Manchester United...2 Fulham...1:  In a season in which Manchester United's relationship with the Football Association has all but disintegrated, there is a certain irony that, after all the political backbiting and acrimonious finger-pointing, it may end in awkward handshakes and stilted smiles at its showpiece event.

Alex Ferguson, who has confirmed he has reached "an amicable settlement" with John Magnier over the breeding rights to the racehorse Rock Of Gibraltar, can now turn his full attention to the FA Cup, United's best chance of winning a trophy.

The Manchester United boss is believed to have agreed to a peace deal that will net him around £2.5million to avert a courtroom battle with the club's biggest shareholder.

With Rio Ferdinand now only one of a long list of notable absentees, United's passage to the semi-finals owed as much to their adaptability as to Ruud van Nistelrooy's predatory finishing.

Again Roy Keane was deployed in the centre of defence, and it says much about the number of personnel either injured or suspended at Old Trafford that, when the captain left the field with a twinge 15 minutes before the end, the reshuffle included Ryan Giggs moving to left-back for the first time in his 578 senior matches.

Perhaps Fulham will reflect that they should have done more to expose this makeshift defence, and Giggs in particular, during those late exchanges but the one disappointment of a match which flickered without truly igniting was that the visiting side could not finish with the sense of adventure they showed during stages of the first half.

Rather than examine how vulnerable United really are without their entire first-choice back four, Fulham chose to put their coats on and politely show themselves out. Had they been a bit more ambitious they might well have capitalised on the flaws in Ferguson's team, which will have inspired confidence among the Porto delegation on a reconnaissance mission preparing for tomorrow's Champions League second leg.

If United are to overcome their 2-1 deficit from the Estadio do Dragao 12 days ago they will have to guard against the defensive mistakes that littered this performance, most notably when Keane of all people surrendered possession to Brian McBride and, in trying to retrieve the situation, Wes Brown conceded one of the season's more obvious penalties by recklessly scything down Luis Boa Morte.

Penalties scored by away teams at Old Trafford have become a rarity, the predecessor to Steed Malbranque's successful conversion being a Ruel Fox effort for Norwich in 1993, and the suspicion that visitors to this stadium get a rough ride was not dispelled when the referee Rob Styles failed to take further action against Brown. Boa Morte would have been left in a clear scoring position if United's talented but occasionally impetuous centre half had not hacked him down with a wildly mistimed challenge.

Porto's representatives will doubtless be aware, too, that United's most impressive performers, Cristiano Ronaldo and Darren Fletcher, are unlikely to be in Ferguson's starting line-up tomorrow.

Ronaldo has flourished since being given a fortnight's winter holiday by Ferguson and is starting to combine his dribbling skills with a better quality of delivery, and Fletcher played at a level to justify some of the hype that has accompanied the early part of his career.

Together, United's youngest two players did much to turn this match into a demonstration of the team's famed powers of durability, not least by combining on the right wing to set up van Nistelrooy for his second goal from inside the six-yard area.

His first had come within two minutes of Malbranque's penalty, when he lashed in Giggs's sumptuous cross, and though Fulham continued to work their neat and elaborate patterns and Zat Knight bounced a splendid volley off the crossbar, the quick response to going behind was crucial in that Old Trafford was never engulfed by a sense of foreboding.

Instead, there was plenty to admire in terms of United's strength of will and resolve, qualities they will need in abundance if their interest in Europe is not to be extinguished tomorrow.