United Corner (Southampton and Champions League Draw)

We have reached the first international break of the new season after the thrilling 2-3 win for United at St Mary's yesterday, although the late winner covered up some of the poorer elements of the play.

Picking up 6 points from a home game against Fulham and a trip to Southampton is the minimum expectation for a side that wants to win the Premier League as far as I am concerned, yet United could very easily have dropped points in both of those games. It took two late goals to beat Southampton, while United were rocking at 3-2 up against Fulham at Old Trafford last weekend and these are a concern to me.

The team just doesn't seem to have the control in the midfield that they need to really dictate games and yesterday was no different as they seemed to have disappear at times with Southampton finding it very easy to get the ball into the box and attack the back four.

There was no real penetrative passes being made by either Tom Cleverley or Michael Carrick and I don't think it was any surprise when Robin Van Persie mentioned Paul Scholes in a positive light in the post-match interview. As soon as Scholes came on, you could see Van Persie looking to get in between the two centre halves knowing that a ball would be played through the gaps or over the top for his runs.

My issue with Scholes is not the undoubted quality that he possesses- it is more to do with the fact that he is soon turning 38 years old and there will be bigger tests than the one Southampton posed yesterday. There is no doubt that Southampton gave him too much time and space on the ball and that won't be the case when we play the likes of Arsenal, Manchester City nor Liverpool and that is where the problem lies for United.

Don't get me wrong, it isn't easy to replace a player of the calibre of Paul Scholes as Barcelona will soon find out when looking for the next Xavi and Andres Iniesta, but we just don't seem to have anyone that is going to be capable enough of running games even against some of the weaker teams in the League.

As I have said in my previous 'United Corner' post, I don't particularly rate Cleverley as much as some seem to be high on him, while Carrick does the simple things well but can really fall out of games at times, particularly against the better teams. Anderson and Darren Fletcher are other options in this area, but there just isn't another player like Scholes that is willing to play those telling passes moving forward rather than sideways and backwards.


The most frustrating element of the midfield issues is the clear and unequivocal desire NOT to buy a player there from the staff at Old Trafford. I don't know why it doesn't seem obvious to Fergie that we need a new body in there, whether he is just being stubborn to prove everyone wrong, but there is a clear need there.

I found it stunning that United didn't at least offer Fulham cash plus Dimitar Berbatov for Moussa Dembele, but my initial thought was Fulham were not interested in Berbatov. That became all the more stunning when the Bulgarian did sign for the West London club who had sold Dembele to Tottenham by that time.

The whole situation leaves me scratching my head and wondering just why we haven't made an effort to fill a glaring weakness.


As well as Robin Van Persie's telling comments about Paul Scholes, I was impressed with him in general, particularly apologising for the 'penalty' he took that could have been very costly if he hadn't popped up with a couple of goals in the final few minutes.

I can't think of too many other players that have scored a hat-trick that has given his new club three points that would have focused so much on the mistake they made with a missed penalty, but he did the right thing in addressing it and that also makes me confident he won't do anything as stupid as that again.


The Champions League Draw was made last Thursday and I don't think anyone can be too disappointed with it, but then again I thought the same thing last season. I actually think the Group is probably slightly weaker than last season's, and United should be able to cruise through as long as Fergie doesn't decide to rotate the squad too much.

We should really go out to win our first four games and then give the fringe players a chance in the last two games against Galatasaray and Cluj, and winning the Group shouldn't be a problem for United.

Braga are a tough team at home, but they concede a lot of goals and they are probably the biggest threat at this stage.

All in all, I expect United will cruise through after the disappointment of the same stage last season.