, if there’s one thing he’s great at
its promoting brand Beckham. Not football. That’s now obvious.
Aside from the early and late scares, this was a game we
won convincingly to set us up delightfully for Old Trafford and comprehensively
exorcise those demons. The 0-3 in 2007 was horrific; but if there was one thing
to come out of it, it was a lesson – a harsh one and that – in ‘how to’ when it
comes to dominating in
trophy the following May, with the (oxymoronic) youthfully experienced Rooney
and Ronaldo leading the way, where as
clearly regressed, keeping their experience but with very minimal youth to build on.
Instead, they added the likes of Beckham to give them a further lack of innovation.
The ghost of the San Siro is laid to rest, the added impetus of our former son failed to impact on the result but above all, most importantly and as always...the reds go marching on.
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