Post Match Reaction - United v Spurs
Guardian: Sir Alex Ferguson’s men are out of the relegation zone - which is not a sentence Manchester United’s supporters will have expected to read in late-August or any other part of the season - and his sense of relief was palpable as the manager reflected on a first victory and a successful end to a “terrible week”.
“The players have not enjoyed this nightmare,” Ferguson said of the club’s worst start to a Premier League season for 15 years, and for the first time he questioned whether it had begun to affect the players’ self-belief.
“I think we lacked a bit of confidence in the early part of the match,” he declared. “The players were anxious because the expectations are so high here. We have some new players - [Carlos] Tevez and Nani - and it’s not easy for them to come to United and get into the pace of the game when teams are so revved up to play against us. It’s going to take them time to settle in.”
United had taken only two points from their previous three games and began yesterday with only Derby County beneath them in the league. Ferguson said he would not scrutinise the table until much later in the season, but he is acutely aware that, from their new position of 10th, there is already a five-point gap to Chelsea, the early pacesetters who beat Portsmouth on Saturday.
“We wanted much better opening results,” he said. “United now have a mountain to climb right from the beginning. We don’t expect to go through a season winning every game, but at the same time we don’t want to play catch-up. A few years ago a slow opening would not have mattered so much but the competition is so intense now that a poor start is the last thing we want. We have certainly put ourselves under a lot of pressure and our rivals must be rubbing their hands.”
His main complaint has been the poor quality of United’s finishing and the way that “we have battered our opponents without punishing them in the area that matters”. That could not apply yesterday, however, and Ferguson hailed the winning goal as a “wonder hit,” claiming that it was “the first time all season we have had a little break.”
Nani’s 30-yard strike took a subtle yet scarcely noticed flick off Tevez as he tried to duck out of the way, and Ferguson’s impression was that it was a crucial moment of good fortune. “I think Carlos Tevez’s touch was decisive,” he said. “It may have gone in anyway because it was such a vicious hit it’s difficult to know whether the goalkeeper [Paul Robinson] would have got it. But Tevez’s touch sealed it.”
Ferguson said that Tevez would need longer before he starts performing as he did for West Ham United at the end of last season and, despite his unwitting contribution for the goal, the Argentinian had little influence on the game.
He was not alone - Nani was a bewildering choice for the official man-of-the-match award even taking into account the superlatives that accompanied his goal - but Ferguson contested that Tottenham had been the superior team only for the opening exchanges.
“Once the first 10 minutes were over it was a reasonable performance from us, not brilliant, and not as good as the previous three games, but we dug in and showed a lot of grit,” he said. “Tottenham are the best side we have played so far and when they play their football they can unlock the door. They are in the wrong position in the league. So 1-0 is a great scoreline for us. This result gives us the chance to go on a run now.”
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Guardian: Martin Jol has been the victim of many things over the past 10 torrid days but the Tottenham manager felt he could add black magic to the collection yesterday. The Dutchman, under pressure after senior club officials including Daniel Levy, the chairman, and Damien Comolli, the sporting director, clandestinely met the Sevilla coach Juande Ramos, was eager for a break against Manchester United at Old Trafford. Instead, he believed, he was unhinged by sinister forces.
Tottenham enjoyed the better of a strangely subdued contest when a flashpoint in the 66th minute had Jol convinced that his side should have been awarded a penalty. Dimitar Berbatov evaded a challenge from Edwin van der Sar, the United goalkeeper, and saw his shot strike Wes Brown on the chest, as the defender covered the line. Howard Webb, the referee, was unmoved.
“He [Brown] must have been a wizard to keep the ball out of the goal,” said Jol. “He used everything that a keeper uses except that he is not a keeper, he is a defender. If you live in Manchester, you could say that [it wasn’t a penalty] but, if you live in England, you could say the big decisions do not go our way. Even if you use a bit of your arm, it’s a penalty.”
Sir Alex Ferguson disagreed. “At the time they protested so much that I thought it must be a penalty but, when I saw it [on television], it’s clear that it hit him on the chest,” said the Manchester United manager. “I am sure of that.”
Jol believed that Berbatov might have had a penalty moments earlier, when he tangled with Nemanja Vidic inside the area, and added that he felt Webb would have given the second kick had the controversy occurred in the other penalty area, in front of the Stretford End. Jol’s misery was completed two minutes later when United’s new signing Nani beat Paul Robinson for the only goal from distance, with the help of a slight deflection off Carlos Tevez.
Jol has had reason to bemoan perceived injustice at Old Trafford before. Three seasons ago Pedro Mendes’s long-range punt beat the United goalkeeper Roy Carroll and crossed the line, only for the linesman not to give the goal.
“I don’t feel we are cursed here,” Jol maintained. “I felt that United were there for the taking. I didn’t think they looked very comfortable or confident. They had a few players out, we saw how Reading approached their game here [on the opening weekend] and we knew that, if we scored, we could be fine. We had to quieten the crowd and we did that. I am very disappointed.”
Jol said that the “most satisfying thing of the week” was the reaction of the travelling support to him. They chorused his name throughout and made it clear to Levy and his cohorts that they continue to believe in him.
Whether their voices will be heard, however, remains in doubt. On another day of confusion, there were conflicting messages from boardroom level while the revelation that Levy and Comolli were at the Ramos meeting in Seville, together with Paul Kemsley, the vice-chairman, and John Alexander, the secretary, reinforced the impression at the top of the club that change is required. Kemsley’s assertion that the delegation had travelled primarily to evaluate Sevilla’s management structure had Jol smiling. “If you want to see a club’s structure, it’s always handy if everyone is there,” he said.
Defeat extended Jol’s uninspiring league record against the big four - only one win in 22 against Manchester United, Chelsea, Arsenal and Liverpool - and it offered further ammunition to his critics. But even if the boardroom has turned, the players continue to fight for him.
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Mirror: There have only been seven penalties awarded against Manchester United at Old Trafford since the Premier League was formed 15 years ago.
The last one given to a visiting side at Old Trafford came on March 17 this year against Bolton, when Gary Speed scored from the spot late on as United won 4-1.
