Wigan vs Manchester United: Five talking points
Manchester United kept their second clean sheet in a row at the DW stadium on Tuesday evening in a comfortable 4 – 0 win over Wigan Athletic, where a brace each for Robin van Persie and Javier Hernandez sealed all three points. There was a sense of resignation about Wigan’s play which made for dull football on their part, and some good football from the visitors was sufficient to yield the expected result without breaking much of a sweat. Here are five talking points from the fixture.
Playing with slightly more selfishness than usual, Hernandez had a couple of attempts at goal from outside the box, when other options were available. Yet, both his goals came in typical poacher fashion, with excellent positioning, and quick reflexes coming to the fore. The first came when he followed through on Evra’s attempt, which was palmed by Al Habsi straight into his path, and the second when an RvP free kick was blocked by the wall, and fell in his path at the edge of the penalty area. He also put the ball in the net two other times in the match, with good finishing skills, but was correctly adjudged offside on both occasions. It will definitely be hard to explain to him why he isn’t in the starting lineup when Rooney returns.
In contrasting fashion to his strike partner, RvP’s first goal oozed of pure class, as an excellent first touch allowed him to control the ball, manouvre it past a defender, and place it into an unreachable corner in Al Habsi’s goal. He was instrumental to United’s play as well, with well taken set pieces causing all sorts of problems in the Wigan box, and leading to more than one clear cut chances at goal. His second goal, however, was a rather simple one, as his unmarked run into the box was found by Welbeck, who had been gifted the ball, and it was simply a matter of out-guessing Al Habsi, which the Dutchman did with ease. Arguably the most important signing of the season, even with Michu’s cut-price tag in consideration.
In all four of United’s goals, they got a lucky break of one sort of another; the kind that seem to fall your way when you’re on top of your game. Patrice Evra’s miskick allowed Hernandez to get forward in the box to be able to score after Al Habsi parried Evra’s second attempt, while RvP only received the ball for his first goal after an unfortunate bounce for Wigan had gifted United possession. The third goal came from Hernandez after RvP’s free kick which was straight into the Wigan wall didn’t bounce back off it, but fell kindly for the Mexican, and the final goal was possible when Welbeck was gifted possession of the ball after two Wigan defenders collided. A great start to 2013, and an indicator of how this year will go, fans hope.
A comfortable seven point lead has allowed Sir Alex to rotate his squad well over the busy festive period, and yet come away with great results on each occasion. Kagawa, and Vidic are being eased back into the side after their recoveries from injury, while Ashley Young has got some regular playing time and confidence under his belt. Even the absence of Rafael caused little concern for the Reds, as Smalling and Jones were available to be called upon; meaning that a fully fit United squad is comparable to the best in the league. Even Ryan Giggs got two more starts under his belt, and produced some good deliveries into the box, which belie his age. Thus, the depth of the United squad was given a good workabout in this fixture, just as it has been over the past couple of weeks.
After a 3 – 0 win in their previous fixture, one might have expected more of a fight from Wigan, instead of the unsure, fumbling performance they put up. An ineffective attack, which only managed to bother De Gea on one occasion, that too when Kone put the ball in the net from an offside position, was matched toe to toe by a weak defence, which was almost always second best, and struggled to take the ball off United. Thus, after the first round of fixtures in the new year, Wigan find themselves back in the bottom three, and in real danger of finishing the season somewhere thereabouts.