review: Bolton wanderers 1 v 0 MANCHESTER UNITED

Article by Mark Graham, Stats Nerd
Match Review
Bolton Wanderers 1 v 0 Manchester United, Reebok Stadium, 15.00pm, Saturday 24th November 2007.
Goals: Bolton Wanderers: Anelka (11).    Manchester United: n/a.
Attendance: 25,028

A poor 1st half Manchester United performance contributed to Bolton Wanderers taking all three points at the Reebok Stadium on Saturday, an error by Young Spaniard Gerard Pique gifted Nicholas Anelka & Bolton the winner with arguably their only real chance of the game.

SAF in a reshuffle was without Serbian Defender Nemanja Vidic (back) & Cristiano Ronaldo (thigh) or rested?? therefore SAF decided Pique would partner Ferdinand & Michael Carrick would partner Owen Hargreaves, preferring the England midfielder to the inform & "Red Hot" Anderson, a controversial decision in many a United supporters opinion.

The 1st half had barely begun when the impressive EX Real Madrid star Ivan Campo delivered a average free kick into the box, with little or no danger imminent, Young Spaniard Pique in for Vidic, totally misjudged his leap to clear the free kick leaving Anelka unmarked to gather from his error & sweep his shot past EVDS for the eventual winner.

United for the entire half were at a loose end, Saha, Nani & Giggs were anonymous, while Michael Carrick may as well have been a scarecrow, the Wallsend born midfielder had probably his worse game in shirt & looked poor in comparison to his normal self & the 19 year old who would eventually enter the game for the Reds.

Bolton & full credit to them always looked the better side in the 1st half & no one stood out more than Campo who kept the midfield ticking over leaving United to feed off scraps of possession, while ruining United's plans to involve United's talented attack.

United didn't have much in the line of chances with only Hargreaves 25-yard shot & Tevez almost sent through from a long ball.

The half ended with SAF being sent to the stands for the second half after Kevin Davies and Patrice Evra were rattling each other with challenges, the Wiley Scot felt Evra was the victim and later explained his players deserved more protection after two late tackles & a debatable head butt to the back of the French fullbacks head went unpunished by Mark Clattenburg.

United needed a change & SAF doing what maybe he should have done from the start brought on Anderson & pushed United's back four further up the pitch to apply pressure to Bolton, the tactic worked immediately with an attack leading to Jussi Jaaskelainen saving a free kick from Owen Hargreaves.

United running a busy midfield & the game then saw a candidate for miss of the season as Evra crossed for Tevez just a yard out, the "Apache" somehow with only minimum contact needed to bring the game level, somehow scuffed the ball badly missing a golden opportunity which was harder to miss than score.  United marched on relentlessly for the equaliser but after Hargreaves (Editor: this is our new free kick taker please) found the roof of the net late in injury time, United suffered their 1st defeat in the League since August.

Do you think Fergie gambled & took Bolton too lightly????
Did he rest players & drop inform players to the bench at the wrong time??
Submit Your Comments & Opinions Below.

United's Man of the Match
Owen Hargreaves, Keano type moments from the combative midfielder & some nice free kicks, hands up if Ronaldo doesn't take any more this season.

MUFC.COM's Reaction
Bollocks, all our title rivals were expected to win this weekend, and they all did, so a bad day as Arse, The Rentboys & the Bindippers all won.

I don't know what its like in your town but why when Liverpool win in an early kick off, do the sad plastic fu**wit scousers stay out to watch, no "hate" Manchester United, cheering their every misfortune, and screaming at the top of their voices if United conceded.

I do have a chuckle to myself as I and many many other Reds will have saw Liverpool in the flesh more time than the plastic population. 

One imbecile even clamed that Liverpool had won the Champions League 5 times.

Was our prediction correct?
No!! We said 2-0. MUFC INFO 2 v 17 Wrong Predictions.

Milestones
SAF's 86th defeat of his Premiership career.

John O'Shea's 260th competitive appearance of his United career.
Louis Saha's 110th competitive appearance of his United career.

Ryan Giggs Countdown = 35 competitive Games left to eclipse the All Time Record Set by Sir Bobby Charlton.

United's Next Match
Tuesday 27th November 2007 against Sporting Lisbon in the UCL at Old Trafford with a 19.45pm K.O.

MUFCINFO.COM Reader Feedback

Name: Patty
Email: 
Comments: how the fuck did u even score giggs performance never mind give him a 5

Name: Alan
Email:  alan1938@hotmail.com
Comments: Playing Haha, Giggs and "range of passes" in the same team makes United spineless.  Let's try and sell Haha (we can't surely keep on paying his BUPA and psychiatrist bills and listen to SAF's "different kind of player" comments).  Let's try and recover our money on "range of passes" then maybe we could pay Ryan a deserved pension to bring a fabulous career to an end.  After yesterday, I thought Reading all over again.  Truly disappointing.

Name: Bobby from Kampala, Uganda
Email:  jaheim.destah@gmail.com
Comments: Editor, I have always said on some Man Utd forums that every time or maybe most of the time we lose games its mostly Fergie to blame for having his tactics wrong.  So what did Fergie get wrong on Saturday?

1. He should have played Pique on the right and the more experienced Brown in the middle with Ferdinand. Im sure Brown is much better in the central defence role.
2. There was absolutely no reason why Carrick played in place of Anderson who has proved in most of the games he has played that he has what Carrick has and a lot more that Carrick can just dream of.
3. The apache was tired, maybe it would have been better to call up a younger star for at least the 1st half and then introduce Tevez in the last 30 minutes.
4. Where the hell was Ronaldo???
In my part of town everyone knows me to be a die hard Man Utd Fan so its hard for me when we lose. The biggest fan base here is Man Utd and Arsenal. So I get all this loud mouthed m'f***kers shouting at me . Actually they think they have already won the title. GGMU.

Name: Kunal from Boston, USA, originally from India
Email: kunal.4622@gmail.com 
Comments: Do you think Fergie gambled & took Bolton too lightly???? No, I don't think he took a gamble.. he is simply testing the squad.
 Every1 is talking about how great our squad is.. People like Carrick should be able to step in someone else's shoes and do the job.

It may be shows our squad is little overrated than initially thought? on the other hand.. it is better to gamble this time and after Xmas.

About the f***in scousers, yes they do... fuckers do wait and see if united concede or even get beaten and cheer for that.  Even here in the States... I have seen many times hanging around the pub when their game is over and waiting for United to concede... fuckin bastards... thy r a different species no doubt about it...