Manchester United 2-3 Blackburn Rovers – Match Review
Grant Hanley spoiled Sir Alex Ferguson’s 70th birthday celebrations after his late goal saw Blackburn pull off the unthinkable and beat Manchester United at Old Trafford to give their survival hopes a monumental boost.
After beating Fulham and Wigan 5-0 in consecutive games over Christmas many were expecting United to repeat feat and leapfrog rivals City at the top and give Ferguson the perfect birthday present. However Rovers had different ideas as Yakubu scored either side of the half time whistle to give them an unlikely advantage before Dimitar Berbatov bagged a brace to restore parity before Hanley silenced Old Trafford beating David de Gea to a cross and sealing victory with 10 minutes remaining. The victory puts a massive dent in the Red Devils’ title challenge as they missed the chance to usurp their noisy neighbours at the top flight summit with Robert Mancini’s men taking on Sunderland tomorrow. For Blackburn and their beleaguered boss Steve Kean the victory lifts a ton of pressure from his shoulders and moves them to within two points of safety heading into the New Year
With the host’s defence ravaged by injury Ferguson was forced to field Michael Carrick and Phil Jones at centre half with Rafael returning from injury to take up his slot at right back. Wayne Rooney was also missing as a disjointed United struggled to get into their usual rhythm with the visitors the brighter of the two sides in the first half. They were gifted an early lead on 17 minutes when Berbatov, who bagged five in the corresponding fixture last season, tugged on Christopher Samba’s shirt causing referee Mike Dean to award a spot kick. Yakubu cooly converted from 12-yards calmly slotting the ball past De Gea. The United storm that usually follows once they fall behind never came with the away side limiting them to a series of half chances. Nani fired an effort over from range whilst Javier Hernandez also shot wide on the turn.
It was a similar story after the break with United looking lacklustre and Blackburn took full advantage with Yakubu doubling his sides lead six minutes after the restart. The husky Nigerian caught a lucky break after the ball bounced off Carrick but took full advantage ghosting past Jones and beating De Gea with a superb angled finish. That seemed to kick the home side into life and barely 60 seconds later they had halved the deficit with Berbatov heading in Rafael’s strike to give United hope of a comeback. The Bulgarian duly delivered just after the hour mark sweeping the ball home from 10 yards for his sixth goal in three games after good work from Antonio Valencia. The race for a winning goal was now on but few would have expected it would go to the visitors with Hanley beating De Gea to Morten Gamst Pedersen’s cross from the left before nodding in the follow up to send Kean and his staff wild on the touch line and put Rovers in with a chance of beating the drop.
[ad_pod id=’writer-2′ align=’right’]