Manchester United 3 – 2 Liverpool Review | Berbatov – A genius at work

A much awaited fixture of the English premier league between the great rivals with huge history and passion. Not a derby game but was described as mother of all derbies. Everyone expected a lot from this match. In the end its Manchester United’s new hero Berbatov sealed the deal for them with sublime Hat-Trick. But United defense which was sloppy for 10mins in the second half, allowed Liverpool to comeback into the game with a penalty and free kick.

Here is the starting lineup of both the teams for this match. united Opted for 4-4-2 with rooney and Berbatov upfront, as expected. Liverpool played 4-4-1-1 with Torres upfront with some surprises in the midfield. This the first time SAF deploying 4-4-2 in a big game after a long time. But given Berbatov’s form and Rooney’s workrate … it seems he went for the right option.

Manchester United vs Liverpool Starting lineups

We expected either Cole or Gerrard to play behind torres but coach RH gave Meireles that role. And Maxi started on the right side. Poulsen started along with Gerrard in the midfield. For united Fletcher and Scholes in the midfield and O’shea returned to the defense.

First Half

United Started very well with their midfield getting the ball to the wingers very early. This kept Liverpool in their own half for most of the time and they defended with numbers. In the midfield Meireles marked Scholes, means Torres is the only man upfront for Liverpool. Liverpool defended really well in the first half till 40th mim.

Liverpool defended well with 2 lines of defense

As you can see here, Liverpool formed 2 lines of defense. In the above pic, Nani is having the ball and you can see five liverpool players are around him. but as you can see they left one of the united players unmarked always. Poulsen also tracked Nani through out the game because Konchesky is not upto the mark.

First Goal

As we all know, United attacked through their wide players especially Nani. Their midfield attempted long passes to the wide players and then they got in the crosses which liverpool found difficult to handle with. Here is the series of actions for first goal:

United's first goal

Nani received a long ball from the midfield and he drove forward and sent a cross into the box. did you observe the 4 Liverpool players behind united’s front 3 men in the picture? So its initially 3v3 up front and as you can see Berbatov didn’t started his run and rooney is sprinting forward this allows United’s front 3 to exchange the passes and if required send the ball to the midfield which is in space. When Giggs took the corner from the left side, it really surprising that Torres has marked Berbatov and he was caught on the wrong end. Berbatov looked like running opposite side but when the cross came in, Torres is just holding him and gave a free header.

Torres and Midfield

In the whole first half Torres managed just 3 passes. So what Liverpool midfield is doing ? Here is a stuation from the game when Liverpool is in attacking position from the first half.

Liverpool's midfield was poor and sent the ball either back or sideways

Liverpool player  on the ball is Poulsen, he had options to send the ball forward or to Cole on the left who is not in this picture. He is in ample of space but he sends it back to a player who is near to Rooney and the pass goes to Maxi and comes back to Poulsen and finally ends up with a pass to goal keeper. Did you observed Torres there between the central defenders? what was he doing there with his hands on hips… watching liverpool midfield’s artistic work? They never played ball to him, the only time ball went to Torres is when they attempted long balls which happend just 2 times in first 45mins.

Here is another moment from the first half where they kept torres.

Liverpool's midfield was poor and sent the ball either back or sideways

Look at number of options the Liverpool player had. But he opted to pass the ball to Cole on the left wing which finally comes back to Poulsen.  This means in the first 45mins they never tried to attack the united’s midfield. Instead they passed the ball either sideways or backwards.

Second Half

In the scond half, Gerrard started pushing forward and Liverpool added some pace to the game. Still they did the the same thing they did in the first half. But United didn’t changed their style of they. They got the ball to the wide players and depended on the crosses.

United's Second goal - Another long ball another cross

Second goal

This is a brilliant moment of the game, from Berbatov to give united a 2-0 lead. He collected the ball from Nani on his knee and tried a bicycle kick which ended with hitting the inside of the top bar and landing inside. Again its a cross from Nani that lead to the goal. you can see in the picture, still nani is tracked by 2 liverpool players and Giggs who is on the left wing is free and unmarked. Even if the the cross went over the united forwards, giggs can make most of it.

