FA CUP: Comfortable Win For The Champions 05/01/09

Southampton 0 v Manchester United 3

It was a day without the big guns in United's starting 11, Tevez and Ronaldo were not even in the bench list, however Rooney was. Southampton starts with a rather youthful side.

An unusual formation for the match was that Anderson was playing on the Left Wing and Giggs went on playing right in the middle of the pitch. The Gaffer probably knew something about Southampton that none of us knows of. Welbeck was given the role to play just beside Berbatov, which was just nice as Berba needs someone that can run fast playing next to him.

United started out the first 10 minutes unconvincingly. Possesion was somewhat balanced, but The English Champions seemed unfamiliar with their own formation and lineups. 16th minute sees Nani's shot stopped. A perfect 1-2 with Berbatov gave Nani just enough room to release one towards Kelvin Davis. United had another descent chance on the 19th minute with Anderson lets fly a bomb of a shot. Too high on that occasion for the Brazillian, however, United managed to get the opening goal from a corner kick. John O'shea's header bounced off the woodwork after a beautiful corner kick by Nani, but the ball was not cleared by the Southampton defenders and Wellbeck took advantage of a point blank header towards the empty goal mouth. 1 - nil to United.

Manchester United failed to go up by 2 goals after a neat play by Carrick, dummy-ing a pass by Giggs letting it reach Berba, who made a perfect through ball to the running Carrick. Unfortunately, the midfielder failed to take the chance.

Southampton manages to make things worse for themselves with Matthew Paterson being sent off on the 36th Minutes. Ref Mike Riley saw the high studs by Paterson on Vidic and did not hesitate to produce the red.

The second half started amazingly fortunate for United when Nani converted a penalty just 2 minutes in. The spot kick was given after Nani's free kick effort hit one of Southampton's defender on the arm. Mike Riley pointed at the spot almost instantaneously. 2-0 for Champions. United would have been given another penalty minutes later after Welbeck was brought down by not one but two Southampton's defenders. Riley did not react to the tackle.

Possebon and Gibson was brought on for Carrick and Giggs on 56th minutes. Must have been precautionary. 63rd minute, Welbeck off, Rooney comes in. That was the 3rd switch for United with 25 minutes left to play. Highly unusual for Sir Alex to make such a move.

United's 3rd goal came on the 80th minute after Rooney sprints past Southampton's defense with ease, unleashing a nice square ball where Gibson was waiting inside the box. Gibson controlled the ball superbly and half volleys the ball to the top corner of Davis's goal.

A comfortable win in the end for the cup holders. After 3 consecutive 1-nil wins, United must feel really good with this big win. And looks like they didn't need Ronaldo after all.