Manchester United

[muckypups]

Well said Nev.. Spot on, I think it's good that we have this ten day break before the next Premiership fixture, it'll help to get the Pompey result out of our heads, and maybe get a few of the walking wounded back if we're lucky. Also don't forget our goal difference.. unless Chelsea go on a goalscoring rampage (unlikely).. then that's as good as another point.

Oh, agreed 2-0 to Utd tonight..Ronaldo and Rooney..

[redrus]

next 4 games will define our season, win against roma then watford will see us in fa cup final, and semi;s champions league, win against sheff utd and boro at homer in the league, mean's at the least we would be 3 points clear and 4 games to go..

or it all could go tits up,, i love this time of the season even if we dont win nought still love the reds,been there when we where crap and i have see the high's.

2-0 against roma tonight.

Me too fella, me too....

redrus

[Baht Simpson]

Is the match being shown on Thai TV tonight? Cable or otherwise.

[nev]

baht espn will be showing the game in thailand not there at the moment get back on the 30th, so i cannot comment on thai tv, but i do know in febuary channel 7 and channel 3 showed the champions league games, i watch the lille game on thai tv.

hope this help's nev.

ps kick oof 1 45am thai time.

[redrus]

BE CAREFUL OUT THERE

Tuesday 10th April 2007

Roma warn their fans.

The Guardian:

Italy's foreign ministry has warned travelling Roma fans of the "possibility" of clashes between rival supporters in Manchester tonight and called for "correct and prudent behaviour".

There have been fears that Manchester United fans would exact revenge for attacks made on them by riot police and "Ultras" before and after the first-leg 2-1 defeat by Roma, though the Italian club said it felt that the violent scenes would not be repeated tonight.

It's right to appeal for calm," said club managing director Rosella Sensi, "but our fans know how to behave themselves at home and abroad."

Around 2,500 visiting fans will fly in on 12 charter flights from Rome, board 50 buses to Old Trafford and return directly after the match. However, another 1,500 fans are travelling independently and there have been reports that some of the club's "Ultras" have obtained tickets.

Three Italian police officials travelled with the team to liaise with Manchester police, who were refusing to comment. Achille Serra, the prefect of Rome, travelling as a fan, said: "At the game against Lyons, the Roma fans were an example of civilised behaviour and I believe they will behave the same way in Manchester."

The Independent Manchester United Supporters' Association urged fans to behave. "We all need to make sure that there are no headlines in Manchester to wipe out the memory of those made by the Italian police last week in Rome," it said in a statement. "The Roma fans at Old Trafford will be just like most of our fans who went to Rome last week and will be only there to watch the football."

A Roma fan, Lucian Manole, who had travelled to the UK to watch tonight's game with his father, said: "I think the Italian fans will behave themselves. I do not agree with the suggestion that the Italian police do not like football or the football fans." He and his father were having their photograph taken across the road from the statue of Sir Matt Busby.

A parking attendant at the ground said the scenes at last week's games were "disgusting". "If it had happened over the road, people living on Mars would have heard about it," he said. "There will be no extra security measures at the ground - we are used to big games round here." A colleague added: "We know how to treat fans here - like human beings and not animals."

The Times:

Twenty planes carrying Roma supporters are scheduled to arrive in Manchester today, although a small contingent flew in yesterday, among them Achille Serra, Rome's chief of police, who outraged United by condoning the tactics of riot police in the Olympic Stadium and, it has now emerged, is a Roma supporter.

Similarly, the British Embassy in Madrid, in conjunction with the Metropolitan Police, have been liaising with the Spanish police on security arrangements after the clashes between Tottenham Hotspur fans and police in Seville during the first leg of the Uefa Cup quarter-final last week.

Neither Ferguson nor Mourinho are expecting any problems, however. "I don't anticipate any trouble," the United manager, whose side trail 2-1 from the first leg, said. "Security at Old Trafford is fantastic. I don't think the Roma fans will have any problems. There's never been any history of that. The policing is excellent, so Roma fans should not fear a thing."

More from Ferguson:

"We stayed in Italy and we missed the footage that was shown over here.

"But I have seen one or two photographs and they don't look very nice at all. Everyone was appalled at some of the pictures and Uefa will have to have a thorough investigation. It is the only way you can find these things out."

"I don't anticipate any problems. The security at Old Trafford is fantastic. Roma fans should not fear a thing."

The Telegraph:

The Rome prefect of police, Achille Serra, whose officers' handling of incidents inside the Olympic Stadium has been heavily criticised, boarded a charter plane full of Roma supporters bound for Manchester yesterday. There are likely to be 20 other aircraft, carrying some 3,800 fans to a game the Roma captain, Francesco Totti, said was "more important than the World Cup final".

While some eyebrows will be raised by a statement from Roma's chief executive, Rosella Sensi, that their fans should "repeat the civility and maturity they showed in the Olympic Stadium" when there were stabbings outside the ground and bottles flung from both sides inside it, Totti attempted to soothe the atmosphere surrounding the match.

"I want our fans to enjoy the experience of being here," said Totti, who has supported Roma since boyhood. "Being a football fan is about supporting your team and I would appeal to ours just to enjoy the performance we intend to put on.

