AwayGoalsRule.com - Football Forum

Genuine Question: Was Drogba/Evans in the area? I know he ended up in the area...

Also.... if the FA look into serious foul play/missed calls post match.... can someone look into that Terry/Valencia one please.... i think it had a bearing on the result.... & if the ref hadn't been hiding behind Joe Cole, he may have decided to give Drogba a 2nd yellow card for fouling Wes.... just before he waggled his offside foot in Eddy's face....

you wanna hand 'em the points & give Evans a 3 game ban..... why not just give 'em a nad while you're at it???

Clarification: I don't dispute Evans looked like it was intentional.... but if you believe the way forward is to meticulously & forensically go through the match, ensuring all decisions are correct & you're sure.... let's not just single out the ones United benefitted from.... let's do everyone.

On this occasion, I believe Chelsea (on the whole) benefitted from some missed refereeing calls.... that's the way it is.... seems somewhat overzealous to go back

Evans had drogba in his pocket thrrough out the game...and he has bit keano in him ..contona kick maybe ..

I didn't think United would get anything from this (yes, I know what I said before, but that was slightly tongue in cheek!), but I'm very disappointed because United were clearly the better team. Fergie got the tactics spot on, although I think Scholesy should have come on for Carrick in the second half.

Should have had a penalty, although hats off to Terry for the very sneaky tug on Valencia's shirt. Neither the ref or the linesman could have seen it. Goal was disappointing also. Playing well and losing is no good - when your on top you need to score, although Chelsea's defending was herioc at times.

Well played Wes and Jonny. Brilliant shackling of Drogba and Anelka. Anderson was also good and Rooney was excellent in the lone striker role. Outplaying Chelsea at their ground is pleasing of course, but doesn't change the fact they are now 5 points ahead of us and that's 3 defeats this season.

Great post PMDK and agree that we should give credit to SAF for getting the personnel and tactics right this time, unfortunate it didn't come off but you can only do so much before the game.

I don't think we did too badly, a bit sharper in front of goal and we could have taken the points away at a reportedly unbeatable Chelsea with several key players missing. Plus the ref wasn't great. On another day we'd have taken them.

Feel we tried to "walk in" a goal as opposed to shooting from the edge of the box! We played well, one of the best performances this season tbh and, remember, Chelsea and Liverpool have to come to us in the new year!

Sir Alex Ferguson will not face any action from the Football Association over his criticism of referee Martin Atkinson following Manchester United's defeat by Chelsea.

Ferguson condemned the decision to award the free-kick that led to the goal as "bad", claimed Atkinson's positioning was "absolutely ridiculous" and said he is losing faith in refereeing.

It is understood however the FA are not planning to take any action against the United manager as he did not question the referee's integrity or claim there was any bias.

Atkinson awarded a free-kick for Darren Fletcher's challenge on Ashley Cole and Wes Brown appeared to be impeded as Frank Lampard's delivery was turned into the net by John Terry.

Ferguson said afterwards: "Clearly, Darren Fletcher's won the ball - Ashley Cole's never touched and has jumped up in the air - and then (Didier) Drogba's pulled Brown to the ground for the goal.

"The referee's position to make the decision was absolutely ridiculous - he can't see anything. He's got a Chelsea player (Joe Cole) standing right in front of him - and he doesn't even move.

"It was a bad decision, but there's nothing we can do about it. You lose faith in refereeing sometimes, that's the way the players are talking in there - it was a bad one."

A few instant reactions from an ugly game that ended in an undeserved victory...

* We keep saying it because it's true: It's the Chelsea way to generally find a way.

* United may be seething at Martin Atkinson over the free-kick that resulted in Chelsea's winner but his decision-making throughout was erratic - too erratic to serve any side. The champions' indignation would be better directed at the linesman who missed John Terry's shirt-pull on Antonio Valencia and flagged the onside Wayne Rooney offside in the tenth minute. So much for the notion that the benefit of the doubt will go to the attacking side. Unfortunately linesmen will continue, more often than not, to take the cowardly way out of the spotlight all the time that so little focus is given to such incidents. There was not a single replay - or mention - of the incident at either half-time or full-time of the televised coverage.

* There's very little to divide Big Four sides in their head-to-head clashes. The Sky commentary team called it "fine details", though there was little fine about this spectacle and the devil in the detail tends to be the tendency of the home team to win the 50-50 decisions from officialdom. It's not outlandish to suggest that - had their games against Liverpool and Chelsea been played at Old Trafford - then United would have collected at least four points courtesy of a couple of key decisions going in their favour.

