Manchester United Salvage a Point at the Whistle

Published on 10-Feb-2015 by srijan213

Soccer    Soccer Daily Review

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Manchester United Salvage a Point at the Whistle

What makes an era an era?

Well, among other things, it has a beginning ... and an end.

Right now, if there was ever any doubt that Manchester United's Golden Era was the span of Sir Alex Ferguson's reign, it's been dispelled. The end of the era left Old Trafford when he did.

Meanwhile, West Ham has a table to climb damn near came away from this match with the trois points. Only a 90th-minute strike from Daley Blind pulled two of them back and allowed United to salvage a 1-1 home draw.

Louis van Gaal's incessant tinkering has still not produced a steady winning formula. Yes, his charges are now unbeaten in their last six matches, with three wins and three draw. But ...

Is this a streak the most successful club in England should accept? OK, rhetorical question.

 Wayne Rooney has been van Gaal’s favorite experiment. He's been deployed almost everywhere. Including both the upper and lower deck.

Was that hard work or frustration? We don’t know.

While United were doing whichever and going nowhere, West Ham put on a clinic from set pieces, including this remarkable gem from Cheikhou Kouyaté:

The Red Devils do need a goal to get themselves going and such was the case on Hammer’s turf.

Maybe it's time to call back Sir Bobby Charlton. As he is.

The proceedings surely had United's faithful dreaming of better days:

Maybe Blind's curtain-closing heroics weren't worthy of that list, but it got the job done. In this era, that's apparently enough.

For this match, that looked like Rooney's best position. And his best move.

Click on a photo to enlarge.