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United may be losing, but all is not lost.

Published by Ian John on March 31, 2010

That sharp intake of breath heard by the World at about 9.30 GMT last night was the collective gasp of every Englishman, with an interest in the World Cup, and the dismal prospect of seeing England travel to the finals without Wayne Rooney. Fortunately Jamie Redknapp was there to put the country out of its misery by informing us that Rooney’s injury wasn’t another broken metatarsal (we haven’t had enough of them for England at World Cup Finals), but was more likely an ankle tweak. Painful and it could see Rooney out for a game or two, but nothing more.

And if anyone should know about injuries it is Jamie Redknapp. There’s chapters devoted to him in the British Medical Journal.

So, panic over, we can talk about Manchester United and last night’s defeat in Munich…

I’ve seen some over the top reactions in my time but to call the result a tragedy for United or a dreadful result is really wide of the mark. Certainly the Red Devils have performed better, especially in the second half where their midfield was uncharacteristically ineffective, but let us not lose perspective here. They lost because of three things. Firstly, a very lucky deflected shot from a poorly hit free kick that was going to end up in the arms of Van Der Sar otherwise, secondly they lost because Vidic’s marvellous header only smacked into the bar rather than the back of the net as it deserved and lastly because Ivica Olic scored an opportunist goal due to poor defending by Evra and Ferdinand. They still scored an away goal and if they win 1-0 at Old Trafford in the return leg they will still go through. It is hardly a crisis.

I think at the start of the evening, Sir Alex Ferguson would have taken that.

In addition to that, there was the very real fact that when United did attack the German side, they managed to open them up on several occasions. Rooney and Nani both missed great chances to add to Rooney’s 2nd minute strike and Bayern, mishit free kick and opportunist strike alone, had to wait until the final minute to really test Van Der Sar with a shot from the substitute Gomez, and yet somehow this has translated into a ‘disaster’ according to Jamie Redknapp. A sentiment which is somewhat lost on me.

At Old Trafford I can see United winning the return leg comfortably, with or without Rooney. His loss is more of a blow for United, especially with the two biggest games of the season coming up, at home to Chelsea and the return leg with Bayern Munich, than losing the first leg to two poor goals but getting an away goal to take into the home leg next week.

So yes, United may be losing, but all is not lost, not by any stretch of the imagination. United for me are still firm favourites to go through, especially with that seemingly porous Bayern defence set to come under great pressure in the second leg.

The second quarter final of the evening was another great game as Lyon defeated Bordeaux 3-1 to take a commanding lead into next weeks return leg. The crucial third goal coming from a somewhat contentious penalty award which was extremely harsh on Bordeaux and handed, literally, Lyon a crucial two goal advantage for the second leg.

Now if United had conceded their winning goal like that, then they would have had something to genuinely complain about.

Incidentally, it was another staggeringly poor performance from an official supposedly good enough to officiate at the highest level. UEFA and FIFA really need to get this sorted. A Paul Scholes thigh high tackle with studs up is not even worthy of a yellow card, yet a defender with his back to the ball trying to block feet first, gets given a penalty against him because the ball was blasted against his hand from 3 yards away? Dreadful decision and if I were a Bordeaux fan, I’d feel pretty hard done to this morning.

Image Courtesy of ***Jennifer M Rukyo*** on Flickr.com

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