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Home > Manchester United > Manchested United Featured News > Full Update on The Major Injuries Suffered And Lesson’s Learned As EPL’s Biggest Rivalry Ends In A Stalemate

Full Update on The Major Injuries Suffered And Lesson’s Learned As EPL’s Biggest Rivalry Ends In A Stalemate

Liverpool, Arsedevils

The much awaited clash between the two most successful English clubs, Manchester United and Liverpool ended in a stalemate at Old Trafford. Liverpool somehow managed to salvage a point to top the table at the end of Matchweek 27.

It was a devastating match in terms of player injuries for Manchester United. Already playing without their talismanic Serbian midfielder, Nemanja Matic and Anthony Martial,the home team were struck with multiple injuries that coerced them to use all their substitutions in the first half. Despite being dealt by injuries to key players like Ander Herrera,Juan Mata and Jesse Lingard,the second choice United midfield outplayed Liverpool.

From the onset of the match, Liverpool fans displayed their ‘class’ when they couldn’t respect the 1 minute silence observed as a mark of respect for the late Eric Harrison. Liverpool started strong and looked threatening for the first fifteen minutes. Twenty minutes into the game and tragedy struck the home side. They lost one of their most dependable midfielders,Ander Herrera to a muscle pull. Shortly after his exit, Juan Mata followed suit. This brought Andreas Periera and a half fit Jesse Lingard into action vs Liverpool.

The home side had their first real chance of scoring when Lukaku delivered a perfect ball to Lingard. Allison came to the rescue for Liverpool and Lingard rued the chance of scoring the opener. A few minutes after the missed chance Jesse laid down on the ground in pain. Just before break, United had to use all their subs when Alexis Sanchez came on to replace Jesse. Liverpool too had a slight share of misery when Firmino had to subbed for Sturridge.

Once the second half started,it looked as if Liverpool players were aggravated with the injuries to the home side. Their most in-form player and the premier league top scorer, Mohamed Salah couldn’t string together a pass,couldn’t dribble past the defense nor could he produce a shot. It was as if Luke Shaw carried him in his pocket the whole time. Sadio Mane was isolated the whole time and Daniel Sturridge couldn’t link up the play for Liverpool.

Few minutes into the second half,United won a freekick. Paul Pogba’s header from the resulting freekick didn’t have enough power to challenge Allison. Although Marcus Rashford was limping for the entire match, he proved to be a better threat than any of Liverpool’s forwards. Lukaku delivered accurate crosses time to time from the right-wing and created a couple of chances but the goal eluded the Red Devils.

Manchester United had almost opened the scoring via an own goal of Joel Matip only for Chris Smalling to be ruled offside. Liverpool looked off-color and aimlessly passed and crossed the ball around the park. Chris Smalling had the best chance to score a winner but he couldn’t throw himself at Lukaku’s low cross into the box.

Defensively United were rock solid and Liverpool had no real chance to score against them. They registered one shot on target thanks to a Sturridge weak attempt that hardly troubled De Gea. It was one of those matches where De gea could’ve been napping for the entire 90 minutes and yet would maintain a clean sheet. This match also marked Dave’s 100th Premier League clean-sheet.

Although the match ended in a stalemate the Devils held their heads high and the fans were truly the 12th man of the team. They regularly cheered for their team and never allowed the voice levels to go down. The vociferousness and liveliness in the stadium was the morale booster for the 11 Reds that dominated the current league leaders.

It was pretty ironical that a team that made three substitutions into the first half, had their key midfielders missing and their central striker limping completely dominated and outplayed the league toppers.

Although United didn’t hold possession for the major part of the game, they created more chances, had more shots on target and were the better team to grace the field. The coach and his squad must be contemplating that they dropped two points instead of rescuing one even though they were the relatively weaker team on paper.

 

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