United defense and Liverpool goals

At this moment it looked like united are all set to win without any hurdles or twists. But for 10mins, united defense was fragile and Liverpool made most of it with a penalty and freekick. Irrespective of his success in the past, Torres finds it difficult with Vidic this time and he has chosen to attack Evans in the second half. When Torres for the ball be ran into the 6yard box and Evans fouled him which lead to a penalty and Gerrard converted it.

Liverpool Substitutions :

Roy Hodgson made a substitution on 66th min by Replacing Maxi with Ngog. This changed the liverpool’s formation to 4-4-2 with Ngog playing just behind Torres as second striker. Cole and Meireles moving to wings with Gerrard and Poulsen controlling the Midfield.

Formations after Liverpool Substitution - both teams 4-4-2

This change brought life to Liverpool with Gerrard moving forward freely but they lost the midfield advantage they have in the first-half. Gerrard moving forward means, they left one of the United player free in the midfield and it is Scholes. And Scholes started controlling the midfield and sent more long balls to forwards and Nani.

O’shea Yellow card and second goal

O'shea foul on Torres and yellow card

Many may argue that O’shea should get Red card for this foul but Referee got it correct. As you can see in the picture, When ball was played forward, Torres, Van der sar and Defender are moving towards  it. Then O’shea clipped Torres leg and fouled. It is very clear that other United players are in good position to get the ball. So the referee gave him Yellow card and awarded Liverpool a free kick. When gerrard took the free kick, Fletcher moved slightly away from the wall and gerrard is cleaver enough to send the ball through that gap. Now the score 2-2.

United Substitution:

with the score settling at 2-2 SAF had brough in Macheda for giggs and with this change United now had 3 forwards upfront with Berbatov in the middle. As i wrote earlier Paul Scholes who was free in the midfield sent a long cross to O’shea on the right, who sends a cross to Liverpool penalty box and again Berbatov rose and heads home a winner, and his hat-trick.

Now SAF Replaces Berbatov the new hero who went into the bench with standing applaude from the United fans, wtih Anderson and Nani with Gibson. This changes United shape to 4-5-1 and closed the shop.

Conclusion

In the end it was 3 crosses, 3 goals for United. But they found a new hero in Berbatov, who was described by SAF as a Genius before the match and he proved that he is a genius at work. He may have just 22passes to his name in the whole game but every time he got the ball, it looked like he is about to do something. Now we all know, what tempted SAF to send 30mi on a player. United deserved their victory and for Liverpool the score line may be flattering but they need to work on a lot of things and its a surprise they created little and scored on the united’s defense errors.

Preview : Manchester United vs Liverpool | Tactics or Moment of Brilliance

After two consecutive draws which were resulted from conceding last minutes against Fulham and Everton, Manchester United are up against Liverpool who were not much impressive so far this season. If you take the form into consideration, MUFC with two draws and LFC with one draw and loss coming into this battle.

There is one good new for Liverpool, J Cole will be available for this match after completing 3 match ban. And Torres was fit and roaring to go. For Manutd, they had Rooney back in the last match against Rangers and there is a set back with the loss of Valencia due to injury.

After watching Liverpool this season, their coach RH seems to be favoring 4-2-3-1 formation than 4-4-2 which they played in their first match. And as far as ManUtd are concerned, they are yet to find which is a better working formation for them. Taking Berbatov’s form into consideration, they cannot leave him out and Rooney is not a kind of player who they want to keep on bench. but with Liverpool’s 4-2-3-1, if united opted for 4-4-2, Liverpool may dominate the possession in the midfield due to 3vs2 situation.

Liverpool are expected to start with this lineup and United are yet decide 3 players[in red box], as per my guess.  If united opts 4-4-2 then, Giggs will take left wing and Berbatov will play behind Rooney and need to nullify the Liverpool’s advantage in the midfield. If United opts for 4-5-1 then, Park will be deployed on left wing and Giggs in the center and it will not be a surprise, if berbatov takes the lone striker position.

