RED11.ORG

When earth in beauty dressed awaits returning Spring, the Champions League
resumes in earnest and this year three and a half thousand Frenchmen made the
journey northwards to enjoy their club’s renaissance in the greatest club
competition after the obloquy of scandal. They did their best, many of them
shirtless on a Manchester night whose temperature seemed more than half way
towards that of the Arctic Circle from that of their Mediterranean home, to
recreate the feverish fanaticism those of us who had travelled had witnessed in
the Vélodrome. The Stretford End did their best, too, and the atmosphere was
good though I doubt it impressed our visitors or any watching Turks.

Perhaps we were subdued by the news none of us wanted to hear; the addition of
our captain Nemanja Vidi? to the lengthening injury list. With it the prognosis
altered from uncomfortable victory to possible elimination. The prospect of
this in the anonymous knock-out round seemed bleak; since our emergence from the
shadows of Jose Mourinho and the Rock of Gibraltar we had successfully
negotiated this stage four times in a row, twice via the San Siro and twice
against French opposition.

We have altogether met eight different French clubs in three competitions,
twenty four matches and come off worse thrice. Against Lille in the disastrous
2005 group stage, in Marseille in the 1999 group from which we qualified and the
1998 quarter final, when Monaco failed to beat us but went through on away goals
following a scoreless away leg.

The obvious lesson from that night was not to give ourselves a huge mountain to
climb by conceding an early goal. Given the necessity to field our third and
fifth choice central defenders the only way to do that was to attack. This we
went about in style, Wayne Rooney playing deep and feeding the pace of Ryan
Giggs, Javier Hernández and Nani.

It produced immediate results after a header fell to Rooney in the centre of the
field. His volleyed pass, thirty yards to the left touchline for Giggs, brought
a gasp and he moved through the defence for the return, which Giggs provided
early. Rooney’s cross was hard, low and diagonal and at the far post Hernández
had manoeuvred himself into space and was unchallenged to sweep it into the net
from six yards; 5 minutes 1-0.

However, the magnificently confident chorus of “We’re Man United, we’ll do what
we want” was ringing around the packed stadium prematurely. For all Paul
Scholes’ skill and Michael Carrick’s reliability we failed to capitalise in the
first period and by half time Marseille, who had enjoyed markedly less of the
ball than us, had nevertheless produced as many direct attempts on goal, from
two of which they should have scored.

As feared, the problem was the central defensive pairing, a partnership whose
most glaring quality was obmutescence. Shortly after the goal André Ayew’s pass
found Chris Smalling ball watching and Wes Brown obambulating. André-Pierre
Gignac was thus onside and in the clear and his finish thoroughly deserved the
Stretford End’s raucous chorus of “What the Fucking hell was that?”

Marseille have big players and exploit this skilfully with wickedly delivered
set pieces; shortly before half time a left wing cross from Taye Taïwo after a
short corner found Brown asleep; Souleymane Diawara’s free header from six yards
went like a bullet past the post. By this time we had lost John O’Shea with a
pulled hamstring and the jitters had spread even to Edwin van der Sar, whose
clearances were going off the field and whose handling of Loïc Rémy’s shot
momentarily courted disaster.

Nevertheless, inspired by Rooney we also should have scored. His first gorgeous
chip was unlucky to find Smalling on the end of it when it needed a fleet-footed
forward. His next gave Hernández an opportunity for a header; and when
goalkeeper Steve Mandanda cleared the ball straight to Nani, his cut back failed
to find Hernández.

Nani was understandably nervous returning to action so soon after Carragher’s
public exposition of his shin bone but he got through a fair amount of work
before the interval and was frustrated by referee Carlos Velasco Carballo’s
eccentric judgement. Evra should have been booked for either or both of his
Scholesian challenges on Rémy; harmless Hernández was harshly cautioned after
piece of Argentinean play-acting from Gabriel Heinze and Heinze himself wrongly
escaped further punishment for his retribution.

Just before the break Nani dribbled out of defence and provided Giggs with a
beautifully judged ball but when Giggs crossed Hernández was sent flying in the
area. Carballo was added to Heinze on the list of those to receive ritual
verbal abuse but when we got home it was clear from television that the correct
decision had been taken.

After the interval the Marseille plan to crowd Michael Carrick and Scholes had
for a while the smothering effect for which the visitors had hoped. Van der Sar
had to go to ground at Gignac’s feet to prevent him converting Ayew’s headed
pass. Marseille were not exactly on top but there was not a United fan in the
ground who was not fretting over the hesitancy in defence and the propensity to
give the ball away too easily.

It was much more fun when we attacked. Rooney’s through ball to Giggs looked a
killer but Ryan opted against decapitating Mandanda. Rooney dribbled skilfully
into the area but his short pass just failed to find Hernández. Nani was fading
fast but got a good ovation as he was replaced by Antonio Valencia, whose first
task was to cover for Rafael, our second right back of the night to be crippled
by a hamstring problem. On came Fábio.

We were all clockwatching now. Wes Brown took a wild airborne swing at Taïwo’s
cross and thankfully sliced it for nothing more damaging than a corner kick but
there was clearly no communication between the key players at the back as if
Wes’ team mates also thought he looked out of his depth and feared that
objurgation would further undermine his confidence. Van der Sar got down well
to Benoît Cheyrou’s deft flick.

Valencia’s arrival, however, had given the French new problems. He and Giggs
led Taïwo and his mates a merry dance and Giggs at the right bye line was
coolness personified as he cut back Valencia’s superb ball. Hernández had read
the situation half a second before anyone else and was in position to sidefoot
home from close range; 75 minutes 2-0.

There was a huge and palpable wave of relief and if Patrice Evra’s clever little
turn and volley had had more power this might not have been so shortlived. As
it was Scholes gave the ball away and from substitute Matthieu Valbuena’s corner
Cheyrou failed to connect with a free header a yard out. Valbuena’s second
corner was equally deadly, Heinze’s oppilative bullying leading poor old Wes
Brown to top his evening by heading into his own goal where Scholes, on the far
post, produced a telescopic leg to retrieve it and play on as if nothing had
happened. Unfortunately the fifth official was not so optically challenged; 82
minutes 2-1.

With hindsight the surprise was Marseille’s incapacity to press for glory. A
further twelve long minutes were played but in this time they were unable to
threaten our goal. They gave away silly free kicks and ended up frustrated,
trying to rob Rooney and Hernández near the corner flag. Even so, it was good
to hear that final whistle.

It is, of course, presumptuous if not downright arrogant of us to expect to
progress through this stage simply on grounds of history. Our achievement in
reaching our fifth consecutive quarter-final is testimony to the capacity of
Ferguson and his present side for ophelimity but this ability will now be
stretched to the limit. The injury situation is getting out of hand. No matter
what the truth in Didier Deschamps’ observation that this United side lacks some
of the fantasy, no team can cope with the loss of five defenders, twelve players
in total, without altering at the best into some lesser thing.

Paul Andrew James