United send a message in the season opener

The football season is back and it started with an enjoyable Community Shield game between Chelsea and Manchester United at Wembley.

Entertaining

In what is always little more than a pre-season friendly, both sides contributed to an entertaining game that saw United run out winners by three goals to one.

The question is whether we, or Ancelotti and Ferguson, learned anything from the game. Although they would both have said before the game that the result was unimportant, they are both intensely competitive men who would have desperately wanted to win.

Disappointing

For Ancelotti the game will have given him some concerns. There was a fear that the likes of Terry, Lampard, Cole, Malouda and Anelka would be suffering some sort of hangover from their disappointing World Cup and there was little in this display to suggest that isn’t the case.

Terry looked slow and made some poor decisions, Lampard was totally outplayed by Paul Scholes, United’s first two goals came from Cole’s defensive position, Malouda was quiet and Anelka was totally anonymous.

Signing

On the plus side for Ancelotti it will have been great to see Michael Essien back on the pitch. He is a world class player and will be like having a new signing for this season.

For Ferguson the game will have given him even greater belief that his team can regain the Premier League title. Wayne Rooney didn’t look to be suffering a hangover either from the World Cup or his nightclub visit and made the first goal with a great run and exquisite first time pass.

Excellent

Paul Scholes was the man of the match and looks as though he has at least another season at the top. Michael Owen completed forty-five minutes and looked reasonably sharp, Nemanja Vidic was excellent and alongside him Jonny Evans gets better and better. Hernandez showed enough to see that he will be a useful addition.

The icing on the cake came when a twenty pass move was brilliantly finished off by the much maligned Dimitar Berbatov for the third goal.

Revenge

Whilst in the long term this match will probably mean very little, United are certainly smarting from losing their title and losing three times last season to Chelsea. They will feel that they have sent a very strong message to Ancelotti and his team that they are gunning for revenge this season and believe they will get it.

Ancelotti won’t be too worried by what he saw but at times yesterday he cut a very disconsolate figure by the side of the pitch. He looked disappointed by what he was watching and will be hoping that whatever is bothering his players at the moment is cleared by the time the league kicks off next week.

All in all it was a good game yesterday played in good spirit and with just the right amount of competitiveness for a game of this sort. It has wetted my appetite for the season after what was for all Englishmen a horrible World Cup. I am so glad football is back!