A Tie to start off the Title Defense !!!

Almost 2 months since I had a dose of some football action. The wait was over and the new season 08-09 kicked off. The matches on Saturday were good, in particular the Everton Vs Blackburn match; one of the best matches. And some spectacular goals on the opening day of the season.Come Sunday(17th August 2008), was the most awaited match; that of Manchester United against Newcastle United.

Vs

Team news for the Red Devils was a sad one because Carlos Tevez had to fly back to Argentina for some family reasons; still the team looked weak with most of the players out injured, suspended, playing in the Olympics. The striking department looked bleak with debutant Fraizer Campbell starting with Wayne Rooney. Midfield had Carrick, "Evergreen" Giggs, "Mis-tackler" Scholes, "Scotsman" Fletcher. The defence department was strong as ever, I refer them to as the "Great Wall of EPL" consisting of Brown, Vidic, Ferdinand, Evra.

The match started off with a great note with flowing attacks from either sides. Newcastle did not want a repeat of their 6-0 thrashing in the corresponding fixture last season. They looked strong even without the likes of Owen, Viduka, Barton; new-comers Jonas "Spidey" Gutierrez, Collocini were impressive in spite of some hiccups at the start from Collocini. Gutierrez seems to be a promise for the Toons.

Enough of introductions. First 20 minutes of the match was breathtaking with ultimate football from both the sides. The Red Devils had a penalty turned down by the referee, who was not in a right position when Giggs' free-kick was handled by Milner.Lady Luck was not smiling on the Red devils at that time.The Magpies took a shocking lead after a defensive error by Darren Fletcher, who did not mark the goal-scorer Obafemi Martins. Not the kind of error one can expect from the champions. The goal was a result of the shoddy clearing by Edwin van Der Saar on the previous corner. Once again the actions were not champions stuff.

The Red Devils took advantage of the treatment that Steve Taylor was getting at the sidelines by turning the advantage into a goal in a matter of two minutes after conceding the goal at the other end. The perfect low cross from Ryan Giggs was superbly flicked into the goal by Darren Fletcher(amended his earlier mistake by scoring a goal). This was the story of of the first 25 minutes. The tempo of the game started to pare down as time passed. But still, Manchester United were in their attacking mode as ever. This time the savior for Newcastle was their goalkeeper,Shay Given, who made some spectacular saves of the shots from Rooney, Scholes which were from a short range.Indeed he proved he was one of the best goalkeepers in the world.The saddest thing to happen in the first half was that of Carrick getting injured and replaced by a more "defensive" John O'Shea.The latest news is that Carrick will be out of action for another 3 weeks.

The second half started off with a bright note with Manchester attacking more. But the Newcastle defence were adamant to let in any Manchester United striker. Things worsened when Giggs was injured and was substituted by another debutant Rodrigo Possebon, another defensive option. Proof of Lady Luck not smiling on the Red devils was when Vidic's powerful header ricocheted off the bar; then once again Shay Given came to Newcastle's rescue by saving a low-drilled shot from Campbell. For sure it was not the Red Devils' day at the office. Another player made his debut, Rafael Da Silva, who came in for Campbell.I was pleased with the way Campbell handled the pressure. Hats off to him. Sir Alex was trying to convert his defensive options into attacking; perfect example would be Patrice Evra a specialist Left Back was playing as Left Wing Mid-fielder.

In the injury time there was a ray of hope when Possebon was brought down by Nicky Butt(ex-Red Devil). Ray of hope because in real-time me and my friends thought it was a penalty, luckily for Newcastle it was inches outside the box. No Ronaldo, No Hargreaves, No Giggs--All our free-kick specialists out injured; Rooney had to step in to take the free-kick, he almost got it right by curling the ball eventually the ball ended up side-netting.

I would rate Newcastle's performance far better than what they were last season. The new comers were impressive, the team looked fit, had clarity in what they were doing; the team will be more stronger with the return of Michael Owen, Mark Viduka, Joey Barton in the near future, still a long way to go before the end of the season.

And for Manchester United, a lackluster performance, which reminds me of the similar start the team got off in the last season. Hopefully the gaffer signs a new striker before the next match against Portsmouth. Hopefully the signing should be Dimitar Berbatov. Lets hope for the best for Manchester United in the Transfer Window. And waiting to see The Red Devils return to their winning form in their next match.