Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the past couple years you will be well aware of Scott the Red and his award winning site The Republik of Mancunia. Rated in The Telegraph’s Top 10 Manchester United sites for 2009, The Republik of Mancunia cleaned up at the 2009 Soccer Lens awards winning both ‘Best football team site’ and ‘Best team writer’.
With this Saturday’s game against Chelsea coming up I thought I would get his opinion on the game and how he sees it going:
The Busby Way: With Wayne out and Drogba declared fit to start, how do you rate our chances?
Scott The Red: We’ve got quality all over the park so I’m not too worried. Obviously you want your best players available when playing against your biggest title rivals but we’ll have enough out there to get a result. It’s been a while since Drogba has done anything against us, his last performance at Old Trafford was nothing short of humiliating for him, and long may that continue.
TBW: Who is our key player?
STR: Antonio Valencia will cause them a threat down the right flank and I hope we get the ball to him as often as possible. I wonder if Giggsy will play behind Berbatov as he will be fresh and raring to go. But all of this has to be based on a solid defence.
TBW: Who is their danger man?
STR: Malouda has come in to some great form of late and is scoring for fun. Lampard is looking more dangerous again. Drogba obviously has the quality to change a game but I’m backing Vidic to keep him quiet.
TBW: What formation would you go with and what would your team selection be?
STR:
Van der Sar
Nev – Rio – Vidic – Evra
Valencia – Fletcher – Scholes – Nani
Giggs
Berbatov
TBW: Score?
STR: 2-1 United. Berbatov and Valencia.
Thanks again to Scott the Red and The Republik of Mancunia for their time and keep an eye on them in the run down to the game as I’m sure there will be some gems coming our way.
Everyones’s on about Rooney’s absence, but people fail to realise Chelsea are missing alot of defenders – especially at full back. Ashley Cole, Boswinga, Ivanovic and Carvalhio are all out. This gives a great chance for us to expliot our strength and what now looks like Chelsea’s weakness-the wings. Valencia against belleti/Zirkov, Nani against Ferarra I can only see one winner in both. Carvalhio is also a huge loss. I rate him as a better all round defender than their skipper JT. He wins everything on the floor with JT winning everything in the air, but as shown against City, JT gets shown up when strikers keep the ball on the floor. So United are well and truly in this on Saturday. Yes Rooney is a loss, but so is Chelsea’s missing defenders not to forget probablu their most importnat player, Michael Essien. Come on you Reds!!!
@Jamie
Spot on mate, i have pretty much just posted a carbon copy of your post on ROM.
I agree with me
@GHTT
How we doing mate? Didnt think you would post outside of ROM 🙂
Giggs11 – LOL. i thought GHTT will not write anything outside ROM. 2-0 United. Berbatov and Nani
I agree with Jamie we are going to batter them down the wings just have to hope Berbatov is able to take advantage of the work Nani and Valencia are going to put in.
Didnt happen for you then eh. Buy to be fair our second was offside and you should have had a penalty for the tackle on park not the handball which was never a penalty so it should have been a draw. But hang on your goal was handball and we should have had a penalty. Overall you deserved the defeat in a season where without rooney you wouldnt be at the races at all. Funny how none of your complaints in the press or on tv offer the balanced honest views i have expressed only the offside second goal. How boring some things never change.