It's a weird old season, whilst i wasn't over confident ahead of the match, I certainly didn't foresee us getting beat by three goals. As poor as we were during the second half, that three goal margin was harsh. But if you let in three goals as defensively poor as we did yesterday, you're always going to be struggling.
For the first five to ten minutes United had to fight to establish dominance of the possession, but just as they were about to establish it, we were caught on the counter attack and some poor defending from Blind and a very soft attempt at a clearance from McNair led to McCarthy waltzing through our back line to give the home team the lead.
United then started to get into a groove and whilst you wouldn't say we were knocking at the door, we did look as if we might have a goal in us. But it was all a bit like last week, oodles of possession, but not any where near end product. In fact United's best chance of the first half and indeed probably the match came from Fellaini pinching the ball of the Everton back four only to blast the ball over the bar. Who knows how the game would have panned out if Fellaini had showed more composure. It wasn't the big Belgian's day. He was booked for a clumsy challenge early on, Everton's midfield managed to keep him quiet for the most part and was replaced at half time.
Before that though Everton got a second goal that was as poor defensively from United as the first goal had been. United had two corners where Everton basically kept trying to hit their man on the near post. On the third attempt John Stones managed to leave Valencia for dead and powered home a fine header. United looked rattled by the second and were never really in the game after that.
For all United's and Van Gaal's improvement over the last month or so, the one aspect of his management that leaves me more and more non plussed is the Dutchman's use of substitutions in an attempt to change a game. As soon as brought Falcao on for Fellaini i basically gave up hope of us getting anything from the game. His first action of the game was to have the ball nicked from his feet from behind and it hardly got any better. The days of seeing United coming back from the dead and laying siege to the opposition goal are not going to happen under Van Gaal's philosophy, so far as we have seen this season. How on Earth was Falcao going to change anything?
The third goal was as comical as the first two goals, yes Mirallis was probably offside, but the whole back four just stopped dead, until in their horror they realised the flag hadn't gone up and the whistle hadn't gone. From that point on, I think I was just happy to see us leave there with no more goal in the deficit column.
So where does that leave the season and where does it leave our so called renaissance. Answers on a postcard, because I'm fucked if I know. After the City game I had though the top four was signed, sealed and delivered. Who knows now, it was vital for us that the dippers didn't get anything out of that trip to the Hawthorns. Looking at our games remaining and Liverpool's, I think we're just about in a good enough position. I can't see them getting anything at Stamford bridge and Stoke away is usually a tricky affair for them. We need to win next week to get things back on track though.
For the first five to ten minutes United had to fight to establish dominance of the possession, but just as they were about to establish it, we were caught on the counter attack and some poor defending from Blind and a very soft attempt at a clearance from McNair led to McCarthy waltzing through our back line to give the home team the lead.
United then started to get into a groove and whilst you wouldn't say we were knocking at the door, we did look as if we might have a goal in us. But it was all a bit like last week, oodles of possession, but not any where near end product. In fact United's best chance of the first half and indeed probably the match came from Fellaini pinching the ball of the Everton back four only to blast the ball over the bar. Who knows how the game would have panned out if Fellaini had showed more composure. It wasn't the big Belgian's day. He was booked for a clumsy challenge early on, Everton's midfield managed to keep him quiet for the most part and was replaced at half time.
Before that though Everton got a second goal that was as poor defensively from United as the first goal had been. United had two corners where Everton basically kept trying to hit their man on the near post. On the third attempt John Stones managed to leave Valencia for dead and powered home a fine header. United looked rattled by the second and were never really in the game after that.
For all United's and Van Gaal's improvement over the last month or so, the one aspect of his management that leaves me more and more non plussed is the Dutchman's use of substitutions in an attempt to change a game. As soon as brought Falcao on for Fellaini i basically gave up hope of us getting anything from the game. His first action of the game was to have the ball nicked from his feet from behind and it hardly got any better. The days of seeing United coming back from the dead and laying siege to the opposition goal are not going to happen under Van Gaal's philosophy, so far as we have seen this season. How on Earth was Falcao going to change anything?
The third goal was as comical as the first two goals, yes Mirallis was probably offside, but the whole back four just stopped dead, until in their horror they realised the flag hadn't gone up and the whistle hadn't gone. From that point on, I think I was just happy to see us leave there with no more goal in the deficit column.
So where does that leave the season and where does it leave our so called renaissance. Answers on a postcard, because I'm fucked if I know. After the City game I had though the top four was signed, sealed and delivered. Who knows now, it was vital for us that the dippers didn't get anything out of that trip to the Hawthorns. Looking at our games remaining and Liverpool's, I think we're just about in a good enough position. I can't see them getting anything at Stamford bridge and Stoke away is usually a tricky affair for them. We need to win next week to get things back on track though.
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