Human After All

It has to be said that we were rubbish yesterday.  Liverpool weren't very good, but they still beat us.  Disappointing. Sir Alex commented pretty fairly (from The Guardian):

'We gave away two bad goals and you don't expect that from Manchester
United,' Ferguson said. 'The defending was poor for both goals. When
people watch us on television, they will think it was some Conference
team defending. It was shocking stuff.'

The same could be said of Liverpool though: it wasn't a victory borne of skill, all their attacking play was pretty ordinary, and that makes it worse really, we should have defended better, we shouldn't have let them dominate, although what Sir Alex says of the referee should also be taken into account:

Magnanimous though he may have been in defeat, Ferguson could not
resist a complaint about the quality of Howard Webb's officiating. 'He
led with his elbow,' Ferguson said of Vidic's late challenge on Xabi
Alonso. 'But defenders do it all the time. [Jamie] Carragher leads with
his elbow, but he never gets a free-kick given against him. We're not a
dirty side, but we've had three bookings and a sending-off. That's the
disadvantage when you're not at home.'

What does surprise me is the way the papers refuse to criticise Ryan Giggs for the second goal.  I've mentioned before how Ryan Giggs is the Man Utd player even the haters like but to ignore his role in their second goal as The Mail does (all the papers downplay it (The Telegraph has "scorning efforts to shield it", whose efforts?) but The Mail downright ignore it) is ridiculous:

Riera made way for Babel and six minutes later, Mascherano surged for
the byline where, for some reason, the normally robust Vidic
pussy-footed into a challenge and allowed the ball to run through to
Kuyt.

And Ryan Giggs was nowhere to be seen...

The Independent has a Champions League preview:

"Villarreal are a very difficult team to beat. They've had the same
very good coach [Manuel Pellegrini] for five years now, never out of
Europe since he went there. It'll be a hard game." [Sir Alex]