Manchester United finally reproduced the form that won them so many games last season in a 2-0 victory over North-West rivals Bolton yesterday. The scoreline however does not tell the whole story as United dominated Bolton almost throughout the entire game. With goals coming from Cristiano Ronaldo and Wayne Rooney, it was a case of more of the same from last season as one or both usually got on the score sheet.
The talking point of the match was and is the penalty that was awarded to Cristiano Ronaldo after he was challenged by Ricardo Gardner in the box. Now in all honesty, Rob Styles was conned by Cristiano as the Bolton defender won the ball cleanly. In fact, it was the offensive player looking for contact rather than the defensive player. But again, when you hear what Fergie had to say about the decision, you realise that Styles indeed owes us a lot of legitimate penalties that he has waved away over the years. Just last season alone, Styles did not give United any penalty out of the 4 legitimate ones in the crucial fixture against Blackburn at Ewood Park. So that was one back.
Meanwhile, Wayne Rooney took his goal so well that it left me wondering if he has had most of his best games off the bench for United. For the many times he has come off the bench in a game we were struggling in, Rooney has either provided the assist or scored the goal. Just to point out a few examples, the FA Cup game against Pompey in 2006 in which he came off the bench to score 2 goals, the FA Cup game last season against Aston Villa in which he inspired a 2-0 victory--getting a goal for himself as well. It was however good to see Fergie taking the bold decision of leaving Wayne, Nani, Giggs, out of the team. It certainly gives us the impression that nobody is assured a place in team. Paul Scholes will do better off the bench than if he starts --and that was proved yesterday. Bring on Aalborg!
The other bit of news to rant about was that we have QPR at home in the League Cup 4th round. Not bad huh!
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