The Champions League game between Wolfsburg and Manchester United at the Wolfsburg Arena on Tuesday Dec 8, 2009.
Michael owen is running out of time to persuade Fabio Capello to end his 18-month international exile, but six days ahead of his 30th birthday, the Manchester United forward gave conclusive evidence of his World Cup credentials with a hat-trick to eliminate Wolfsburg from the Champions League.
Owen enjoys scoring hat-tricks in Germany. Eight years after famously hitting three in England’s 5-1 victory in Munich, the former Liverpool striker did it again in the Wolfsburg Arena on a night when a patched up United broke Champions League record by extending their unbeaten away record to 15 games.
It was Owen's 14th career hat-trick, but his first in four years.
Never before can Sir Alex Ferguson have fielded such an unfamiliar back-four in a competitive fixture. With nine first-team defenders unavailable, the presence of midfielders Michael Carrick and Darren Fletcher as United’s central defensive partnership gave the German champions every reason to target the English team’s soft centre.
Despite the unprecedented injury crisis afflicting his defence, however, Ferguson insisted prior to the game that he will not seek reinforcements during the January transfer window unless absolutely necessary.
Ferguson said: “We’ve not reached that point yet. Obviously we hope that, by January 1st, we’ll get one or two of them back - particularly John O’Shea and Jonny Evans.
“Gary Neville may not be too far away. We think maybe two weeks with him, so we’re not in the position to have a knee jerk reaction to anything. Let’s see out the month.”
Seeing out the opening 20 minutes without conceding was United’s first challenge in the Wolfsburg Arena, however.
Committed as Carrick and Fletcher undoubtedly are, neither are natural born defenders. Performing defensive duties in midfield are a world away from holding a tight line at the back and that became evident to the pair of them in a fraught opening period.
Carrick somehow escaped the ignominy of conceding a penalty on 13 minutes when Dutch referee Bjorn Kuipers myopically failed to see the United player’s right leg bring Makoto Hasebe tumbling to the ground on the edge of the six-yard box.
Having missed the ball by a decisive margin, Carrick could have had no complaints had Kuipers pointed to the spot. Hasebe, understandably bewildered by the decision, was fortunate not to be booked as a result of his vociferous protestations.
Wolfsburg continued to heap pressure on United, though, with Zvjezdan Misimovic and Brazilian forward Grafite both testing Polish goalkeeper Tomasz Kuszczak.
Kuszczak, playing his fourth game in ten days in place of the injured Edwin van der Sar, has clearly usurped England’s Ben Foster as Ferguson’s preferred understudy to the Dutch veteran.
But he would have been helpless to prevent Wolfsburg from taking the lead had Andrea Barzagli or Misimovic hit the target with close range headers after being left unmarked by United’s defensive rookies.
Edin Dzeko, Wolfsburg’s towering centre-forward, had been identified as the main threat to United, but Fletcher and Carrick were able to nullify the Bosnian during the first-half.
It required another important Kuszczak save, from Hasebe’s 20-yard effort on 42 minutes, to seemingly ensure that United would go in level at the interval.
But Ferguson’s team stunned the Germans by taking the lead through Owen with their first genuine effort on goal on 44 minutes.
Owen had barely had a touch during an opening period that was largely played out in United’s defensive third.
The same could be said for Nani, the Portuguese winger who has been skating on thin ice at Old Trafford since publicly criticising Ferguson last month.
But Nani delivered a cross of rare accuracy — for him anyway — to pick out Owen at the far post in the dying seconds of the first-half.
The smallest man on the pitch he may have been, but Owen escaped his marker to nod in his second Champions League goal of the season. One chance, one goal. Fabio Capello take note.
With CSKA Moscow leading at half-time against Besiktas in Istanbul, Wolfsburg now faced the prospect of elimination, so United knew they faced another onslaught in the second-half.
And so it proved. Dzeko, so quiet in the first-half, finally showed why Ferguson is battling with AC Milan for his signature next summer by equalising with a bullet header on 56 minutes.
A perfect cross from the left by Marcel Schafer picked out the £20m-rated forward at the near post post and Dzeko outjumped Carrick to score his twelfth goal of the season. Kuszczak had no chance.
Fearing the draw that would consign them to the Europa League, Wolfsburg continued to pour forward, but Kuszczak embellished an already-impressive performance with another impressive to deny Grafite on 71 minutes.
And then came the sting in the tail for the home side, inflicted once again by Owen.
Mesmerising skill by substitute Gabriel Obertan took the Frenchman past Ricardo Costa and his cross was converted by the unmarked Owen at the far post.
And with the game in injury-time, Owen scored his third on the counter-attack to confirm a famous United victory.
No comments:
Post a Comment