United 3 - 3 CSKA

VDS

Neville Brown Evans Fabio(Evra)

Valencia Fletcher Scholes Nani(Rooney)

Macheda(Obertan) Owen

What an entertaining match! Fergie clearly prioritized this weekend's game vs Chelsea and named a second string line up. Bearing in mind the lack of experience in our starting XI I sensed that this will be a tough match and indeed it was! United defended horrendously at times and that lead to CSKA scoring 3 goals. Thankfully a goal from Owen and two late strikes by Scholes and Valencia proved to be enough for United to get through to the next round.

The match clearly ignited when Rooney was introduced, that's when we were 3-1 down and seemed to be chasing shadows. After his introduction we tried to do something and if it wasn't for a brilliant Akenfeev we would have beat this side easily. Macheda was also unlucky when his attempt hit the post while Fletcher was yellow carded for being fouled in the box, it should have been a penalty. It looked like it wasn't United's day but the grit and determination showed during the late stages of this game rewarded our players with a deserved point. Thanks to this result we preserved our unbeaten home record in Europe. United have last lost to a European side at Old Trafford some 5 years ago vs Milan.

One last note....Obertan, who played for 10 minutes, played well today. He was involved in most of our attacking moves. I'll have to take back what I said last week about this guy. I hope he keeps improving because he has the potential to be someone special. Meanwhile our Valencia put in a man of the match performance. His performances lately have been quite good.