"It is an important game. As a Roma fan, it is more important than the World Cup final. We are playing against a huge team with great qualities but we have beaten them once already and we have to show the same attitude as we did against Lyon in the last round.

"I had a good feeling before that match and I have a good feeling now."

redrus

[Baht Simpson]

Thanks Nev. I forgot my copy of the Bangkok Post today.

[chonabot]

Blinding result tonight !

[taxexile]

never let it be said that taxexile is short on generosity of spirit.

and even though i am having to force my fingers on to the keyboard to type this ......... ccccccongrats mmmmmman. u. on a bbbbbbrilliant and wwwwwell ttttttimed rrrrrrrresult.

i wont go as far as saying i want them to win the final , but now is neither the time nor place to get into that , but last nights 7-1 win shows total class , well done.

[muckypups]

Thanks Tax.. What a performance! A team missing Scholes, Neville, Vidic, Saha as well.. I also wish to make an apology to Darren Fletcher, I've never been a big fan and I've stated that here many times but he was fantastic last night especially in the first half...

A perfect night.. how I wish I could have been there...

COME ON YOU REDS...

Oh, and the Premiership's 1-2-3 (assuming Liverpool don't blow it tonight).. into the Semi's of the Champs League. Excellent

[muckypups]

Fergie's happy..

Ferguson: 'It was my greatest night at Old Trafford'

Manager sings the praises of his young guns as United show their fire power, reports Daniel Taylor

Some nights in football are golden. "In European terms that has to be my greatest moment at Old Trafford," said Sir Alex Ferguson, casting his mind back over the way Manchester United had blown a gaping hole in Italy's reputation of having the world's most accomplished defences. "The quality of our game was so high that once we scored the second and third goals I was in the dugout thinking 'this could be something really big here'. But even so, I wasn't expecting that."

Ferguson used the word "uncanny" and he shook his head with disbelief as he pored over the most exhilarating display of fast, penetrative, adventurous football this stadium has witnessed since the Champions League's inception. "Hopefully it's not a one-off but the quality of goals was so high it is difficult to think we could ever get that again," he said. "It was a fantastic performance; the speed of our play, the penetration, the confidence we showed, the clinical nature of our finishing. It was a special night and we can't wait for the semi-finals now because it will give the club a real lift.

"We've had a couple of bad results in the last weeks and it isn't easy for a club like ours to lose two successive matches. But all the great teams have to get over these mishaps. Every team has disappointments but it's how you recover that's important. We have shown a new level of maturity and performance here.

"We played Milan a couple of years ago and back then Cristiano Ronaldo and Wayne Rooney were young lads and not ready for those nights. They found it difficult against experienced opponents but tonight they looked like men."

On a night when Ferguson felt Ronaldo and Rooney came of age, and Michael Carrick bewitched Old Trafford with his range of passing, he also made sure to identify Alan Smith for special acclaim.

"He deserves it more than anyone," he said the United manager of a player making only his fourth start of the season, but who is finally showing signs that he has fully recovered from the broken leg and dislocated ankle he suffered against Liverpool 14 months ago. "His attitude is absolutely wonderful but the greatest qualities he has shown are his patience and his perseverance," said Ferguson. "You have Ryan Giggs who sees these European nights as such a challenge and Michael Carrick, who I believe is getting better and better and is now playing with an excellent authority. But the one individual we have to pay attention to is Smith because his enthusiasm spread through the team."

There was praise, too, for unsung heroes such as Darren Fletcher and John O'Shea on a night when it was easy sometimes to forget that United were missing the considerable talents of, among others, Paul Scholes, Louis Saha and Nemanja Vidic.

"What we have done really well is that all the players who have come into the team have responded to the challenge," said Ferguson. "I'm particularly pleased because all these players are responding. I said a while ago that the players who could bring us success would be the ones who are often sitting on the bench and I hope that is the case. We have to win something to be seen as a great team and hopefully we will do that now. The way they are playing and enjoying their football, they deserve it."

With United and Chelsea already through, Liverpool all but assured of joining them tonight, Ferguson went on to say the presence of three English teams in the semi-finals signified that the Premiership could now be considered as the strongest league in Europe.

"A few years ago I would have said that Spanish football was the best but the evidence this season is that Barcelona and Real Madrid are nowhere near as strong as they have been in previous years," he said.

"The quality of the English game has improved and everyone can see that now because it is very probable there will be three of us in the semis and, hopefully, an all-English final. I think English football has to be recognised as the best in Europe now."

[muckypups]

I'm enjoying this...

Seven wonders of sublime United dazzle and destroy helpless Roma

Kevin McCarra at Old Trafford

Manchester United obliterated Roma and all but erased the reputation of Serie A. No one believed it possible to treat an Italian club quite like this. The victors, nonetheless, will give more thought to their immediate future than to this contribution to the lore of European football. Their burden now is the widespread expectation that they will beat Bayern Munich or Milan in the last four and go on to the Champions League final.

The panache displayed last night was all the more uncanny considering that United had seemed so careworn while losing the first leg of this tie and being beaten by Portsmouth at the weekend. Even the substitute Patrice Evra helped himself to the spoils, claiming the seventh with a drive in the 81st minute. This blistering display ranks with any in United's romantic history and the freedom of it smacked of an innocent golden age for European football in the 1960s.

