[FreakyJim]

We brute forced it but it finally came, the goal. Our attacks lack any finesse or cleverness but today, there was desire. The second half was great in that sense. We threw (clumsily) everything we had at them.

 

[Mutter Merkel]

Dreadful performance in the second half. Rooney atrocious, as usual. Carrick's passing was rubbish (no idea how people are voting Rooney and Carrick as man of the match). Blind by far the man of the match. Smalling was excellent. Bastian was very good. Lingard was promising. Martial had his poorest game for us so far but the decision to bring on Fellaini for him was awful, and we lost the one player we had who was stretching their defence.

In short, a long long way to go, and the worst part is we now have to suffer Wayne Rooney for another 10-15 games.

 

[FC Ronaldo]

Territorial dominance. LVG set the match up with his tactics. He can't make the final pass and score himself.

Good result in what was a very comfortable game with one blip that should have cost us but De Gea and Mike swept that up.

Rooney will get the headlines but was poor again.
Young was good also but wasn't really tested in truth.
Carrick and Schweinisteiger were safe but again, not really tested.

 

[InfiniteBoredom]

And why is that? We gave little away and created some very good chances. I certainly disagree.

70% possession and we scored one goal from a header. That's not a good performance at home in my book. If it was away then you wouldn't see me complaining.

 

[.Rossi]

4 actually.

Aye. Forgot we drew in Moscow

 

[Will Singh]

Top of the league, clean sheet again!

 

[Sylar]

Deserved the win.
Need crossing and set piece training. And need to hit the target more.
Another clean sheet, Smalling and DDG are rocks for us at the back. Thats 4 clean sheets in a row right?

 

[QuackQuack]

14 shots, 7 on target. More of the same, please. (With better finishing.)

Lingard MOTM

Compare that to the shower of shit displayed against palace with a measly 1 shot on target and 2 off target. That was a better performance.

 

[Getsme]

Struggled after a bright start, we were lost at times and ran out of ideas. We looked nervous and lost control of the game.

 

[SalfordRed1960]

Thought that was a better tempo than usual.

Thought Schwienie tired badly so should have been changed earlier.

 

[stretford_oslo]

14 shots, 7 on target. More of the same, please. (With better finishing.)

That's actually a huge step forward.

 

[InfiniteBoredom]

Not necessarily, it guarenteed progress to the last 16 though.

We won't lose to Wolfsburg.

 

[Walrus]

Performance was better, but still not great. I remember our games playing 4-3-3 last season and we looked as good as anyone in Europe. Standards have slipped if tonight was "good", but we got a very important three points nonetheless.

Rooney......where do you even start. He got us the winning goal, but in doing so has earnt himself a(nother) stay of execution when the team would be better off without him frankly. Tonight was his best performance in a while but was still not good enough, and I am doubtful he can even maintain this level.

Definite positives to take from the game, but we are still not where we should be, and we were only minutes from a fourth consecutive 0-0 draw, so lets not get carried away.

 

[dannyrhinos89]

Much better, we dominated we had plenty of shots and looked sharper in patches.

Can we please just blow away WBA on Saturday I'm hoping for a 3-0 or something

 

[Sandikan]

did enough, but thank goodness I didn't drive the 3hours up for that one, and can just go to bed now, and forget about it!

Beat PSV and we're through though (presuming it's still on head to heads if equal points and thus Moscow couldn't get ahead of us even if they won both)

 

[Riz]

4 actually.

Everton
City
Middlesborough
Palace
CSKA

 

[UnitedinRed]

Dominance

 

[red_devil83]

Nice to see some attacking impetus. Decent win. Glad Rooney scored even though he was pretty crap.

Next.

 

[Getsme]

Deserved the win.
Need crossing and set piece training. And need to hit the target more.
Another clean sheet, Smalling and DDG are rocks for us at the back. Thats 4 clean sheets in a row right?

Yep, with one goal scored.

 

[Eddy_JukeZ]

Good win.

We should be progressing through. Still, we need to do better I feel.

Rooney did play better at least.

 

[Amethyst]

Better performance obviously- couldn't get much worse than what we've served up recently in fairness. I still have a slight feeling that van Gaal sort of 'lucked' his way to victory in this one, strange to take Martial off even though he wasn't having his best game. But overall, a goal and much needed 3 points, we'll finish top now I think.

 

[justboy68]

It's no surprise we look better when we have a bit of vigour to our attack and we don't mess about as much (shown with the goal).

At the time, let's be honest, it was a shocking decision taking Martial off. Luckily for LVG he's got away with it.
Hopefully Rooney goes on to improve now though.
Well played by Lingard for the goal too. Didn't take the cowards way out and chose the harder option.

It really wasn't that shocking. He's a 19 year old kid who was having a poor game and kept giving the ball away, after playing a lot of football recently. I felt the reaction was bizarre at the time and more so as it paid off and we had a very good attacking period following it and got a goal.

I love Martial but it was right to sub him as his passing was getting more and more sloppy.

 

[Raw]

Everton
City
Middlesborough
Palace
CSKA

You're forgetting the 1-1 v CSKA between Everton and City.

 

[Trizy]

Smalling my MOTM.

