Date: 27th December 2011 at 11:34am
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The pressure is well and truly on Man City after they drew with West Brom and we hammered Wigan 5-0 at Old Trafford.

City were expected to be run away favourites following the 6-1 defeat in the derby, but slowly we have chipped away at their lead and we now sit behind them in the table on goal difference.

Performances like this and the one against Fulham are what the fans have craved, often we have ground out results or created tons of chances only to win 1-0. But recently we have played good football, created chances and finished them off.

It appears we have gotten over the hangover of that disappointing loss to Man City, and with the second half of the season coming up the rest of the league must be more than a bit worried.

The team against Wigan was a team created out of our continuing injury problems. Jonny Evans was our only fit recognised CB and was partnered by Michael Carrick. Valencia played at RB whilst the likes of Park, Berbatov and Gibson got rare starts.

Wigan must have been slightly enthused seeing the starting line up, but come final whistle will have learned that though the players may be different the spirit of the team and the club remains.

Here are 5 thoughts on the game:

Berbatov

Dimitar Berbatov remains a problem for Sir Alex Ferguson in that he is too good to ignore, but how can we fit him into the team?

The striker hit a hat trick yesterday and will have put himself firmly into Sir Alex’s thoughts but with Rooney, the young and talented Danny Welbeck and the ever dangerous Javier Hernandez all ahead of him it appears he will have to wait for the scraps.

His contract is nearly up and whilst Sir Alex said the club can and most likely will exercise their right to one more year, will Berbatov be content with another year of this?

In terms of his goals they were all impressive, the use of his body and strength for the first, the turn and finish for the second and calm almost arrogance of the third. They show he is still a player with a lot to offer and perhaps another club will benefit from his talents.

Ref decisions

The average ABU fan will tell you that everything goes our way in terms of decisions, especially at Old Trafford, and yesterday will do little to dispel that notion.

Phil Dowd’s sending off of Sammon was a flash point in the game, and whilst I am under no illusion that the result would have been the same, it severely handicapped Wigan.

Even the penalty decision is being contested as some feel Alcaraz’s impediment took place outside the box (the line is counted as inside the box).With that said, I feel we could have had at least 2 penalties as Javier Hernandez too was toppled in the box.

For me whilst his overall game was decent, Dowd messed up on some big decisions.

Rotation and Selection

The continual rotation of players is often a point of contention but in some cases it is a necessity.

Valencia at RB, Carrick at CB, Gibson starting his first PL game since April, Berbatov starting; these were all decisions made because of injuries or with injuries in mind.

It seems we are forever complaining about injuries, but again yesterday we picked another one up with Evans suffering with a calf complaint.

At the moment we are coping and whilst not full fledged proponents of ‘Total Football’, we have players that are capable of playing in various positions and thus it eases the blow.

This is dependent on us getting players back though, we are getting down to the bare bones and with a tough run of games coming we may not be able to continue getting away with this.

Park

Had a pretty solid game for me. There were a number of players that performed yesterday, but Park worked hard and hassled Wigan incessantly.

He opened the scoring for us, his first since scoring in the 8-2 drubbing of Arsenal, but there is so much more to him than goals and we saw that yesterday.

Park can often be the forgotten man and is criminally under rated but he offers a lot to United and is usually dependable when called on.

Yesterday was a good day

We have now reduced the 5 point lead City had to 0. Our goal difference is rapidly improving and now there are just 5 goals between us, down from 17.

We were being written off but we have been getting better whilst everyone was focusing on City and now the questions being asked of Man City, if they can hold their nerve, will be ringing extremely loud in their ears now we have cranked up the pressure.

In our last 9 league games we have conceded just twice and kept 7 clean sheets, this is a massive turn around from when our defence was leaking goals like a sieve. At the other end of the field the goals are flooding in too, scoring 16 goals in 4 games.

Teams like Chelsea continue to drop points allowing us to focus on City and from being also rans in the eyes of the press, United will fancy their chances of picking up title 20 in May.

 

7 responses to “5 Thoughts On the 5-0 Win Over Wigan”

  1. timbo says:

    The question on Berbatov is what is going on in the background to keep him out of the side, particularly when Wayne Rooney goes for nine games without a goal and loses the side it’s slot in the knockout stages of the CL, when Chicharito plays like crap for most of the season and continues to look invisible in most games he plays, and when Wellbeck continually shows that he still has a great deal to learn in the game and doesn’t have on tenth of the Bulgarian’s poise, skill, or football intelligence. Note that all this is against the backdrop of a manager who stated unequivocally last season that he picks players on form, not on reputation, as a means of trying to explain dropping Berbatov to the bench in place of Chicharito despite the Bulgarian putting in such a hot start over the first few months – while Rooney spent the same amount of time looking absolutely dreadful, made his petulant demands to be traded, saw Fergie grovel in order to keep him at Old Trafford, and maintained his position in the team throughout. makes perfect sense, right? And throughout, Berbatov has acted like a complete gentleman, showing absolute class in pretty trying and hypocritical circumstances.

  2. John Tring says:

    Win over Wigan proved nothing. Evans and Gibson, as the whole world except SAF knows, were just rubbish. And yes, Berba is much better than Hernandez, Welbeck and the likes. Not because he scored a hattrick but I always thought it was bizarre he wasn’t picked. SAF is showing some clear signs of tactical shortcomings. You can see upto 4 wingers on the pitch at times! Why buy Young when you have Nani and Valencia?? Where is our CM or DM? Good buys in January or good-bye season. Period.

    • Chudi says:

      Congrats you’re the first person to be banned from this website!

    • jonathan says:

      If we don’t end up bringing any players in January and win the League I’m sure you’ll be the first to admit you were wrong given your reputation.

  3. RedScot says:

    @ Chudi no dont.He will be let loose, elsewhere.
    I laughed like crazy when I read this.

  4. Chudi says:

    You’re free to have what ever opinion you want, you can see that from the range of things we post but seriously I googled this guy and he just goes about spreading negativity on United sites!

    • RedScot says:

      I know Boss, he and I have clashed several times, the strange thing, he never replies to the questions on his comments you pose to him.
      He just posts and disappears.I clashed with him recently on Justin’s site.