Joy ambushed a manager who had perpetrated an extravagant understatement while getting a prediction right in his programme notes. "If we score tonight and I think we will," Sir Alex Ferguson had written, "we will pull this one off." Maybe he was only being coy about a premonition of what was to come.

While the gusto was irresistible, the side was set up perfectly as well. Ferguson, unexpectedly, had adopted the same 4-2-3-1 formation as Roma but there was no problem telling them apart when the Premiership team had all the width, pace and penetration.

There was certainly foresight in the planning. Wayne Rooney was nominally stationed on the left, a piece of positioning that customarily has the crowd cursing the name of Ferguson's assistant Carlos Queiroz. Like most other things that United attempted, the ploy was inspired. The logic of the battle plan also called for an unexpected selection.

Of the men available Alan Smith was the appropriate choice for the role of lone striker, even though he had not started a Premiership fixture in the current campaign. Fully recovered from the broken leg he suffered at Anfield last season, he was the ideal foil for all the players darting and spinning around him. Smith, in addition, took time off from that to score his first goal since November 19 2005.

From the start Roma had a sickly pallor and not only because Rodrigo Taddei took ill so close to kick-off that the team sheet had to be redrafted. His place went to Mirko Vucinic, who had delivered the winner in the Serie A club's 2-1 success last week. Personnel turned into an irrelevance as Cristiano Ronaldo and the others swerved round all obstacles.

With 12 minutes gone the Portugal winger jinked inside and sent play to Michael Carrick, whose bending finish from outside the area confused the static goalkeeper Doni and beat him at his near post. Five minutes later Gabriel Heinze advanced on the left and picked out Ryan Giggs in the middle during an ebullient attack of one-touch passing. Cristian Chivu failed to cut out the Welshman's through-ball and Smith was clear to take the chance with aplomb.

In the 19th minute a mesmeric cameo by Ronaldo was followed by Smith's ball to Giggs. The veteran centred and Rooney knocked in the third. It was Ronaldo above all who made Roma drown in their own helplessness. The visitors deferred to him as he cut inside from the right and beat Doni at the near post after 44 minutes.

More was to follow from the scorer of that goal. Four minutes of the second half had gone when Roma lost the ball in defence, play was fired instantly to Giggs on the left and, while Smith could not quite connect with a low delivery, Ronaldo at the far post did force it home.

Roma had won 2-0 in France to eliminate Lyon in the previous round but clean sheets were now beyond the imagination of a team in torment. "Are you City in disguise?" bayed the crowd. That was unjust on Stuart Pearce's squad.

With an hour gone, United switched a move sharply to the left, Heinze laid the ball back and Carrick placed it high past Doni from 20 yards for his second goal. Roma bought short respite only because Daniel de Rossi netted a volley from a Francesco Totti cross in the 69th minute.

By the close United, with their substitutions made, were voluntarily reduced to 10 men when Rio Ferdinand was allowed to go off with a knock. On this showing the visitors would have suffered even if Ferguson's line-up had been in single figures from the kick-off.

[Plus]

By the time I woke up to watch the game it was 3-0 already and I thought Man U were awarded an automatic lead for Roma crowd troubles, for my first ten minutes it seemed completely against the flow of the game.

I stopped watching the second half as at all as it was not a contest anymore. Chelsea's struggle was more exciting at that time as they completely turned their game around. Everytime I checked on Man U it was another goal added.

Excellent result, of course, but like with Liverpool and Arsenal - this season they beat each other by big scores already (was 6-1 for Arsenal and 4-1 for Liverpool?).

If Man U's luck streak continues, the Champions League is theirs, but it's a big IF. There's a big gap between the games, lots of things can happen, though Arsenal almost pulled it off last year, and so did Liverpool in 2005.

[muckypups]

Of course all the sport's writers are falling over themselves to lavish praise.. so, for brevity, I'll just post a few links..

(be easier to sift out all the compliments from the ABU's that way.. )

The Telegraph

The Telegraph on Carrick

The Times

The Mail

Manchester Evening News

The Independent

That'll do for now.. until I find some more..

[muckypups]

If Man U's luck streak continues, the Champions League is theirs, but it's a big IF.

With respect Plus; luck had nothing to do with it..

[muckypups]

Good report here also..:

RTE

[nev]

Thanks Tax.. What a performance! A team missing Scholes, Neville, Vidic, Saha as well.. I also wish to make an apology to Darren Fletcher, I've never been a big fan and I've stated that here many times but he was fantastic last night especially in the first half...

A perfect night.. how I wish I could have been there...

COME ON YOU REDS...

Oh, and the Premiership's 1-2-3 (assuming Liverpool don't blow it tonight).. into the Semi's of the Champs League. Excellent

what he said i am speachless,best i have sen us play awesome game.

thanks tax and chon.

all england final bring it on!!

[muckypups]

Brilliant eh Nev..what a performance..

From The Independent:

Ronaldo irrepressible as Roma empire crumbles

By Phil Shaw at Old Trafford

As Italian fans queued for admission, still full of horribly misplaced optimism, a spaniel sniffed their bags on behalf of the Great Manchester Police. It was, her handler explained: "In case they had anything explosive."

