Manchester United 3-0 Liverpool

It's always beautiful beating Liverpool, but beating them on such an important day made it as sweet as most of our victories over them. And to be gifted it, really, by an act of stupidity by one of their better players put a smile on this Mancunian face . It also meant that United didn't really have to take as much out of themselves as you would have expected, auguring well for the next couple of months.
Whilst United were always the better team, i wouldn't go along with Fergie's after match talk of the side showing maturity. That spell in the second half where the 10 man Liverpool team threatened to come back into the game, kind of summed up the game to me. I thought there were some nervous performances out there for United, as if some players were scared of making a mistake in such a big game. Thankfully for us, the main men were the exceptions, Rooney, Ronaldo and especially Ferdinand were absolutely magnificent.
United started the game on the front foot right from the start, as Liverpool's tactics as usual seemed to be to defend and try and catch us on the break. United had a few decent half chances without quite opening the Liverpool defence completely. Rooney had a half chance that he controlled first time, but couldn't bring down in time to get a clear shot in and Reina saved easily. Ronaldo hit the post from a Giggs free kick, but it wasn't an easy chance. And another Giggs cross saw Reina fumble the ball under his own cross bar, but he managed to get away with it. The one thing that amazes me about Benitez's side is that he employs such negative tactics and yet his team are so susceptible to any crosses delivered into the box. And that's where the first goal came as Rooney put a decent cross in that didn't seem that dangerous to be honest, when Wes Brown of all people appeared in the penalty box and managed to out jump Reina to bundle the ball into the back of the net off the back of his shoulder.
On the stroke of half time Mascherano lost his marbles and handed us the game on a plate. He had already been booked for a foul on Scholes that was thoroughly deserved, when a foul on Torres saw Mascherano run over to berate the referee. After the Ashley Cole incident at White hart lane he was obviously giving the ref a chance to send him off, and that is what Steve Bennett duly did. At this Mascherano really lost it, and had to be virtually dragged from the field. Benitez had likened his Argentine defensive midfielder to Keano in midweek, and whilst the Cork man was no angel as we all know and had his share of red cards he never got sent off for dissent in a big game to the best of my memory.
The second half saw United have an outstanding chance to kill the game almost straight away as Ronaldo was gifted a great chance but couldn't put the chance away. Next up Rooney had a great ball put through for him that he controlled with a sublime first touch before unleashing a left foot strike that Reina saved brilliantly. Scholes produced a magnificent lob pass to put through Ronaldo through once more, but Reina was up to the job again as he came out to smother the effort. Half way through the second half nerves seemed to get the better of United as they were seemingly unable to put the game away. Vidic seemed to suffer a bit of a shaky spell during this stage of the game, i don't know if he was carrying a knock, but fortunately Ferdinand was in imperious form. He managed to keep Torres shackled for the entire 90 minutes, though to be fair to Torres he did show some reasonable touches in the first half.
United fought their way through this spell to get on top of the match again, and once more another great chance fell to the feet of Ronaldo, and unfortunately, once more he couldn't find the back of the net as this time Reina tipped it round for a corner. Thankfully for United this led to the second goal as Nani's corner was glanced into the back of the net off the head of Ronaldo who had beaten Reina to the ball. Just two minutes later Nani finished off a fine move with a superb finish into the corner of the net which Reina didn't even bother to dive for, and the game was now emphatically over. The day didn't go entirely to plan as the draw we had hoped for in the other game didn't materialise as Chelsea came from behind to beat Arsenal. That was the last result i had wanted. I have expected Arsenal's title charge to fade away for quite a while and although it has took longer to happen than i thought it would, the last month has seen them start to bottle it as i had expected. So with me not expecting Arsenal to last the pace, i would have preferred them to come out victorious rather than the rent boys. That game at Chelsea is going to be a biggie now, if we draw or win that, the title will be ours.

A 90 minute master class according to the guardian
http://football.guardian.co.uk/Match_Report/0,,2267731,00.html

Alan Hansen on United's perfect day
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/main.jhtml?xml=/sport/2008/03/24/sfnhan124.xml

Scholes is enjoying it while he still can
http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/football/premier-league/paul-scholes-i-know-there-isnt-much-time-left-so-i-have-to-enjoy-it-799562.html
And so are all us Scholes admirers, there aren't too many footballers who are able to produce perfect lob passes like the one that gave Ronaldo such a great chance yesterday, in the very biggest of games. It was very similar to the one that produced the Rooney equaliser against Milan at Old Trafford last season.

Ryan Giggs loves beating Liverpool, don't we all
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/football/premier_league/manchester_united/article3602355.ece

Patrick Barclay on Ferguson and Queiroz, the double act
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/main.jhtml?xml=/sport/2008/03/23/sfnpad123.xml

Will Hutton on reforming the city
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/mar/23/creditcrunch.economy

The end of capitalism as we know it
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/comment/outside-view-the-end-of-capitalism-as-we-know-it-799494.html
probably not, but almost certainly the end of the market fundamentalists hegemony