Manchester United Thump Aldershot

Dim­itar Berbatov

In what turned out to be a one sided affair, Manchester United beat League Two team Alder­shot 3–0 at Recre­ation Ground in the Foot­ball League Cup Fourth Round on Tues­day. After the 6–1 defeat against Manchester City at Old Traf­ford last Sunday, Sir Alex Fer­guson had changed the whole team for the game against The Shots.

Manchester United went into the lead in the 15th minute of the Carling Cup match when unselfish mid­field work­horse Ji-sung Park found Dim­itar Ber­batov who scored from close range. Michael Owen, who net­ted a brace for Manchester United against Leeds United in the League Cup Third Round, made the second goal of the even­ing shortly before the half time sig­nal. The former Eng­land for­ward received the ball from Ber­batov with only four minutes remain­ing of the first period and the vet­eran made no mis­take as he powered his shot behind the help­less Alder­shot goal­keeper and into the net. Two minutes after the resump­tion, Ant­o­nio Valen­cia made the score read 3–0 when he net­ted with a fero­cious effort from the edge of the pen­alty area. Sir Alex Fer­guson then decided to bring on Paul Pogba, Michael Keane and Ravel Mor­rison mid­way through the second period but the sub­sti­tu­tions had no effect on the res­ult. The plucky hosts came close to scor­ing on 85 minutes, how­ever, when a dan­ger­ous drive from Luke Gut­tridge went just wide. Although Manchester United never reached top gear, Sir Alex Ferguson´s play­ers ran out well deserved 3–0 win­ners against Dean Holdsworth´s Alder­shot side. Manchester United Team: Ben Amos, Fabio, Phil Jones, Nemanja Vidic, Ezekiel Fry­ers, Tom Clev­er­ley, Ji-Sung Park, Valen­cia, Mame Biram Diouf, Michael Owen, Dim­itar Berbatov.

Manchester United Books