Monday, October 25, 2004
woah. Football matches like Arsenal's visit to Old Trafford last night to take on Manchester United make football fans like us realise why we love the game so much. All the hype about the game and the intense rivalry behind these 2 sides... this was never going to be a boring match.
Remember last season in the corressponding fixture when Arsenal and United were headlocked at 1-1 until the final minutes of the match when United were given a penalty? Ruud Van Nistelrooy subsequently crashed the ball against the crossbar when he took the penalty. Scenes that disgraced football then followed as the Arsenal players surrounded Ruud Van Nistelrooy and cornered him like a bunch of vultures surrounding their prey.. Shouting, Taunting and pushing him around. Van Nistelrooy had earlier gotten Arsenal's captain sent off by reacting like he's just seen a cobra when Patrick Viera aimed a kick at him.
Martin Keown gets in Van Nistelrooy's face after the missed penalty
That penalty miss would prove to be costly as Arsenal went on to win the Championship unbeaten in all 38 games.
That unbeaten run stretched to 49 games as the guns of Arsenal strode into Old Trafford again.. Looking for their 50th game unbeaten. It's also the 24th :D of October. Well not many people know the significance of 24 yea but the one who does probably isnt reading this. It's also the 19th birthday of United's latest accquisition a youthful exuberant immature Mr Wayne Roooney. The wonderkid and the person who stopped Arsenal's last run of 30 unbeaten games.
19 Year Old Wayne Rooney face off against Arsenal Captain Patrick Viera Yesterday
And so here it goes again. Old Trafford the battle ground for the two biggest giants in football. On tv the two pundits were going head to head on who was going to win. so too were the commentators in the tele box there in England. That was how big the game was. When Manchester United host Arsenal or vice versa, the world stops and watches.
Drama immediately unfolded as Manchester United set out to "bully" Arsenal into submission. Phillip Neville stood in for United Roy Keane who was out with a virus and boy did he do his job well as a destroyer. Manchester United picked on Arsenal's young spaniard Jose Antonio Reyes. (Which i'm personally very pleased about cos i dont like him) early minutes in the game rough tackles and tangles were aimed at Reyes bringing him down more than 5 times within the first 20 minutes. After going through one of the neville brothers in Gary.. he was brought down by a cynical challenge. He got up and then was caught late by the other neville. Van Nistelrooy was also guilty as he slid his boots.. studs and all down Ashley Cole's knee. If that wasnt cynical i dont know what is. The one in which i was most pleased with was when Thierry Henry flew in with a kick on Gabriel Heinze and Rooney calmly picked him up like a toy and flung him to the floor. =) =)
Manchester United's bullying tactics
Controversy was rife as Arsenal's young swede (zhen if u are reading this =p)Frederik Ljungberg raced onto a through ball and rio ferdinand bumped into him. Down went Ljungberg and if that was a foul Rio Ferdinand would have been red carded, ejected from the game as he was the last man and stopping the attacker from getting a direct route to goal. But nooo the referee waved play on and Rio Ferdinand went on to play a man of the match performance to lead United to Victory. 70 minutes into the game.. Wayne Rooney gets into an attacking position and turns sharply in the penalty box to beat Sol Campbell. The burly defender sticks out a foot and brings the 19 year old down. The penalty was immediately given. But was there contact? Did rooney go to ground too easily? In football the rules are if there is contact, and the player goes down it's a penalty. But where is rooney's honour? could he have stayed up? or was there even contact? You could have questioned the penalty decision but let me tell you it was poetic justice done for me. Earlier last season a certain Robert Pires seeked to get contact from a player in another team and went tumbling down in the box to get Arsenal a penalty and to keep the unbeaten run going. What goes around comes around. What's more later in the game Ashley Cole blatantly hacked down Cristiano Ronaldo and the referee didnt give the penalty. But that wasnt really the point. It was about Ruud Van Nistelrooy.
What a moment this was for Ruud Van Nistelrooy. A year ago, his missed penalty had robbed United of victory. Today he has a chance to make it up. To exorcise the ghost that has haunted him for over a year now. I wonder what was going through his mind as he got ready to take the penalty. I know United fans all over the world must have been praying super duper hard for him to put this into the back of the net. And he did. Newspapers all over the world headlined " RUUD'S REVENGE " and how apt!! it was a huge moment for him. He has done it now.. United were on their way to stop Arsenal's run at 49 games. No 50 games unbeaten for Arsenal.. and to think that ruud could have ended it all a year ago if he had placed that penalty in.
Van's moment of joy
Arsenal then sprung to life.. hitting Manchester United with wave after wave of attack.. and with one swift moment United scored again in the last minute of the match.. dispelling all hopes of the unbeaten run from Arsenal continuing. And who else to put away the 2nd goal but Wayne Rooney himself and what a 19th Birthday for him!! This youthful immature exuberant bugger has stopped Arsenal's run of unbeaten games for the second time and went to Sol Campbell saying after the game " You dint touch me. I dived. " And the way he picked Thierry Henry up and flung him to the floor just like a school play ground bully. This 19 year old is meant for great things.
rooney and Smith celebrate
And so it was.. All the drama. All the controversies all the fights and battles the magic of football can be seen once again. Manchester United have stopped Arsenal. They've done it in an ugly fashion. But they have done it. And the score stands at Old Trafford...