How Roma must have wished the same test had been enforced on Cristiano Ronaldo's feet.

Ronaldo dazzled and dribbled Roma into a most humiliating defeat in their history, reducing Francesco Totti to the unaccustomed role of an onlooker. Apart from scoring twice, he did more than anyone in a stunning Manchester United display to establish a tempo that left Totti and his team-mates chasing shadows

With 31 minutes remaining, when Ronaldo's cross went through for Michael Carrick's second goal, United historians wondered whether they might match, or even surpass, the 10-nil rout of Anderlecht 51 years ago but they had to settle for a 7-1.

United's opening onslaught came, curiously enough, after Totti had hinted that he might serve up a match-winning performance. In the opening minutes he killed one dropping ball with the deftest touch before drilling it a foot wide and then sent Mirko Vucinic through with a breathtaking pass for a shot that the Serbian wasted.

Totti's virtuosity was like a challenge from the old order to the new, and Ronaldo rose to it magnificently. In a blur of white feet he created the opportunity for Carrick to start the spree.

Then, after Alan Smith and Wayne Rooney had made it 3-0, Ronaldo exploited generous help from an absentee defence to score the fourth. After he had slid in the fifth, Totti looked on disbelievingly, hands on hips, and the Roman Ultras watched in stunned silence.

Christian Chivu, sporting a mask à la Phantom of the Opera, resorted to grabbing Ronaldo's shirt to check one surge. He also hauled his tormentor down in United's next attack, yet waited to shake his hand, the gesture serving to placate the referee and it, seemed, to acknowledge a superior talent.

Off the pitch, it appeared that forewarned was forearmed, or rather disarmed. A week earlier, the first leg had been overshadowed by ambushes of United fans by Italian youths, resulting in a number of stabbings, and by baton charges against the Manchester contingent by the police in the Stadio Olimpico.

On this occasion, police reported only "small and isolated incidents" at Old Trafford, adding that they had made "some arrests". The main skirmish, around two hours before kick-off, took place near the Munich memorial outside the East End. A small group of men, many wearing baseball caps but not United colours, ran at a section of the 3,800-strong Roma support before police intervened.

As helicopters whirred overhead, one Italian fan disappeared into the Disabled Entrance, in search of treatment for a cut beneath the eye. Even as his friends escorted him to safety, some of his compatriots were following in the time-honoured Old Trafford ritual of posing for photographs, seemingly oblivious to any danger.

By the turnstile lay a pile of Giallorossi scarves which stewards had obliged them to surrender. In the same way, their team appeared to have left the fabled Italian defensive ruthlessness in the dressing-room.

[muckypups]

Some great writing in the press today..(well. I would say that wouldn't I.. )

From the Mail..

Spectacle was a rebuke for the malevolent few

A British passport was not required for the neutral to hope Roma’s misanthropic rabble would be expelled from the Champions League on the end of a Manchester United boot.

The disorder outside Old Trafford before last night’s kickoff rendered Sir Alex Ferguson’s first prediction of the week redundant. There would, he promised, be "no trouble" at a ground so expertly policed.

The duff tip was forgiveable. It’s never easy for rational people to anticipate the idiocy of tribes who use the game to display the effects of a lobotomy.

Now for the good news. Ferguson’s other forecast was bang on the money.

He said his Premiership leaders would create "lots of chances" — and so they did in a pulsating opening half that brought them a startling 4-0 lead and allayed the fears of those who questioned whether a team containing Wes Brown, John O’Shea, Darren Fletcher and Alan Smith could overturn the Roman legion.

This was a night for blowing away doubt. United’s first three scorers all had a point to make.

Michael Carrick is trying to fill the iron shoes of Roy Keane, Alan Smith had not scored for the club since November 2005 and was offered to Cardiff City on loan, while Wayne Rooney had not scored in the Champions League proper since his debut in 2004 before his peach of a strike in Rome last week.

The beauty and verve of United’s attacking play was the best rebuke to those who have defiled this tie with their own malevolent agendas.

With their shades and leather bomber jackets, Roma’s hard-core are what hooliganism would look like if Armani supplied the costumes.

But, really, calling them ultras runs the risk of dignifying them with a political label, when the truth is that they are merely a mob of designer drama queens.

The hope was that only gentle Italian restaurateurs from London would turn up to this second-leg, but in the event around 100 agitators were involved in brief skirmishes as the British retractable truncheon sought to match the mob-quelling powers of the Italian baton.

Aided and abetted by the Rome police, whose indiscriminate bludgeoning of United’s fans set the tone for last night’s trouble, the extremist tendency have sent a shudder through the European game.

All the while the violence is confined to Serie A, the rest of the continent can shake its head and marvel at Italian football’s laissez-faire approach to crowd control. But put the modern Colosseum on primetime European television, and it’s not just the Champions League elite commercial ‘partners’ who twitch.

These competitions are based on the premise that European football has become a model of integration in which supporters can travel safely to other cultures. Nowhere in this utopian scheme is there scope for police batons cracking the heads of innocent bystanders or law-abiding fans being chased through the streets of Seville or Rome.

Nor does the description on the tin say anything about hostile mobs grappling with police beneath Sir Matt Busby’s statue.

