United slip up as Rooney has a rare off-day

It is a funny old Premier League this season. Manchester United lost their sixth game yesterday yet they are still only four points off the lead and are far from being out of contention.

Struggled

United have played a mixture of disappointing and exhilarating football all season. They have struggled to find any real consistency and whilst a game at Goodison Park just a few days after a game in the San Siro was always going to be a tough ask, the performance they produced in their 3-1 defeat at Everton was simply not good enough for them to be title winners.

Sir Alex Ferguson accepted that his side had been beaten by the better team on the day and he blamed tiredness for the performance and looked ahead to Tuesday’s game against West Ham rather than looking back.

“We left something in Milan and there was tiredness in the team. But Tuesday is a massive game now. We’ve been responding for a long time so I don’t expect a problem with that. It is difficult to think that when you go through all the emotions and the pace and intensity and atmosphere of a game like Tuesday, you don’t lose something. Whatever it was, it was just too much for us today. We had some good chances early on and we could have been two or three up. The equaliser changed the game a little bit. But it was the second half that let us down. Our second-half performance was very poor and when you are going for the championship you expect Manchester United to respond to the importance of the game.”

Of course, Fergie has been through this sort of situation many times before and he is realistic about his side’s predicament.

“This is a bad result and at this time of the year we can’t afford results like that. But I don’t think we will panic because it has been a funny season. Teams have been losing points that you don’t expect so the very nature of the league suggests we still have a chance.”

Many of United’s problems have come at the back this season with the long term injuries and suspensions for Nemanja Vidic and Rio Ferdinand. That problem may be coming to an end as Vidic was named on the bench at Goodison yesterday and the game was the last of Ferdinand’s four game ban. Their return will be welcome but it may be too late in terms of winning the league.

Award

Another issue that became very clear in yesterday’s game was just how much the team are relying on Wayne Rooney this season. He has been exceptional and barring any disasters he will undoubtedly be named as the player of the season in all possible award ceremonies later this year.

Yesterday, however, Rooney had one of those games where he couldn’t have trapped a bag of cement! His first touch was awful meaning that his second touch was usually a tackle! He is perfectly entitled to have a bad game but it was clear that the side couldn’t function when he did.

Effective

The title race is far from over but yesterday’s games saw Chelsea grind out an unconvincing but ultimately effective 2-0 win at struggling Wolves whilst United were being beaten. That might just be the difference between the two teams this season, that Chelsea have just a little more resilience than United.

Having said all that, if I was a betting man, which I’m not, I wouldn’t be putting too money on Fergie not winning another title just yet!