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Palace Cruise Past Hapless United

By Sownak27 on Nov 30, 2011 - Twitter:@manutdtalk

Manchester United were unceremoniously dumped out in the Carling Cup quarter-finals for the second season in a row, after a shock 2-1 defeat to visiting Championship side Crystal Palace. Despite starting nine internationals, the home team looked devoid of attacking threat and urgency, and Palace ran out deserved winners. Ben Amos continued his League Cup run in goal, and in support ahead of him was the defensive quartet of Rafael, Smalling, Evans and Fabio. Sir Alex opted for a more experienced midfield of Valencia, Park, Gibson and Diouf, while Berbatov and Macheda spearheaded the attack.

In truth, it was not a very memorable game at all, with the only real incidents of note in the first half coming, unfortunately, in the form of injuries to both Palace and United players. The only real chance fell for Antonio Valencia, who when one-on-one with Luke Price in the Palace goal, could only direct his finish agonisingly past the post.

United started the second half with a greater sense of purpose, especially with the introduction of Ravel Morrison, who replaced the injured Berbatov. Perhaps the best indication of United's poor play in the first half came through the 55th minute statistic, when Morrison produced only the first shot on target. It was, however, Palace who took the lead, and with a real humdinger of a goal too. Subsitute Darren Ambrose collected the ball inside the United half, and from almost 40 yards, unleashed an unstoppable shot that Amos had absolutely no chance with. Old Trafford was stunned into silence…

…A silence that did not last too long though, as United go the equaliser through a Macheda penalty only four minutes later. The Italian was tugged down in the box, only to subsequently pick himself up and slot in the resulting spot-kick.

There were no other chances in the remainder of the half, and as things moved into extra-time, it seemed just a matter of when the goal would be scored, with the Palace players clearly tiring faster than their United counterparts. Incredibly, however, it was the team in yellow that got the ultimately winning goal, after Glenn Murray headed home from close-range, although television replays showed that he was marginally offside. No one could begrudge Palace the goal that their resolute performance had warranted. The first displays of any desire to win the game only appeared five minutes from the end, too late to influence the game in any way.

It was a dire performance from the team in truth, and one or two players in particular did not do too much to stake a further claim for a regular first team place. It is disappointing to be knocked out in the quarter-finals once again, but once again, the team's response to this latest setback will be interesting to observe.

Best Moment: Fryers's double fish-dive at the end
Worst Moment: Murray's winner
Man Of The Match: Wilfried Zaha

[IMG]
The Zeki Fryers Moment of the Match:
Sownak27, Nov 30, 2011
 
  1. I am simply astounded by this result. This is not a result you can expect from them its simply dissapointing. this is the problem when fergie think’s that everyone in his club can adapt to new positions and all. what he actually needs to do is stop with the experimenting and start taking these games seriously. there doesn’t seem to be any sort of connection in united’s passing and thats all because of their ego’s and think that they WILL win every match and take the opponents very lightly and in the end this is the result. if they stopped trying to pass the ball around soooo much then maybe we might actually have a chance at goal! Now, the main thing is that from this result people dont look at united any more and shiver….rather now EVERY team believes that when they face united they have a 50/50 chance of winning the game. if man u want to be the power house that they used to be, they better start making some improvements rather than sitting on their bloody back sides and start playing THE UNITED WAY!
    , Dec 26, 2011
  2. Jay
    United were also knocked out of the by west ham last year 4-0 and south end a few years back fergie is not bothered about the carling cup,if he was he would put a stronger team out,Whats the big deal??
    Jay, Dec 18, 2011
  3. Jay
    There is no problem with united,weve had a great start to the pl ,weve only lost once ,so what if it was 6 1 ,it was a big derby and that happens some times it has happened in the past and will happen again,the players weve got are fine and will do fine without any other signing,as for the champions leugue united have always had shock defeats and draws and all ways will,all the talk for the critics and fans i see online that united are in trouble is a load of bollocks if you actually watched united every week you would know they have had the best start to the pl since 2000.Any real united fan and by that i mean a MANC would no theres no trouble.
    Jay, Dec 18, 2011