In the interests of accuracy, it should be said that small gangs of United fans in black baseball caps and hoodies also gathered with the intention of exacting revenge for Rome.

Though the scuffles, arrests and knife-searches were unseemly, there was at least the comforting sense that industrial-scale hooliganism has been consigned to history at British grounds.

Not everything in this country works (not much, sometimes), but football policing is right up there with roadworks and real ale on the list of things at which we excel.

United’s followers were tense enough already. Chewing at their hopes was the knowledge that United had just lost back-to-back games for the first time for 17 months, and had never survived a Champions League tie after losing the first leg.

Resilience and courage are not in short supply in these parts, yet the roll call of knock-out disappointments was sufficient to unhinge the most optimistic United fan: Borussia Dortmund (1997), Bayern Munich (2001), Real Madrid (2003), FC Porto (2004) and, most recently, AC Milan (2005).

There were also goalkeeper Edwin van der Sar’s recent howlers to fret about, and the loss, in defence, of full back Gary Neville and centre-half Nemanja Vidic as well as Paul Scholes, in midfield, to suspension.

How could a dispiriting loss at Portsmouth’s Fratton Park be transfigured as a Champions League quarter-final victory when the odds were so heavily stacked in Roma’s favour?

United are always at their most affecting when they obey the Old Trafford spirit; when they advance wide and fast.

There are few more thrilling sights in football than the red shirts fanning out to work the ball into the box and, finally, the net.

Cristiano Ronaldo did so brilliantly to bring United their fourth and fifth goals either side of half-time, before Carrick made it six and Patrice Evra added a seventh to induce disbelief in the home crowd and paralysis among Roma’s vanquished team.

An artistic tradition is something bottle-throwing fascists and local toughs could never violate.

[mrbojangles]

Well i'll hold my hands up. That was a performance and half. Well done you reds.

Still hope you don't make it any further though

[muckypups]

Ever the gentleman Mr. B. thankyou Certainly was an amazing game..

[muckypups]

More analysis.. (and superlatives )

From The Telegraph:

Roma destroyed by a family institution

By Tim Rich

It may be a strange thing to say about a club that has trailed stardust ever since Duncan Edwards first stepped on to a football field, but Sir Alex Ferguson made the point recently that at its heart Manchester United was not an especially glamorous institution.

He remarked that it was run by people who had been doing the same job for years - washing the kit, acting as secretaries or smoothing matters behind the scenes.

It served as a kind of surrogate family and it is perhaps this that gives Manchester United the inner strength to pull off performances such as Tuesday's 7-1 demolition of Roma, when their season appeared to be teetering on the brink.

Yes, the match dripped with glamour. The goals, unusually for such an overwhelming scoreline, were all breathtakingly conceived. The result, the biggest defeat suffered by an Italian side in the European Cup since Sophia Loren was making her first movies in Rome, was numbing. But it was the work of men, who under pressure, responded with a brilliant collective will.

"Congratulations to everybody because we had something like eight players missing and we won against a very big team," said Patrice Evra, who was playing right-back for the first time in his career and ended up scoring. "That is why Manchester United is like a big family. When you have 76,000 behind you, you need to give of your best. This is what Manchester United is all about."

This was not, however, a new kind of scoreline for Evra in the Champions League. In November 2003, he had been part of the Monaco side that annihilated Deportivo La Coruna 8-3 and that went on to eliminate Real Madrid and reach the final, which they lost to Jose Mourinho's Porto. He does not want another season where his club's football takes all the plaudits but someone else lifts the trophies.

"One of the reasons I came to Manchester was to win the Champions League," he said. "We need to win something - if we win nothing people will say that United played some good football but to me that is not enough. If we win nothing, it will be unbelievable."

Beforehand, as police cleared the streets outside Old Trafford of the fitful violence that had briefly threatened to scar this game, it seemed United might indeed win nothing.

Defeat here might have fatally undermined a thinning squad. As it was, it showcased the ageless talents of Ryan Giggs and the youthful exuberance of Cristiano Ronaldo to thrilling and devastating effect.

"It is the saddest night of my sporting career," reflected the Roma captain, Francesco Totti, who had put this match on a par with last summer's World Cup final. "Before the game I said Cristiano Ronaldo was a great player but I hoped we could limit his play like we did in the first leg but he found us with every punch."

"The great thing about him is that he does not just do it training," said Evra. "He does it on the pitch and he does not do it for himself; he does it for the team and the fans and to win the game. He is unbelievable; Cristiano can do the same job as Maradona, Pele or Best. He can be like them."

Putting seven past a team even as formidable as Roma guarantees nothing - the Leeds side that lost out on three trophies in 1973 separated their defeat in the FA Cup final by Sunderland and the loss of the Cup Winners Cup final to AC Milan by thrashing Arsenal 6-1. However, it does make Aidy Boothroyd's pre-match team talk before Saturday's FA Cup semi-final with Watford a bit more awkward.

Whether the result has any implications will have to wait but as a game it was grand theatre. Edwin van der Sar, part of an Ajax side that destroyed Bayern Munich 5-2 to reach the 1995 European Cup final, confessed he had seen nothing like it in his career.

Michael Carrick's swerving shot 11 minutes into the evening stopped the pretty passing football Roma had begun with in its tracks and persuaded Old Trafford this was a match that could be won. He reflected that "it was awesome to be part of it."

