nice match to watch from a neutral point of view, u're right PLF. many scoring chances, some nice plays, a pretty balanced macth.
but everybody who watched roma matches this season, will tell u this was the poorest roma seen so far. they really were another team; no switch positions, no change of pace, no off the ball movements, no fast passing game, no pressing on the ball carrier, defensive line always backward (mexes and juan rarely came out of their box), many wrong passes, wich turned into many lost balls.
in the 2nd half roma's 4-2-3-1 turned into a 4-1-4-1, with de rossi always behind aquilani\pizarro and perrotta always behind totti. this formation change speaks for itself. roma was too tired to play his football.
it was just another team. the only good thing they showed was personality. and i'm quite surprised to notice that (just) their personality was almost enough to beat man utd at their home, as, even if they played really bad, they still created more scoring chances than man utd and they were really unlucky in the end.
but anyway, as PLF correctly pointed out,it doens't matter how much football u "produce", if u don't score, and we also have to give some credit to sir Alex, who perfectly read the game and perfectly displaced his team.
let's try to get inside the match now. roma was quite poor, as i said, but nobody really expected nothing more from them yesterday. actually they were even better than i thought. they went trough a terrific week, facing a top team each 3 days (juve, fiorentina and inter). they had to play always with (almost) the same starting 11, as roma's backups are all new buys, and spalletti couldn't risk them agaisnt teams like juve, fiorentina or inter, of course. During the week roma lost: panucci, cassetti, taddei, perrotta and tonetto (that's what happens when your guys have to face 3 top teams in 7 days with no rotation). Perrotta and tonetto were forced to play. perrotta was forced by himself. he really cared to play at the old trafford, coz he was born in Ashton and his parents have a pub in manchester. he couldn't play last season in manchester, as he was injured; this time he said "i'll play no matter what". Tonetto was forced to play by spalletti as there wasn't anybody who could take his place (panucci and cassetti were out), so he had to play, despite his muscular contraction. of course he wasn't good, he didn't push, he lost many easy balls, he didn't even cover very well. but that's pretty obvious, considering he was injured.
anyway guys, saying tonetto is crap is really a blasphemy. tonetto is one of the greatests left-footed sidebacks in europe. and if we consider just last season he was the best in europe in his role (togheter with adriano).
aquilani too had some muscular problems this week, and i was really upset when i read his name in the starting 11, coz i knew what could happen...... now let's just hope his injury isn't as bad as it seems
totti and de rossi clearely need some rest. they just can't play every roma match. i know they're some kind of icons for the romanisti, but this is insane. totti especially, the more he plays, the less he plays good; he's not a kid anymore, his ankles can't afford 3 matches per week; especially if u consider how much energy it takes to play as the only foward in roma offensive line. it would be tough even for a kid like rooney... we can't ask so much to totti.
also mancini was almost unrecognizable. he almost didn't play till last week... then this week he had to face this tour de force... i'm surprised he's still standing on his foot.
with all this issues, we couldn't expect roma to play his football. and infact roma didn't.
aquilani and de rossi didn't press at all.
the cbs were too deep in their own midfield, they almost played in their own box, and this is a big mistake (due to lack of stamina, of course); both of them, juan and mexes, never pushed the defensive line toward the midfield, and this, added to the lack of pressing by de rossi and aquilani, allowed manchester to get inside roma's midfield too easily.
the sidebacks were really awful. i already talked about tonetto. cicinho too was really bad. he never pushed with the right timing (just look at how many times roma lost the ball possession, when totti looked for cicinho... cicinho was always too late or too early on totti's passes, so roma almost didn't play on the right side).
of course we can't blame cicinho. he still has to harmonize his movements with his teammates. roma gameplan requires each player to respect a specific timing, because totti, perrotta, aquilani, de rossi, taddei, they won't ever look at their teammates before passing the ball, they don't have the time to look at them; they just receive the ball and then get rid of it as soon as possible. it's up to tonetto, cassetti, panucci, cicinho, mancini and giuly to be always where they are supposed to be in every moment.
cicinho still didn't learn roma's tempo, it's still too early for him to play roma football.
