Man utd draws the first blood

Manchester United added another silverware to their already overflowing trophy cabinet and hopefully first of many in the season 07'08. On close introspection one should not be blamed for thinking that the hype surrounding this season opener is a tad too much. Its just a game played for charity. Both the teams are having either injury problems or the players rested. Chelsea had terry, drogba, sheva(1st eleven?) out with injury while man utd had scholes, saha and neville in the medical room while hargie was rested. And the players are yet to hit their peak form or fitness.

In spite of all these there are some positives and negatives (or let me label it as "things that needs attention") that either manager must have taken from this game. Lets take the game as a whole first. Both teams had their own fair share of chances and moments in the game though moaninho believes to the contrary as usual. While giggs, ronaldo had the chances for man united, mikel will feel that he should have shown a bit more alertness in front of goal. Giggs certainly redeemed himself by taking the only other chance that he got. It was a sleek goal constructed by evra and well finished by giggs. At the other end malouda, who impressed in his debut, took full advantage of one of the ferdinand's famed lapse of concentration. It was a good finish considering that he was under considerable pressure from ferdinand.

Ronaldo though not at his imperious best was creative enough to cause problems for the chelsea rear guard. Same can be said about rooney. Silvestre... less said the best. Heard that he threatened to leave man utd if not picked for this game. Dont think that fergi would have fell for that. Must be some other reason. Nani impressed with his corner kicks. And he also seems to have learned from ronaldo's mistakes by releasing the ball early and trying to look up rather than blindly running into defenders.

Coming on to the players noteworthy of mention from chelsea side, the name that springs to the mind first is none other than the absurdly talented and equally wasteful SWP. He constantly turned silvestre, who was crap, inside out and found himself alone and free for putting a cross across the goal only to leave the camera man behind the post searching for cover. Lampard was conspicious by the lack of contribution, only to leave the stamford faithful to wonder whether he is on his way to nou camp. Cech was as usual reliable between the posts making you feel that blues have a point when they say that things would have been different last season had he been not injured.

Anyways it was a good work out for the players and no one seems to be complaining.

Verdict : If these are two sides who are yet to hit their peaks then the teams across england and europe has some thing to worry about.

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