Bit sloppy at times but dominated the game start to finish. Happy with that game.

 

[Tosicsleftpeg]

People complaining about the martial sub confuses me as Martial was poor tonight, constantly offside and wasn't in the game enough.

Overall was very happy with Lingard although he did show a lack of quality at times he has the courage to run at people which is something we have desperately lacked. Some other notable performers such as Smalling, Schweinsteiger and Carrick. Good win and we'll done to Rooney who got that vital goal.

 

[FreakyJim]

Should also be noted though, CSKA allowed us a lot of time on the ball, they didn't press hard (or at all). Ideally, we should've done much better than we did but it's a start of sort. Let's beat WBA now.

 

[pseudo_canadian]

Lingard was incredible. Love how he plays, just no fear and is always positive.

 

[ants7]

I have to say that it was much better than what I had expected.

We attacked, penetrated and really looked to get the result. Haven't seen that much passion for a really long time. I think the stats for this game are much better for us than the previous few. Please keep it up.

Happy for Rooney but he's still not doing enough for me. Agree with the fans saying that it was a bittersweet goal. Probably can half-arse til the end of the year now and have no fear of getting benched. I beg to christ that I'm wrong and he actually picks himself up.

Have to say - Big Dave and Captain Mike (I don't care, Rooney fans) saved us. Mike is a United captain in the making. So happy for him.

Good result. Did the job in the end. Let's see if we can continue this in Premier League.

Edit: Lingard put in a shift today alright. Must be mentioned.

 

[Spock]

We ground out the result, which is all that really matters. But our play overall was uninspired, borderline dreadful.

Positives:

The win. Doh!
Another clean sheet. Defending hasn't been our problem.
Lingard's play. Very promising stuff.
Rooney with a match-winner. His overall play is still worrisome but a striker in the end has only one job.

The negatives:

Almost zero chemistry/understanding among our attacking four players.

 

[Sylar]

Yep, with one goal scored.

Glass half full for you eh?
The lack of goals / shots is well documented. Gone quiet is the way we havent conceded so its nice to have a positive after a win like that.

 

[HabeasC]

Performance was better, but still not great. I remember our games playing 4-3-3 last season and we looked as good as anyone in Europe. Standards have slipped if tonight was "good", but we got a very important three points nonetheless.

Rooney......where do you even start. He got us the winning goal, but in doing so has earnt himself a(nother) stay of execution when the team would be better off without him frankly. Tonight was his best performance in a while but was still not good enough, and I am doubtful he can even maintain this level.

Definite positives to take from the game, but we are still not where we should be, and we were only minutes from a fourth consecutive 0-0 draw, so lets not get carried away.

I think that 433 team would get found out very quickly. It was essentially us hitting it up to Fellaini who would isolate either the RB or RCB, him chesting it down to a team mate and then the team mate crossing it in or using the space that Fellaini had made.

 

[VeevaVee]

It really wasn't that shocking. He's a 19 year old kid who was having a poor game and kept giving the ball away, after playing a lot of football recently. I felt the reaction was bizarre at the time and more so as it paid off and we had a very good attacking period following it and got a goal.

I love Martial but it was right to sub him as his passing was getting more and more sloppy.

Overall considering recent games as well as what had happened in this game, it made a lot more sense taking Rooney off in my opinion.
It worked out though and that's all that matters until next time. Would be great if it spurred Rooney on.

 

[YouOnlyLiveTwice]

We were playing with much more purpose today and a tad bit more direct. I hope todays performance is something we will keep on doing instead of just a reaction to us being desperate for a goal.

I liked Lingard's Desire and hard Work, Smalling's clearance was brilliant.

 

[OnlyTwoDaSilvas]

We are the only team in the group to get something from an away game so far. That draw in Moscow doesn't seem as bad as we made it out to be. Home form is so crucial in the group stages. Beating PSV will cement it. Going to Germany needing something is a dangerous position to be in.

 

[FreakyJim]

Lingard was incredible. Love how he plays, just no fear and is always positive.

Yep, it didn't come off a lot of times for him but he simply kept going. Other players would disappear after a miss like his.

 

[Revan]

4 actually.

Correct. And we scored one goal in these 4 matches. Capello would have been proud.

Good performance today though. We could have scored more.

 

[YouOnlyLiveTwice]

We are the only team in the group to avoid defeat in an away game so far. That draw in Moscow doesn't seem as bad as we made it out to be. Home form is so crucial in the group stages.

We lost to PSV.

 

[Winrar]

We are the only team in the group to avoid defeat in an away game so far. That draw in Moscow doesn't seem as bad as we made it out to be. Home form is so crucial in the group stages.

didn't psv beat us?

 

[thegregster]

A win at home V PSV and we are through.

 

[Jazz]

So damn relieved with that result. Much much better performance - still room for improvement but we'll get there. I understand the crowd showing their displeasure, but I thought the fact we were showing some attacking intent and the players were really trying hard made me disappointed with the chanting as the players could have become over anxious - so congrats to the lads for holding it together. Pleased that Rooney scored and showed some passion in that celebration. I hope it wakes him up.
Smalling and Dave

Top of the group and on we go.