Ronaldo Brace Brushes Rovers Aside

Manchester United 2-0 Blackburn Rovers

Manchester United ran out comfortable winners as a quick-fire double from Cristanio Ronaldo made it to difficult for Blackburn Rovers to recover once they had been reduced to ten-men.

zoom - galleria Manchester United struggled to find their feet in a scrappy opening to the game, but Ronaldo leapt highest to head a Giggs corner to open the scoring (32), before doubling the lead with an elementary finish to an incisive counter-attack a mere two minutes later (34).

The two goals stunned Rivers, and any chance of a revival were dashed after David Dunn received his marching orders for a second booking (52).

First Half

Although another 65,000 capacity home crowd roared their men on from the referee’s commencing whistle, Manchester United struggled to ignite their usual expansive game.

In contrast, Blackburn began just how manager Mark Hughes would have wanted, as they competed all over the pitch and pressurised United into squandering possession.

However, the visitors rarely put a decent passing move together themselves, meaning the match began in a fairly scrappy manner.

But Hughes men did fashion the first shot on goal within the tenth minute, as Christopher Samba’s diagonal long-ball was won and then quickly moved on by David Bentley to Benni McCarthy, allowing the South African the time to set-up Mort Gamst Pederson with a long-range shot that whistled past the near-post leaving Van der Sar rooted.

Being lucky not to have gone a goal down seemed to kick-start United, as Carlos Tevez displayed dazzling movement to first suck in his marker, before spinning in-behind and flashing a low shot from 22 yards out that Brad Freidel did well to save down low to his left.

Tevez once again threatened to open the scoring minutes later as he wormed his way into the box but then had a shooting chance taken away from him as Ryan Nelson timed his last-gasp tackle perfectly.

But Rovers struck back mid-way through the half as Samba pounced on a loose ball outside of the United area and proceeded to slam a rocket of a shot that had the keeper beaten, but rebounded agonisingly off the angle of the crossbar-post.

Just as Rovers might have thought they had shackled United for the first-half, Cristiano Ronaldo popped up on the half-hour mark to put United in the lead.

Giggs won, and then swung in a swirling corner that Ronaldo rose highest to meet with a meaty header that beat Bentley standing on the far-post and into the corner of the net (32).

The goal sparked a heated argument between the Rovers defenders, whilst the United players simply reeled away in delight.

Hughes seemed to be as irate as his players, especially at David Dunn, as the corner from which the goal was scored came when Dunn had lost possession and subsequently punished with a yellow card for wrestling Ronaldo to the ground in an attempt to win the ball back.

If the Rovers defence were upset at the manner of the first goal, they would have been splitting hairs for allowing Ronaldo to score a second for him and United only two minutes after the opener.

Once again Rovers lost the ball, as Roque-Santa Cruz’s misplaced pass was picked up and moved onto Louis Saha, who until now had been ineffective, but nevertheless showed superb awareness to pick out Tevez on the far left side.

The stocky Argentinean advanced inward before laying the ball onto Ronaldo who had made a fabulous 50-yard dash to get into the penalty area before coolly slotting the ball past a hapless Freidel (34).

Within two minutes United had punished Rovers twice via classic counter-attacks.

The first half soon ended with only Bentley trying in vain to give Rovers a glimmer of hope with a volley, which arrowed straight into Van der Sar’s hands.

Second-Half

Uplifted by a two-goal buffer, United restarted the game with a significant touch more freedom than the beginning, with an extravagant flicked shot from Giggs off a Wes Brown 60-yard pass the highlight of their early play.

Hughes rarely left the technical area after the second half kicked-off, as he bellowed instructions to his team.

However, the Welshman could do nothing as Dunn picked up his second booking of the game after only 7 minutes of the second-half.

Much like his first yellow card, Dunn fouled a United player from behind in attempt to win back possession, with Saha the victim this time, leading to referee Chris Foy to dish out a second yellow followed by the inevitable red card (52).

Although the home side now had a clear advantage, they nonetheless failed to create many more clear-cut chances, even though they dominated possession.

A rare moment of ball retention on the hour-mark for Rovers did fashion an opening from which they could have done much better with.

Stephan Warnock broke away from his fullback territory to whip a cross into the box that United could only clear to the edge of the area, where Pederson clearly didn’t realise the time he had as he dragged his instant shot harmlessly wide of the goal.

From there United remain unruffled, and could have added to score-line through Patrice Evra, Giggs and Ronaldo.

But Freidel stood firm to rebuff their shots, with a fine reaction save to stop Ronaldo from gaining his first hat-trick the pick of the bunch.

The home fans began to head for the exits in their hordes ten minutes from time, obviously satisfied their team had finished the game.

Although the game seemed way beyond Blackburn, defender Samba had not given up the fight as he powered a header goal-ward from a late corner that the keeper cleared at the second time of asking.

The referee soon blew the final whistle to end the game and confirm the three points for United in a game which, in-truth, was a win made close to inevitable after Dunn’s early dismissal