cicinho also didn't a good job in defence; he lost too many duels with nani. nani is a very good player of course, but sometimes he pushed till roma's box without a single dribbling.... and this is cicinho's responsability.
there are 2 simple ways to notice how bad roma played yesterday:
1 - each time totti, de rossi or aquilani get the ball, u can usually see roma's sidebacks (panucci, cassetti, tonetto), roma's wings (taddei, giuly, mancini) and perrotta running around the ball carrier like a tornado (the centre of the "tornado" is the ball carrier, while everybody else run around him or switch position with a teammate. usually the 2 wings go wide on the sidelines, while one of the sidebacks and perrotta go deep, giving the chance to the ball carrier to decide what to do (a big opening for the wings or a through ball for the sideback or perrotta).
yesterday instead, roma players didn't run at all; and that's the reason why roma lost so many balls in manchester's midfield (as i told u before the ball carrier hasn't the time to look at his teammates position, so if they aren't where they're supposed to be, totti, de rossi and aquilani will pass the ball...... to nobody; and that's exactly what happened yesterday).
2 - nobody in roma holds the ball for more than 2 touches. usually they touch the ball once, max twice, then they pass it.
yesterday instead everybody touched the ball 3, 4 ,5 times before passing (sometimes they tried to pass the ball soon, but all those fist touch passes turned into lost balls, as roma players didn't move without the ball). this made roma gameplan look quite predictable and slow.
just theese 2 points are enough to realize how bad roma played yesterday.
anyway, if such a weak, tired roma still managed to create some serious troubles to manchester, i wonder what a fit roma could have done yesterday
talking about mexes, i have to disagree with u, Sina. he looked pretty "clean" to me, talking about his attitude on the pitch (especially if we consider mexes standards). Moreover spalletti couldn't really say anything to mexes in the dressing room. telling him "
don't make stupid fouls anymore", or something like this, could be really dangerous, because this way, u put pressure on your cb; a cb has always to be cool, never hurried, never worried; he doesn't have to think what to do, he has always to follow his natural instinct. because if he starts thinking what to do, if he doesn't react immediately, if he has to be worried about not making fouls, he might loose the right timing for the tackle (and that's the worst thing can happen to a cb).
of course he wasn't perfect at all, he didn't move roma's defensive line toward the midfield, and he looked a bit hurried sometimes, but he wasn't dirty, imo. he got a yellow card for just 1 foul, i'd say it's pretty good for a cb. moreover i don't think that yellow card was deserved. that was a foul, no doubt about it, he didn't look for the ball, but for rooney's legs...... but still he didn't hit rooney :roll
. and as i said before, it was his first foul (at least the first i noticed). i'd say juan made much more fouls than mexes (and the ref didn't even noticed them).
talking about fouls, there was also a clear penalty on mancini. carrick litterally jumped over him (what a bad performance by carrick anyway... he didn't help scholes at all, he was always too close to manchester cbs).
talking about manchester defensive line instead, i was really impressed by ferdinand; always cool, no "dirty balls"... very good performance
still talking about manchester players, i liked a lot evra and nani. they pushed a lot along the sidelines and were always very careful when roma had the ball. of course they didn't face a real opposition (the "real roma" is another team), but still they did a good job
rooney was awesome. and not just for the (great) goal. i loved they way he moved along the offensive line, putting pressure to the entire roma defensive line, just by himself. really impressive. rooney is one of those player who have always to feel free to move along the offensive line, to truly express their abilities. infact, when tevez came in, rooney was a bit too bounded, a bit too limited and he hadn't anymore the same impact on the game.
a last point about ferguson. what a great coach he became! his improvements in the last 5 years were awesome, and it's really nice to see such a legendary and old coach being modest enough to still learn something about football. since ruud went away, he had much more freedom and he could try some great tactical experiments. respect :applause:
p.s. one last point. when vucinic and esposito came on the pitch, they looked pretty good. maybe it would have been a wise move to line up both of them since the beginning of the game, putting vucinic on the left (in place of mancini) and esposito on the right (in place of giuly, with giuly taking perrotta's place and perrotta resting on the bench).
