It was a familiar story for Manchester United tonight, having to fight back following a poor start.
United found themselves 1 down after 90 seconds when Alan headed in a Hugo Viana (yes the Newcastle flop) cross. United probed but found themselves 2-0 down when Alan again struck, this time after Eder danced passed Michael Carrick out wide.
2-0 down after 20 minutes but not playing particularly badly, the team snapped into life and took advantage of the referee’s decision to allow play to continue when RVP was brought down by Leandro Salino. Shinji Kagawa picked up the ball, illegally taken from the Dutch striker, and crossed for Hernandez to pull 1 back.
The Mexican could have got a second in the first half too, but failed to get onto the end of RVP’s cross so United would have to wait until the 62nd minute when Jonny Evans put past Beto at the second time of asking from an RVP corner.
With the chance to make it 3 wins from 3 and a second home win in Europe this season, United continued to press forward and were rewarded when Javier Hernandez raced clear of his marker to head in a Tom Cleverley’s wonderfully whipped cross.
The constant poor starts are something that will need to be addressed as United enter a tough run of games, whilst we may have fought back in the majority of games where we have started poorly there is always the chance we will find ourselves in a position like we did against Tottenham.
It must be said that Javier Hernandez did well tonight too. Whilst he may not be a cert like he was earlier in his United career, tonight he reminded us what he is capable of, particularly important in light of transfer speculation linking him with a move to Atletico Madrid in January.
