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Middlesbrough 1 - 2 Manchester United
Saturday 2nd December 2006
Riverside, Middlesbrough
Manchester United retained their Championship hopes with a well-deserved hard-fought win at the Riverside, Middlesbrough.
With United practically back to full strength - only Michael Carrick was rested - Manchester fans would have been hoping that the boys would be firing on all cylinders. As it was, the Reds only needed to make it up to second gear to confirm the three points.
It was Cristiano Ronaldo who was the talking point of the match, with the Portuguese star falling after having his legs taken by the onrushing Boro keeper halfway into the first half. The referee saw it clearly, as did those who were watching on TV - Cristiano Ronaldo clearly stumbles after being knocked by Schwarzer, the goalie, and is forced to the floor, but its not a dive!
Louis Saha calmly put the spot-kick away to set the boys on to victory.
The play was dominated by United, and Louis Saha and Ryan Giggs both missed great opportunities to fire United further infront before half-time.
Gabriel Heinze nearly made it into the score-shet with a well-timed run and strike, but he pulled the ball too far wide.
The second half saw a newly envigorated Boro side starting to take some of the play. The ball was crossed in towards Cattermole, but Rio and then Heinze tried to clear. The Argentiean made a poor clearance, and the ball fell to Morrison's feet, who fired home over van der sar.
Luckily, United's reaction was fast - they ran up to the other end of the pitch and scored. Scholes intercepted a pass and set Saha on his way. He fed Giggs who played it into Ronaldo. Cristiano was forced to take the ball away from goal in the 6 yard box by the keeper, but he had enough composure to lookup, find Giggs, and Giggs crossed it in for Fletcher to score the winning goal.
Good play, and a hard strong performance will remind Chelse that they have some catching up to do!
Middlesbrough: Schwarzer, Huth, Woodgate (Morrison 46), Pogatetz, Xavier (Parnaby 88), Cattermole, Boateng, Downing, Taylor, Yakubu, Christie (Maccarone 72)
Subs Not Used: Jones, Arca.
Booked: Christie, Cattermole.
Goals: Morrison 66.
Man Utd: Van der Sar, Neville, Ferdinand, Vidic, Heinze, Ronaldo (Brown 86), Scholes, Giggs, Fletcher (O'Shea 75), Rooney, Saha.
Subs Not Used: Kuszczak, Evra, Carrick.
Booked: Scholes, Vidic, Saha.
Goals: Saha 19 pen, Fletcher 68.
Att: 31,238
Ref: C Foy (Merseyside).
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