CHAMPIONS LEAGUE: Richard Williamson an off night for more than those players rested by Alex Ferguson as Rangers tough it out
A LOT OF big names had the night off as Manchester United began Alex Ferguson’s 19th consecutive European Cup campaign in his 25th year at the club. Paul Scholes, Gary Neville, Dimitar Berbatov and Nemanja Vidic were not even on the bench as the manager took the opportunity of a much-hyped but potentially unthreatening fixture against his cash-strapped old club to have a look at some of his more recent acquisitions.
Javier Hernandez, Ferguson’s summer purchase from Chivas of Guadalajara, and Chris Smalling, bought a year ago from Fulham for €13 million but allowed to spend last season at Craven Cottage, were both making their debuts in the competition, although there was no sign of Bebe, last week’s scorer of a goal for Portugal’s Under-21 side.
It was the return of a much more senior figure, however, that attracted the greatest attention last night. Given United’s uncharacteristic inability to hold on to a lead in the closing minutes of their last two away league matches at Fulham and Everton, Ferguson and United’s supporters will have been pleased to welcome Rio Ferdinand back into action, more than three months after he suffered a knee ligament injury in a collision with Emile Heskey during England’s first training session after their arrival in Rustenburg. In fact, Old Trafford has not seen much of Ferdinand over the past 12 months.
His contribution to the 2009-10 season was limited to just 21 appearances – 13 in the league, six in the European Cup, and one each in the Community Shield and League Cup – as he struggled to overcome a chronic back problem and a collateral groin injury.
Extensive treatment led to him missing all of November and December and most of January – an absence at the very heart of the season that surely contributed to United’s failure to win a fourth consecutive title.
Last night’s match, in perfect conditions against opponents who arrived with an attitude that – to put it conservatively – prioritised damage limitation, offered the perfect opportunity for a gentle reintroduction.
There was also the chance to glimpse the potential of Ferdinand’s partnership with Smalling: two tall southeast London boys, the 31-year-old from Peckham and the 20-year-old from Greenwich, both comfortable on the ball and with presence on the pitch.
Smalling, occupying the position on the right of the central defence, caught the eye more frequently in the opening stages of a largely soporific first half, particularly with an easy back-header to his partner in the early minutes, followed by a swift and marginally illegitimate tackle on Kenny Miller, Rangers’ lone forward, the result of an instant appreciation of potential danger.
With 13 minutes gone he moved into the penalty area as Darren Fletcher flighted a free-kick from the right, but was denied a clear header.
Five minutes later another darting interception denied Miller a sniff of the ball and opened the way for an instant angled pass to set Park Ji-sung free down the left.
Ferdinand, content to spend most of his time sitting back and keeping a watchful eye while Smalling took care of Miller, looked his old smooth and unruffled self. Just past the half-hour he stirred into a forward run, fed Wayne Rooney, and kept moving into position for a return that never came from a forward who, in the playmaker role, was not at his most accurate or incisive.
Ferdinand merely trotted back into position alongside Smalling, the two of them forming a double lock that was giving Tomasz Kuszczak the easiest of evenings.
It was further forward Ferguson’s attention would have been directed, as Rooney and Hernandez toiled without the slightest sign of creating the sort of understanding, or of showing the individual skill, that might trouble a defence anchored by the remarkable David Weir.
How many 40-year-olds, one wondered, will feature in this year’s Champions League? Rooney, aged 24, and Hernandez, 20, were doing little to inconvenience the Scottish veteran.
A dozen minutes into the second period a rare exchange between the pair also involved Park, but their combined effort was easily smothered by Walter Smith’s massed defence.
If Smith’s tactics had laid a very wet blanket over the proceedings, he could hardly be blamed for the failure of United’s forwards to catch fire. His is a club whose existence is threatened by a debt hardly any bigger than the transfer fees paid by Ferguson for Rooney and Ferdinand.
In such circumstances, every member of Rangers’ team could be proud of a display of outstanding character and unremitting obduracy, while the home fans may have regretted Ferguson’s decision to give so many of his stars a rest on a night that confirmed the widespread distrust of this competition’s group stage.
Guardian Service
