Ton-Up Scholes puts us on top

And the dreaded event for all United fans finally happened this weekend. Rooney not even in the squad list for our journey to The Molineux. Two games in three days at that sorry excuse for a pitch at Wembley finally took its toll on the Premier League’s most durable player. At the rate this pitch is taking players out, it should be banned for 5 games and the FA should draft a letter of apology to Arsenal (it’s always Arsenal isn’t it) saying it was never intentional and they send their best wishes for a speedy recovery.

The tackle that didn't take Rooney out

As a result of our squad size now consisting of a grand total of one senior striker, one man who’s been impressive for the reserves and Macheddaaaaaa, Fergie had no option but to play the now-standard 4-5-1, or 4-3-3 however you view it, with Berba as the lone man up front. Expectedly, it didn’t work out. At all. Berbatov is not the kind of player who can lead the line by himself. That requires hard work, a lot of pointless chasing after the ball and a very clear understanding of the rest of your team. None of which will find a place even among the top 20 in Berbatov’s list of attributes.

After the first-half performance, the hairdryer treatment from Fergie wouldn’t have sufficed to breathe some life into our team, more like a leaf-blower. In fairness to us, we weren’t exactly being hammered by the “full-strength” Wolves team at their own stadium (so the FA can suck on it with its fines for playing “under-strength” teams). But we weren’t hammering them either. In fact, we were barely even tickling them. Gibson for Fletch isn’t quite the same commanding presence in midfield while Nani’s back to form on the left. That left Valencia to be the only source of inspiration for anything good to happen for us, and he almost did with a swerving shot that just missed the left of Hahnemann’s post.

Diouf’s introduction for Gibson at least took the pressure off Berbatov to be the center of all attention, though Diouf tried his best to not be the same himself. In the end, the best moment for Diouf came as he got himself a front row view of the master showing the kids how it’s done within the box as well.

That's how it's done kids

100 up finally for the Gingerbread Prince, as he joins Giggsy in that elite club. Few minutes later, Diouf had a chance to put what he’d learnt to practice, but his wildly flapping dolphin-type dive at the ball in from Gary would’ve left all United fans with the same thought – surely Owen would’ve put that in. That’s one place where he was useful. Finishing off such teams in tight away games after Rooney would have put us ahead, putting the game beyond their reach, securing the points… that didn’t happen this game. And we nearly nearly paid the price as Vokes found himself 3 yards from goal, with only the keeper to beat and the ball rolling nicely towards his feet. However, in a moment reminiscent of Kanu putting the ball over the crossbar from one foot out, Vokes sliced his shot into the 20th row at the Molineux, as the red side of Manchester breathed a collective sigh of relief.

Sure it wasn’t pretty, and trust a Goner to point that out promptly. But, as we have tried to explain to the Goners for 5 seasons now, irrespective of how pretty you play and/or how many goals you score per game, you get only 3 points per game, and that is when you win. This is not the 9-ball pool trick shot championships. And even about the goals, I would like to direct everyone’s attention to the Goal Difference table. And hope all this pretty football nonsense can stop. Another very important takeaway from the game – we CAN score without the Roon. Against a parked-bus defence that too. Quite satisfying.

Fergie’s made some scary statements about Roon’s availability for Milan’s return leg. If he’s not playing that one, it’s almost a given that we’ll be going for the 0-0 on the night, now that we have Rio and Vida back, at the back. Valencia’s not quite experienced enough yet to step up on big European nights, and Berba is… siiigh. If we are to score on that night, it will most probably  be through our ton-up man again. Memories of United 1-0 Barca, ’08 Champions League Semifinal second leg come to mind…