"You don't want to let it slip away," he added. "It was down to sheer quality, desire and determination to do well." In other words, it was a performance based on the cornerstones that have made Manchester United great.

[muckypups]

and The Independent:

United focus on return to reality after rout that sent a 'message to Europe'

By Andy Hunter

There were tears among those who shared Francesco Totti's disbelief at "the saddest night of my sporting career" on Tuesday but only one figure generated heart-felt sympathy as the Manchester United parade swept into the Champions League semi-finals. It was the Watford manager, Aidy Boothroyd, who bounded down the steps of the Old Trafford directors' box in the wake of United's seventh goal against Roma with a dead-weight dossier under his arm that may never see the light of day.

While Roma delegates sat open-mouthed at their team's 7-1 obliteration, supporters sang in defiance or wept in despair and Italian journalists fond of the Giallorossi slammed shut their laptops in fury, the astute and diligent Boothroyd departed with the dilemma of what to say to his players before they attempt to bridge the widest possible gulf in the Premiership in Saturday's FA Cup semi-final. He may conclude that some things are better left unsaid and place the report in storage.

The division's bottom club will hope that United's tendency to flirt with the extremes returns at Villa Park, just as it did at Fratton Park last Saturday, but only straw-clutchers would accept that the only way to go, after a record-equalling destruction of the meanest defence in the Champions League quarter-finals, is down. Not only was there a remarkable ruthlessness about United as they equalled their record European victory at Old Trafford after a 39-year wait, and a performance that seasoned observers ranked among the club's finest, but a hunger to ensure that this will not prove the highlight of a reaffirming season, which illustrated the depth of the task now confronting Boothroyd and his players.

Patrice Evra, who marked his first appearance at right-back on Tuesday with the seventh goal that signalled the exit for the Watford delegation, encapsulated the mood running throughout the United camp. "We need to win something this year," he stated. "If you win nothing, people will say, 'Well, United played good football', but to me that is not enough. If we win nothing it will have been a bad season. We must win one trophy, or two - three would be unbelievable.

"Even in pre-season we knew this could be a special season. It is not just about this game - we've been playing well all season. We are a team of great character. Now we just want to get to the final. One of the reasons I came to Manchester United was to win the Champions League."

Ferguson insisted he was more concerned about his own players than United's next opponents in the Champions League and, after a night when he masterfully overcame a serious list of absentees by loading his fittest attacking options behind the buffer of Alan Smith, the Scot appears unlikely to have to add complacency to his concerns.

Though his squad is stretched, stand-ins such as Smith, Darren Fletcher and Wes Brown were instrumental in the destruction of Roma - "I have never seen a performance like that before in my career," insisted Edwin van der Sar, a European Cup winner with Ajax in 1995 and veteran of 120 caps for the Netherlands - and despite salvation being harder to find for Kieran Richardson, scandalously booed by sections of the home crowd when he replaced Michael Carrick, the majority of the United squad can consider this as the night they came of age in Europe. Not least Carrick, whose excellence found an outlet in two stunning goals and who is now waiting for the DVD of the game to be released. "It will be coming out once or twice, you can be sure of that," said the England international.

"Maybe this result does send a message out to the rest of Europe," he added; "But we can't turn off once we get to the semi-finals. We have to start again. I've been on the end of a few scorelines like that in my youth team days at West Ham and to do it on a night of such importance, against team with a defensive record like Roma's, is just incredible. But, from our point of view, how we played or the number of goals we scored doesn't really mean anything. Psychologically, it may boost your confidence, but when you go in against big teams you've got to do it all again. This was a one-off game so we will not get too carried away."

And then, of course, there is Cristiano Ronaldo, so mesmerising against Luciano Spalletti's team that Evra was compelled to claim he "can do the same job as Maradona or Pele or Best, he can be like them", and now he is rid of the burden of never having scored in the Champions League proper.

"I'm pleased I've finally scored my first goals in the Champions League - I'm very happy," said the Portuguese international. "But the most important thing is the team and that we take this form into the semi-finals. In this form we don't fear anyone."

[muckypups]

Hargreaves for sale this time?

Beckenbauer hints at Hargreaves exit

Bayern Munich president Franz Beckenbauer has admitted for the first time that Owen Hargreaves could join Manchester United this summer - providing the price is right.

Speaking on Premiere television just a few hours before Bayern's Champions League quarter-final against AC Milan, Beckenbauer said: "If it is right that there is an offer of 25-30 million euros (£17million-£20million) for Hargreaves, then I would seriously consider it.

"I think the board also think this way to satisfy the needs of the player."

The 26-year-old England international has been a long-standing United target, but the Bavarians have resolutely refused to deal with the Barclays Premiership leaders.

They believe Hargreaves should honour the new four-year contract he signed last summer.

[muckypups]

and inevitably...

Ronaldo compared to Best and Pelé as Real rumours refuse to go away

Oliver Kay

It was, Cristiano Ronaldo said, an “unbelievable” night, one that may have taught him a little about why Sir Bobby Charlton called Old Trafford “The Theatre of Dreams”. After his role in Manchester United’s stunning 7-1 victory over AS Roma in the second leg of the Champions League quarter-finals, it was impossible to imagine the Portugal winger wanting to play his football anywhere else, but it is not only in terms of his talent that he has the football world at his feet.

