Grinding it Out: Manchester United 1 - West Ham United 0

photo by jasleen_kaur	via PhotoRee

Q. Any notable changes to the Manchester United starting lineup to face West Ham on Wednesday?

A. Well, Sir Alex said Anderson had basically picked himself due to his performance on the weekend, and he wasn't lying. Chicharito also received a recall, joining Roo and RVP in attack. Chris Smalling partnered Jonny Evans at the back, with the two youngsters given the task of reining in West Ham's Andy Carroll.

Q. Did the home side fall behind early again?

A. Not yesterday. In fact, the two sides were only level for the first 31 seconds of the game before RVP separated them with a wonderful spin move, fancy footwork, and a fortunate deflection which looped the ball over Hammers' goalkeeper Jussi Jaaskelainen and into the net for a very quick 1-0 lead.

Q. Did the goals come flying in after the quick start?

A. Not quite. Instead, the game settled into what you might have reasonably expected at the outset: United with much of the ball and West Ham playing on the counter attack for long stretches, using their flanks to loft in crosses from the wings.

Q. Beside United lacking width to their attack, what else did you notice about the action?

A. In a week in which Anders Lidegaard said that the game needed more homosexual heroes, the multiple Movember mustaches appearing on both players and coaches lent a bit of the air of a gay porn convention to the evening's festivities.

Q. How would you describe the start of the second half?

A. To borrow a latin phrase (which we like to do a lot at corporate) it was all very status quo ante.

Q. Then followed lots of action?

A. Not really. Despite being encouraged by the Stretford End to "Attack Attack Attack," the Reds' second half effort was actually a bit of a snoozefest. Although a shutout's a shutout -- even if it wasn't very entertaining.

Q. Any lasting impressions?

A. We hope not. This was a butt ugly effort, with the latter half of the match largely geared toward just grinding out a result. The sooner we forget about this one, the better.

This is farlieonfootie for November 29.