If we observe liverpool’s game, most of the time their attack will originate from the right side through Johnson driving forward and kuyt continuing it. The other option is Gerrard playing killer passes to Torres. So United has 2 tasks. 1. Make Fletcher keep track of Gerrard then you can easily deal with Torres. As we all know, Torres is not a kind of player who drops and takes part in the build up play and then scores a goal. He is an out-and-out striker, who depends on his pace and position to score goals. This means the supplier is must for him to score.  2. Restrict Johnson’s movement. He may not be a complete defender but his forward runs are more effective for Liverpool. The other one i didn’t mentioned was JCole. in my assumption, he will get a free role and  may just work as second striker also. Everyone says, free role behind the main striker is his best position but he never played in that position and all his best performances are on the wings.

Result? the game will be decided in the second half with 2-1 score to United. We can expect a tight game with good tension for fans because Liverpool knows that they are playing their Rivals United and they have the tendency to come all guns blazing into this fixture irrespective of their form 🙂 .

Manchester United 3 – 0 Newcastle United | how old is scholes and Giggs ?

Manchester United began their Premier League campaign in style with a comfortable 3-0 win over Newcastle.

United went to this game with 4-4-2 by putting rooney along with Berbatov upfront and Scholes started along with fletcher in the midfield. Nani and Valencia are the wingers. O’shea started in the right back position with Vidic and Evans patrolling the center of the defense.

First 20-25mins of the game was dull as united took time to settled in  but the credit should be given to Newcastle for the way they defended. United had kept the position and showed the patience which in general is they style of play in the beginning of the season. Newcastle also had few good chances in this period but they couldn’t convert them.

The breakthrouh came in the 33’ when Scholes played a through pass to Berbatov who is just onside. Then Newcastle defense didn’t tracked the pass properly and Berbatov showed his class and scored his first goal of the new season and first for United.

The second goal came when Evra attacked on the left side and sent a cross which found Fletcher near to the goal and he scored a simple goal. The second half was bright for United as they created many chances but couldn’t convert many. Then Rooney was substituted by Hernandez and he looked like adding another to his impressive list but he was judged offside. Then Giggs who came on as substitute for Nani collected the precise pass from Scholes and scored a beautiful volley for the third goal on 85th minute.

It looked like Rooney was off color but still his work rate is good. He missed ball many times in the box and now he is 13games away from his last goal for United. Nani also again showed that he not so comfortable on the left side but did good defensive duties which allowed Evra to move forward. Valencia did his job on the right wing by providing straight runs and crosses into the box.

Did anyone observed? Vidic got forward more in the game. that is because, Newcastle played 4-4-1-1 and the second striker had join the midfield which leaves the united central defense with not much worries and vidic took the opportunity and got the ball forward when ever he can.

Now, how did paul scholes managed to control the game ? Scholes actually played deeper than Fletcher, means Fletcher moved forward more often. When he moved forward, the newcastle midfield has to follow him leaving some space for scholes which he used effectively. At the same time credit should be given to Fletcher as well since he dragged newcastle mofield towards him and made many diagonal runs and passed the ball to wingers and overlapped with them.

Now for Berbatov, isn’t this kind of display all United fans have been waiting for from him? He looked constant threat in the game. Also he played very deep at times and his link up play was wonderful. He scored one goal but failed in a one on one with the keeper in the second half. When he dropped deep and started hitting the ball forward and then making the runs….isn’t this berbatov we all saw at Tottenham? So, we can hope that this time he will have a good season. Even SAF told that this could be his season which shows that there is some change in Berbatov that SAF might have observed in the training sessions.

Definitely good signs for united as they are able to keep the position and create opportunities. United’s golden boys, Giggs and Scholes looked in good touch.

Chelsea 1 – 3 Manchester United Highlights |FA Community Shield 2010

Netherlands vs Spain Review | FIFA World Cup 2010 Final – Tactics or Tackles ?

Yeah, Viva la Easpana! . Spain are the World Champions after beating Netherlands 1-0 in the final of FIFA world Cup 2010. They deserve it and they played the beautiful game in the dirty final.

The starting lineups are as expected in the preview. Which means, there is no place for Torres and Pedro takes his place. For Netherlands, they welcomed back van der Wiel and Nigel de Jong from suspension.