Reports from Spain yesterday claimed that Ronaldo’s agent, Jorge Mendes, had met a prominent Real Madrid official, Franco Baldini, in London before last week’s Champions League match between Chelsea and Valencia.

Moreover, it was claimed that Mendes offered Baldini assurances that his client would reject the offer of a new contract with United this summer to pursue his ambition of playing for Real, who have indicated that they are willing to break the world transfer record and pay more than the £48 million that it took to sign Zinédine Zidane from Juventus in 2001.

Such matters were not on United’s agenda yesterday, as the club basked in the glorious afterglow of the impressive performance against Roma on Tuesday. It is understood that, while the board is eager to increase his wages above £100,000 a week in the hope of extending his contract beyond the summer of 2010, it will not be panicked into selling him should he reject the new deal, but it is increasingly clear that United will face a severe examination of their resolve over the coming months.

Ronaldo was not the only outstanding performer against Roma — Michael Carrick and Ryan Giggs were also, in different ways, devastatingly effective — but it was the Portuguese, yet again, who left his teammates awestruck and searching for new superlatives to describe him. Ole Gunnar Solskjaer opined that the 22-year-old was unstoppable, but Patrice Evra, another substitute, went farther.

“At this moment Ronaldo is the best player in the world, no question,” the France full back said. “He is unbelievable. Cristiano can do the same job as [Diego] Maradona or Pelé or [George] Best. He can be like them.”

It was not the first time this season that Ronaldo has been described as the best player in the world, but to mention him in the same breath as Maradona or Pelé is to open a new debate. These are the players whose positions atop the sport’s pantheon of greats are unchallenged, putting them in a different class from the many outstanding performers — most notably Zidane — since Maradona’s retirement. But, as his annus mirabilis approaches a heady climax, with United in contention to emulate their “treble” triumph of 1999, the compliments are growing in proportion to Ronaldo’s reputation.

“I feel great,” Ronaldo said on his way out of Old Trafford on Tuesday evening. “It was an unbelievable result. When you win 7-1 against Roma in the quarter-finals of the Champions League, it is great. The team played very well, we were very confident and the supporters played their part by helping the team. It was fantastic, amazing for the players, amazing for the club, but now we need to think about the next round.

“This team has great spirit and is now very mature. But we need to carry on like this. I don’t have a preference who we play — AC Milan or Bayern Munich. Both would be tough ties. But in this form we don’t fear anyone.”

Indeed, on Tuesday’s evidence, United are the team to fear in the Champions League.

It had been several seasons since they had produced a resounding victory against top-class European opposition, but their performance against Roma was spellbinding, as illustrated not only by the number of goals but their breathtaking quality.

Ronaldo scored twice and was involved in just about every one of the other five. The only concern for United is that, as his reputation grows, so does Real’s desire to get their hands on him.

[muckypups]

I don't get it.. the whole Gallactico nonsense. They're hardly a footballing powerhouse any more...

Real ready to offer £54m to secure Ronaldo

Sid Lowe in Madrid

Real Madrid have stepped up their attempt to sign Cristiano Ronaldo by meeting his agent and agreeing a course of action that directors at the Santiago Bernabéu believe will end with the Portugal winger becoming their latest galáctico

Franco Baldini, right-hand man to Madrid's sporting director, Predrag Mijatovic, and the man who negotiates all of the club's signings, met Jorge Mendes in London last Wednesday.

Sources at Madrid claim that during the meeting, Baldini confirmed that Ronaldo is their No1 priority for next season and informed Mendes that they would be prepared to meet Manchester United's asking price for the winger - expected to be somewhere in the region of €80m (£54m). They would also be prepared to beat any contract offer made by Manchester United, matching Ronaldo's salary to that of the galácticos: €6m (£4m) a year, after tax.

While he warned Baldini that United would fight to keep Ronaldo, Mendes apparently told him that the winger is keen to join Madrid and would reject the contract offer currently on the table at Old Trafford. Ronaldo's wage demands on a new United contract are believed to be in the region of £140,000 a week.

Madrid also insist that Mendes has reassured them that Ronaldo will force an exit from Old Trafford, although a second meeting with Sir Alex Ferguson is expected in the next 10 days.

[muckypups]

and a final word on Tuesday from the Manchester Evening News:

Fergie's seventh heaven

Stuart Brennan

ASKED whether he had been to see the Pope while in Rome last week, Sir Alex Ferguson said that he had cut out the middle man and had granted an audience to the Almighty Himself.

We thought he was joking.

But when Manchester United served up football which was undoubtedly made in heaven, you could start to believe that there truly had been some divine inspiration at work.

And the hosts of Old Trafford sang hosanna.

Not since Moses was a lad - Remi Moses, that is, obviously - had United overturned a first leg deficit in European football, other than a qualifying round victory over Zalaegerszegi four years ago.

But on a sparkling night in Manchester 16, they not only overturned Roma's 2-1 lead, they flattened it, tied it in a knot and had it bagged up and buried by half-time.

