Last night Wolves travelled to Old Trafford to try and knock out the holders Man United out of the cup. Despite being down to 10 men for quite a bit of the match, United went through to the fourth round of the Carling Cup comfortably.
18-year old Danny Welbeck made his first start of the season for United’s first team and it was Welbeck who finished off a great United move to win the game.
The Man United starting XI was- Tomasz Kuszczak, Gary Neville, Jonny Evans, Wes Brown, Fabio da Silva, Luis Nani, Darren Gibson, Michael Carrick, Danny Welbeck, Michael Owen and Federico Macheda.
Sir Alex fielded a totally different starting XI to the one who beat Man City 4-3 on Sunday but there weren’t too many surprises. Most of the youngsters will get their chances in the cups this season with a few senior players making the starting line-up.
Man United got off to a good start- Nani, Welbeck and Macheda all started off at a lively pace.
The first real chance of the game fell to Macheda who nearly lobbed Wolves goalkeeper Marcus Hahnemann. Wolves first shot came in the 11th minute but it was off target. Sylvan Ebanks-Blake hit a left foot shot which went over the bar, not even troubling Kuszczak.
Wolves weren’t just sitting back, they were prepared to have a go and United and they did a couple of good chances during the game.
Nani was impressive during the first half, many predicted that once Cristiano Ronaldo left, this would be Nani’s season.
With only 28 minutes gone, Man United were down to 10 men. Michael Kightly was running through on United’s goal, Fabio stumbled twice and took Kightly down with him, kind of like a rugby tackle. Fabio had to go; he had given the referee no choice.
Once we were down to 10 men things had to change and unfortunately that was the end of Macheda’s night. Minutes later Ritchie de Laet was being brought on to replace Macheda.
Even though we were down to 10 men, it was United who were attacking the most. Owen and Welbeck both had great chances before half time and United had most of the play.
Second half wasn’t too different to the second. Man United had most of the play and Wolves best chance of the match fell to Ebanks-Blake in the first half.
Many were waiting to see what Owen would do tonight, he didn’t do much but it wasn’t really his fault. Sir Alex had fielded youngsters who obviously want to make an impression, instead of finding the pass through to Owen, there were shooting themselves.
United’s goal came in the 66th minute, Welbeck played a one-two with Owen and then fired the ball into the corner of the goal.
Wolves had most of the possession in the second half, not much of a surprise considering they had one more player but they were unable to break down United’s defence. Wolves also didn’t have the quality in the final third of the pitch to really trouble us.
Kuszczak had come in for Ben Foster who had a bit of a nightmare against Man City and he probably would have hoped for a few more chances for Wolves. Kuszczak would have liked to show everyone what he is capable of and why he should start against Stoke this weekend.
It was a comfortable night for United and we are now in the fourth round draw. The only disappointment would have been the sending off, it meant Fabio and Macheda couldn’t show what they have to offer.