* But United are in danger of losing the war because they keep losing big battles. Though the small print includes some mitigation, the bottom line is that since the start of last season they have won just two of their nine matches against fellow members of the Big Four.

* Having confessed to his tactical culpability for his side being "too open" against CSKA Moscow in midweek, Sir Ferguson redeemed himself in west London. With Valencia effectively man-marking Ashley Cole and Ryan Giggs pushing in from the left to nullify the anonymous Michael Ballack, Chelsea struggled to exert any authority. Yet it did leave Chelsea with a man over on one side of the pitch and it's debatable, if not doubtful, whether the ploy would have been successful against a more offensive and pacier right-back, such as Jose Bosingwa, rather than the lumbering Branislav Ivanovic.

* Nor should Manchester United's superiority be overstated. Though they managed to limit Chelsea to just a couple of chances and had a greater share of possession, this is the least that should be expected of a side with a numerical advantage in midfield. United themselves created very little - which is the trade-off most teams suffer when selecting an extra man in midfield as opposed to a second forward.

* Sir Alex's remark a few weeks ago that "there's a bigger expectation on Wayne with England than there is with us" was generally, and not unreasonably, interpreted as a claim that England are more reliant on the striker than United but at Stamford Bridge the champions were in danger of looking like a one-man team. Though Darren Fletcher and Anderson put in decent shifts, Rooney was their sole creative spark. If they lose their new talisman, Ferguson will surely live to regret his club-v-country smugness.

* Antonio Valencia is in genuine jeopardy of being the flop of the season. He is producing nothing, delivering nothing and doing nothing. His confidence looks to be at rock bottom but unless he finds enough to take on his full-back then he will quickly become a very expensive substitute.

* Football certainly hasn't gone soft if it's now mandatory that any player who receives a kung-fu kick in the chest is cautioned for his troubles. A retrospective ban against Jonny Evans would be no surprise and no outrage.

* All the criticism Deco receives is justified.

* And Frank Lampard wasn't much better. Even his set-pieces were unusually wayward and when the league resumes after the international break it would be no surprise if he is given a breather against Wolves ahead of the two critical away matches that will then follow: Porto and Arsenal.

* Nicolas Anelka is now as elegant as he was once sulky. It is to his considerable credit that he has, against expectation, successfully reinvented himself as a link striker having made his name (and first fortune) as an off-the-shoulder centre-forward. But for his conversion, his partnership with Didier Drogba, who can only play as an out-and-out centre-forward, would be an impractical impossibility, while Chelsea's lack of craft and invention would be glaring rather than merely apparent.

* If Michael Carrick could shoot there might actually be a point to him.

* Enough, please, about Manchester United's decision not to embroider their kit with a poppy. As their spokesman said: "We don't think it's particularly necessary. We sell poppies around the ground and all our officials wear them and we work with armed forces charities in a lot of other ways throughout the year." That's their decision and freedom of decision is what this century's great wars were fought for. By refusing to be cowed by the self-righteous moralising of a self-righteous moralising newspaper, United have reminded us that wearing a poppy is a voluntary act and not an obligation. In that context, with 18 of the 20 top-flight clubs carrying the poppy on their kits this extended weekend, United may not have promoted the cause but they at least served it well.

* More fouls should be given against Didier Drogba just for the comedy value of his reactions.

* There's no doubting now that Chelsea are the clear favourites for the title. And it's their knack of winning games they don't deserve to win that makes them favourites.

The Daily Mirror's website produces a curious feature about ten things they learned from Chelsea v Manchester United.

We enjoyed them having a crack at Didier Drogba for wearing gloves when the accompanying picture shows the big man with bare hands, but our favourite was this bit:

'United are not usually ones to miss a marketing opportunity, or the chance to flog a new replica kit. So why did they not wear their poppies with pride against Chelsea on Remembrance Sunday?'

We would therefore presume that the Mirror, famous for absolutely never preaching about the morally-corrupt state of our game, would have absolutely no problem if United took advantage of this 'marketing opportunity' and flogged a special-edition kit featuring the poppy.

They really can't win, can they?

So complete is the transformation of Darren Fletcher from average bit-part footballer to Premier League superstar that - according to the Daily Mirror at least - he was man of the match this weekend. In the Man City-Burnley game.

Bit harsh on Valencia I think. However, agree with the comments about Carrick and Drogba.

very Harsh on Valencia who was arguably our best player, Put in some good crosses and nullified one of the worlds best left backs