“I love it when a team comes together”

Rooney will, perhaps unfairly, steal much of the limelight, but it has to be said that the 7-1 demolition of Blackburn was no one-man show.

Some might argue that it was someone else who single-handedly thrashed Rovers, since Berba , who only this week was rumoured to be leaving Man Utd in January and whose agent had to come out and deny it, grabbed an amazing 5 goals as Utd ran riot. At the end of the day, I think Rooney has to get some a lot of credit with the way he seemed to galvanise not only Berba, but the whole team.

The interplay between Rooney and Berba was so slick at times that you would have thought they had played together all their life. United fans may have seen Berba getting annoyed at times someone wasn’t in the right position to collect his pass but today it seemed like Rooney always knew exactly where to find him and where Berba would find him.

Rooney also tends to relieve the pressure on Berba to score or create goals and they also take turns in dropping deep to collect the ball. Apart from the front two, I think the architects of this resounding win were the 4 guys behind them. I think if Nani keeps going, he could come very close to what Ronaldo has achieved so far. He can be frustrating to watch at times, but he absolutely terrorised the Blackburn full-back and everytime he had the ball, he looked dangerous. I can’t believe how amazingly quick his feet have become too! On the other side, Park was once again acting as a lively synapse in tight plays and creating openings. His goal was probably my favourite of the afternoon as he collected a very clever pass from Anderson, fed it to Rooney and immediately ran in behind the defender to receive the ball and apply the coolest of finishes. In central midfield, while Carrick was the self-assured rock in front of defence and spraying passes from flank to flank, Anderson was on fire at times. He still looks a bit inconsistent with his passing. But, some of the passes he was ‘seeing’ in the second half were amazing. His burst forward to set up the 7th goal was just one of the many examples where he would carry the ball forward energetically, taking on a few players and look to create rather than pass sideways. Just like Fletcher, Ando seems to enjoy playing next to Carrick who prefers sitting back to protect and spread the play and is not the best creative midfielder in the world!

Last but not the least, our full-backs were once again relentless in their support of the attack, with special mention to Rafael who seems to be improving with every match. I love the way he gets angry with himself when he messes up a pass. I think, despite the comprehensiveness of the win and the massive goal margin, we must not get ahead of ourselves. Blackburn were utterly poor. I couldn’t believe this was one of Big Sam’s uncompromising sides. They offered nothing, quite possibly because of the early goal, after which they tried to come back until they were dealt a second blow.

Although we haven’t really turned a corner (and we are not going to steam roll every team at OT), there is no reason why we cannot celebrate a great results for the fans! Let’s leave the worries aside until our next draw!