IT HAS BEEN SO LONG SINCE we have seen evidence of the real Manchester United that one has begun to wonder if such a thing still exists. Roy Keane, the personification of that spirit, appears only occasionally now that age is taking its toll while the famous “band of brothers” who graduated together from the club’s academy are dwindling in number, making way for exotically named individuals such as Eric Djemba-Djemba and Klé berson, who have so far shown little inkling of what it means to play for this special club.
Suspicions about the new players’ grasp of the United spirit were heightened in stoppage time on Saturday afternoon, when, after Alan Smith benefited from a handball by Louis Saha to strike a long-overdue equaliser, Gary Neville was forced to run 60 yards to break up their celebrations and point out, quite forcefully, that there was a still a match to be won. As one of only two survivors from the 1999 European Cup final on the pitch, Neville, his face contorted with rage while his team-mates beamed with misplaced delight, stuck out like a sore thumb.
These days, a point away to Blackburn Rovers should not be seen as a cause for celebration for any team with championship aspirations, particularly not a team that is already struggling to keep pace with Arsenal and Chelsea. Under the circumstances, after they had been so frustrated for so long by the heroics of Brad Friedel in the Blackburn goal, perhaps a little of their relief was understandable, but is it really likely, come May, that this will be regarded as a point gained rather than two dropped? After falling behind to Paul Dickov’s well-taken goal in the seventeenth minute, United were utterly dominant and, had it not been for the agility of Friedel and a lack of conviction in front of goal, they could quite feasibly have been four or five goals to the good by the time Smith finally scored. For their persistence and total commitment to attack, which saw Ryan Giggs and Paul Scholes operating behind four out-and-out forwards for the final ten minutes, United deserve credit, but, still, undeniably, it was two points dropped.
It could have been worse. Smith’s goal, when it arrived, was controversial on many levels — not only because of Saha’s handball but because it came during the fourth minute of what the fourth official had initially indicated would be three minutes of stoppage time and followed a free kick for a non-existent foul on Neville by Dwight Yorke. It was enough to enrage Graeme Souness, the Blackburn manager, whose head was “boiling” after the final whistle, according to Dean Saunders, his assistant.
Souness did not try to claim that his team deserved three points, but the controversy over Smith’s goal left him seething. “I know what I saw,” he said of the stoppage-time issue, which Saunders and others claimed was forced upon the referee by Sir Alex Ferguson. “You go and ask the referee what happened.”
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Alan Wiley’s response was straightforward. “It was the fourth official (Chris Foy) who indicated that he thought it was three minutes, but I said: ‘No, it’s four minutes,’ ” Wiley said. “It is the referee’s decision.”
Neither Mr Wiley’s explanation nor his belated recognition, echoed by Ferguson, that Saha handled the ball is likely to pacify Souness, whose team had lost in stoppage time under similarly contentious circumstances at Southampton seven days earlier. “It would have been hard for United to leave without anything after that performance, but when you concede a goal like that in the last second, it’s hard to take,” the Blackburn manager said.
“I keep being told that these things even themselves out over the course of the season. I have to keep believing that.”
Souness could have fewer complaints about the dismissal of Lorenzo Amoruso, who had already been booked when he illegally denied Saha a run on goal with 20 minutes remaining. United, surprised by Dickov’s clever turn and shot, were already camped deep inside the Blackburn half, but thereafter it became a seige, one in which Friedel used various parts of his anatomy to deny Smith, Saha, Scholes and Cristiano Ronaldo before the irrepressible Smith finally found a way through.
As they made their way to the team bus an hour later, presumably having been reminded by Ferguson that a draw was no cause for celebration, several of United’s players, having stopped to sign autographs, were subjected to some tame verbal abuse by a couple of oiks wearing Blackburn shirts. “Who are yer?” they screamed in the faces of Kléberson, Djemba-Djemba and others. The answer is that they are Manchester United and would do well to remind themselves what that means.