Echoes

Last night's breathtaking dismissal of one of Serie A's finest had none of the enduring drama of that last spectacular reversal of a first leg defeat, when Bryan Robson hauled United back from 2-0 down to Barcelona to win 3-0 and send a packed stadium into tears and pitch-side somersaults. On that night, there was nail-biting and nerve-shredding right until the final whistle.

But it had some echoes of that glorious night.

Before that game, United fans gazed at their programmes and wondered how on earth little Moses - all Afro hair and bad attitude - could hope to live with the football god which was Maradona.

The answer was a large dose of Mancunian snarl and snap, hustling and badgering the brilliant Argentine into errors.

A lingering look at last night's team-sheet brought on similar feelings of anxiety and anguish.

United were ravaged by injury and ruffled by two consecutive defeats, to the point where the subs' bench was populated by the unknown and the unlikely.

With Alan Smith coming back from injury, John O'Shea slotting in at right-back - hardly his best position - and Darren Fletcher and Michael Carrick handed a tough midfield job, there was every reason to be pessimistic.

And yet the sight of Fletcher digging into Francesco Totti, admittedly a mere demi-god in comparison to Maradona, while all around him red shirts bristled with serious intent, was enough to lift the spirits.

What turned out to be a feast of Champions League football was almost soured before a ball had been kicked as mobs of angry United fans roamed around outside the stadium, intent on revenge for the bitter scenes in Rome last week.

A few innocent Italians received bloody noses, missiles were thrown and threats exchanged. And all the while, the real culprits, the thugs in uniform who laid into the United fans last week, were probably at home, watching it all unfold on the telly, their overtime pay packets bulging in their pockets.

It is time UEFA made countries which cannot control their police pay for such outrages. If English clubs were banned from Europe in the 80s for the violence of some of their fans, the same should apply to state hooligans.

Unless the authorities take action, someone will die - the situation goes beyond football.

The only positive to come out of last week's horrible scenes and the misguided attempts at revenge was that it helped to give the atmosphere inside Old Trafford a real edge.

Frenzy

The club itself got it hopelessly wrong again, thinking that loud tannoy music and a pitch-side interview with Wilf McGuinness was the way to whip the masses into a frenzy.

When the team on the pitch is positively crackling with static, and lightning bolts are hitting the Roma net with frequency and ferocity, artificial attempts at getting things going just look pathetic. There were heroes in red shirts everywhere you looked, not least Smith, who defied all logic to put in a first half display of muscular poise and slick touch which showed that he can be a serious factor in United's run-in to the end of the season.

Michael Carrick came of age, a paragon of composure and invention in midfield, and capped it all with two of the best goals you will see all season.

And Cristiano Ronaldo will get plenty of the limelight too for his goals.

Wayne Rooney said on the day before this game that he felt Ronaldo was by far the best player in the world and was perhaps the one man who could single-handedly win it.

It was as bold a piece of Scouse con-artistry as you are likely to see, and it appeared that the Italians fell for it big time.

While the Roma midfield and defence gazed worriedly towards the Portuguese, the slight figure of Ryan Giggs was running them ragged.

Too old to play two games in three days, Giggs had sat on the bench at Fratton Park as his tired team-mates slumped to defeat.

You could say that the rest did him good. He roved down the left, he raided down the right, he terrorised the centre.

And once Ronaldo and Wayne Rooney entered the mood, the Italians were in serious trouble.

For a while it seemed like the club record win, a 10-0 demolition of hapless Anderlecht by the Busby Babes over 50 years ago, was in jeopardy as the Reds raced to a 6-0 lead within an hour.

Roma spoiled some of that fun with a goal of their own, but the joy remained unabated.

Jose Mourinho said at the weekend that he wished his Chelsea team was playing United next week, after that showdown was postponed to accommodate the FA Cup semi-finals. Still fancy it now, Jose?

[nev]

Well i'll hold my hands up. That was a performance and half. Well done you reds.

Still hope you don't make it any further though

thanks mr bojangles.

we have a really tough game against ac milan,they are a very good team.

you have to be in it to win it, i am sure they are worried about us as much as we are about them.

[MiG16]

Well i'll hold my hands up. That was a performance and half. Well done you reds.

Still hope you don't make it any further though

thanks mr bojangles.

we have a really tough game against ac milan,they are a very good team.

you have to be in it to win it, i am sure they are worried about us as much as we are about them.

i think you boys missed the coloured text

but gee what was that.....

I bet redrus is out having beers for 7nights

EDIT: make Mr.BO's comment more visible

[mrbojangles]

Well i'll hold my hands up. That was a performance and half. Well done you reds.

Still hope you don't make it any further though

thanks mr bojangles.

we have a really tough game against ac milan,they are a very good team.

you have to be in it to win it, i am sure they are worried about us as much as we are about them.

i think you boys missed the coloured text

but gee what was that.....

I bet redrus is out having beers for 7nights

EDIT: make Mr.BO's comment more visible

Darn you M1g, the boys should have found the hidden message themselves. However my initial comments still stand, as it was a tremendous performance.

[MiG16]

I didnt watch the game...but last night on TV saw one of those SMS viewers send in to TV channels...one was about the match and asked if Roma played without their legs

Im glad I didnt watch it....Im equally as bitter as Bo there when it comes to ManU winning