We must start the game review with this incident because thats the inspiration for Netherlands players in the first half. I gave the name dirty in the first paragraph because of the way Netherlands played.  See below, the security guy punching the intruder who tried to put his hands on the trophy before the teams gear up for the national anthems.

Once the game kicks off, the first 4mins are horrible. there are 3 fouls by Holland and are lucky to have Howard Webb as referee. We can understand this tactic for Holland as they looked to simulate the tactics of Chile to press and disturb the spains passing game. Also the Netherlands had maintained a high defense line in the first 30mins.  At the same time when Spain is not in position., they too pressed hard, inturn that didn’t allowed Netherlands to do any proper attack in the first half.

As you can see in above pic, Dutch maintained higher defensive line and the midfielders are not as tight as it expected or as they played in previous games. Because, they need to follow the Spain midfielders [Alonso and Busquets] when they have the ball. This two factors allowed spain to play some long balls to Villa who stayed up front. Almost few time he was through with those passes.

For Netherlands, the tactic is to disturb the spains passing game. So everyone is busy with that and Robben was the best player in that half as he tried to cut in and shoot but he always ran into the traffic. When spain found the Robben’s runs, one of them started covering the space between Capdevila and Iniesta [playing central]. Nigel de Jong should have gotten a red card from referee Howard Webb for his karate kick of Xabi Alonso, and Mark van Bommel could have drawn red as well for a challenge on Iniesta.

Second half:

The start of the second half is better than the first half but it looked overall the same. Netherlands are not able to press as high as they did in the first half. It is understandable that, after 5 booking, they can not simply press and get the red cards. But the turning point of this dirty game is Substitutions.

Width for Spain

first change is from Spain, they replaced Perdo who is playing inside and central with Navas. This gave spain what they have been missing. The width and opportunity to stretch the game. This gave more space for the Spain midfielders to play. Once this substitution was made, Iniesta started playing brilliantly as he has more space up front now. And he got 2 opportunities to seal the deal but Dutch keeper denied him.

Robben Chances

At 71’ min, Dutch replaced Kuyt with Elia…an attacking minded substitution and now they have a winger on the left. Now, Van Persie started to play towards left means the central defenders of the Spain need to move a bit towards left and track him. This allowed Robben to move freely from left to inside. We can see that effect of it, He missed a glarious change and was denied by Casillas twice. I still didn’t understand why didn’t Robben tried to Chip the ball first time and why didn’t he dive, the second time.

Introduction of Fabregas

now at 87’ min, Alonso was replaced by Fabregas for Spain. This is not a straight swap. Xavi moved to more deeper role infront of Busquets and Fabregas played in Xavi’s position.  Fabregas started running straight at goal from the midfield and his passing was also very good. He has a good chance in the first extra time to score in one-on-one situation but his shot doesn’t have power. Now spain has its midfielders in their best position and the positions where they play for their clubs. Result is Spain are back to their best passing game. And Iniesta was brilliant in the extra time.

Then Netherlands made an attacking minded substution by replacing De Jong with Van der Vaart but just after 10mins of that, they found themselves with 10men. A Deserving red card shown by referee considering the Dutch’s physical game. Heitinga’s second yellow came when he brought down Iniesta. Once he left the field, Iniesta has more space to exploit.

Golden Goal:

Finally, the goals came after the red card and Dutch were reduced to 10members. As indicated above, Iniesta was found in space. The passing started from Navas’s run, who gave the ball to Fabregas who is in advanced position and found Iniesta in space. This time there is not mistake from Iniesta….he found the net, and thats all.

A disappointing final…it had 47fouls, 13 yellow [8NED+5ESP] and 1 Red card. Spain had kept the position as expected but they failed to create chances and Netherlands preferred to disturb the Spain passing flow by adopting the physical game but they ended up with many yellow cards and 1 man down. Spain needed Netherlands to go down to 10 men to score the goal and win the Final.

Again the substutions made all the deference in the game, in terms of quality. The Euro champs are crowned as World Champions in an all European Final surely this is the Golden generation of Spain’s Football and will be termed as the greatest team.