ManUtd 3-0 Wolves: Plastic Wolves
December 17, 2009
The recession has hit Sangam, our meeting place, which has closed one of its restaurants, effectively halving its size. But its interior was warm, its Tandoori Chicken pieces generous, its Cobra much needed, the company most welcome. Outside it winter was descending, the temperature falling, the sleet sweeping the streets. Wolves were in town. The warm breath in the cold night was rising in clouds, the ground was full, the Stretford End was doing its best to invoke Christmas cheer with The Five Days of Cantona and Feed the Scousers lustily sung upon a dank and miserable Manchester evening; indeed, until the football started it seemed unequivocally good to be at the Theatre of Expensive Bovril.
Mick McCarthy, the Wolves manager, irritated United’s rivals by resting most of his best players for the weekend, so we faced a team of inexperienced youths, experienced reserves, three left backs and in George Friend a lad who has been loaned out to just about every lower level club in Europe and who had twenty four hours previously been training with Scunthorpe United.
Kuszczak was in goal again but back on form. He dropped crosses, missed punches, refused to leave his line when Carrick shielded the ball for him and at the last nearly decapitated the same team mate with a wild, panic clearance. His forte is shot stopping and since Wolves did not produce one on target all night we could well have played a rush goalie. To be fair he has been playing through the worst injury crisis in living memory, nearly all of it affecting those just in front of him. This time around we had Carrick partnering Vidić in the centre of defence. Patrice Evra, surely a contender for our player of the season, was in his familiar role but at right back was Ritchie De Laet. He did well in that position and even better when Vidić limped off and he moved across to partner Carrick in the middle. No defender had a bad night but there was something missing collectively and more wily and ravenous wolves might have relished the wintry
conditions and attacked with greater cunning.
Scholes and Gibson were in central midfield, Valencia and Obertan on the flanks (the cadaverous one for his first league start). Rooney and Berbatov remain our best partnership up front, though you would not have guessed so on this night. Berbatov has not yet fulfilled his potential save in glorious glimpses, another of which he offered in this game. That fraction of a second apart, he has looked powerless since Delilah gave him a haircut.
It was Ferguson’s nine hundredth league game in charge of United and I am sure he has not watched a more tedious three nil victory. With Wolves belying their name with tactical timidity it began well enough. Rooney should have scored when he inadvertently blocked Gibson’s goalbound shot then turned to find the ball at his feet with goalkeeper Marcus Hahnemann the only man in front of him. Stefan Maierhofer was lucky not to turn Gibson’s cross into his own net. Hahnemman saved well from Rooney’s near post flick but the promise of the seven goal thrashing which would have lifted United to the top of the table for a day faded after Rooney’s mid-air touch to Scholes’ brilliant pass let him down.
Ere long the game had reduced to a disjointed, artless series of missed passes in the freezing drizzle and a running duel which Maierhofer initiated with Vidić. It might have been worse if the visitors could have shot straight; the giant Austrian headed on Greg Halford’s throw-in for young Friend to blast over from the penalty spot.
One pleasing feature of our game was the danger which Gibson was causing from well taken corner kicks, an art we all thought had long been lost from the United coaching manual. One such was headed on by Rooney for Vidić to hit wildly. The next flew into the middle of the area and out of nothing we were being given a much needed penalty kick. The award was for Ronald Zubar’s contrectation of the ball; he claimed innocence by miming a shove but from the lack of protest it was obvious that those who shared his changing room knew of his peccadillo. Rooney drove the kick with ferocity to Hanhemann’s right at a height which would have made it saveable had the goalkeeper not minded a broken hand; 30 minutes 1-0.
For the next quarter hour United played as if further inexplicable defensive aberrations were the only means through which we would be capable of extending our lead, a feat we achieved when Wolves failed to defend another Gibson corner. Vidić headed it fiercely onto the line inside Hanhemann’s near post, the goalkeeper’s hand serving only to deflect it into the net; 43 minutes 2-0. Astonishingly, we should have scored again before the interval. Obertan had been overdoing the stepovers all evening but this time dribbled cleverly into the area, only to shoot from a narrow angle when both Rooney and Berbatov were unmarked.
Why it was decided the pitch needed spraying given the extraordinary rainfall of recent weeks and the persistent drizzle of the night was beyond me; it must have been meant as the half time entertainment. The only entertainment when play resumed was Maierhofer’s unwise decision to renew hostilities between Austria and Serbia. Archdukes in the crowd must have been shuffling nervously in fear of imminent assassination. Word of the dispute reached the Foreign Office, urgent despatches were sent and each of the managers withdrew his combatant. Events worth recording were sparse; it was one of those nights. Berbatov was meandering around delivering clever flicks to opponents yet gesticulating when he himself did not get a perfect delivery.
Then, as if a switch had been thrown, we were magically transported for a few seconds to a parallel universe by a movement whose poetry was doubtless exaggerated by the drabness of everything that had occurred beforehand. Kuszczak’s clearance was headed by Berbatov but the ball eventually fell to Scholes in the inside right channel. He executed a unique one-two, gracefully chipping the ball to Gibson and when he got the return, volleying an equally graceful and accurate chip to Berbatov on the edge of the area. The crewcutted figure forgot his night of sulks and fumbles as he spotted Valencia’s run inside him and delivered a perfectly judged overhead flick. The Ecuadorean, who has hitherto scored for United only from two feet or through huge deflections, hit a stunning half volley without a break in his stride and the net and I shivered with the ecstasy; 66 minutes 3-0.
Wolves fans sang for their money back but the game improved marginally; Welbeck came on for Obertan and Owen for Rooney and United attacked with more energy while David Jones, erstwhile captain of United’s Youth Cup winning side, showed the quality of his upbringing by producing two wonderful forty yard passes for the visiting forwards. We might have had a fourth goal by the end, Hanhemann parrying Evra’s shot after a great move between him and Welbeck, whose gangly enthusiasm manufactured, then wasted, a couple of other opportunities. Fifteen United shots to three (ten to nil on target), nine corners to three and 60% possession. Wolves had done little but run around preventing United from playing.
The rain eased off for my cold walk back to the car, United temporarily level on points with leaders Chelsea. The drive home was a nightmare thanks to those Scousers and Bitters who staff the Highways Agency and whose aim is to disrupt travelling United fans out of jealousy. There was roadwork after roadwork on the accursed M6; it was half past one before I got to Wolverhampton, still a hundred and forty miles from home. Thankfully, South of Birmingham the racetrack opened up, the fog held off and I was snugly in bed by half past three.
Copyright © Paul James
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