Miller Strike Stuns United
By David Hobbs / Chris O'Brien
January 17 2004
Kenny Miller's second-half strike gave Wolves a shock home victory against Manchester United, which worked as a huge dent to United's title hopes. The visitors dominated possession for the majority of the game, but failed to take chances with the Red Devils without a goal in almost four hours.
| Wolverhampton Wanderers 1 - Manchester United 0 - Report |
| Kenny Miller's second-half
strike gave Wolves a shock home victory against Manchester United, which
worked as a huge dent to United's title hopes.
The visitors dominated possession for the majority of the game, but failed to take chances with the Red Devils without a goal in almost four hours of football. Cristiano Ronaldo returned to the starting line-up after his two week break in Portugal to recharge his batteries. Darren Fletcher also returned to the squad after serving a one match ban but Ryan Giggs missed the game due to injury. Wolves manager Dave Jones said his side 'earned the result' and they certainly did with United's lack of fire power up-front and failure to take chances despite having basically all the possession in both halves. Ruud van Nistelrooy has two golden opportunities in the first half, and were the two only chances in the half, but failed to take them. His first came just before half-time when he directed his ambitious over-head-kick over the bar. But for a player of his ability really should have scored his second chance but he quite literally headed the ball over the bar from a yard out.
Wolves then had a chance to take the lead a few minutes after half-time when former United and England midfielder Paul Ince hammered the post from 25 yards out. The Wolves' 'keeper Michael Oakes got called into action and did well to save Paul Scholes' close effort. Rio Ferdinand limped off after 50 minutes with an injury and was replaced by Wes Brown. That was Ferdinand's final bit of action for United as he starts to serve his 8 month ban. United then brought David Bellion a few minutes later and replaced Fletcher. Wolves then shocked everyone when they took the a breathtaking lead over the Champions when Kenny Miller easily took the ball past Wes Brown and slotted the ball home past a hapless Tim Howard. United then introduced Uruguayan ace Diego Forlan in an attempt to spice up the attack. He replace Phil Neville. With just 15 minutes left on the clock, David Bellion nearly equalized when his edge-of-the-area shot lacked power and Oakes comfortably saved. United surged forward in an attempt to get something out of the match... but it was too late. Wolves, play-off champions, beat United, the Premiership champions.
Full-time - Wolverhamton Wanderers 1-0 Manchester United
The Teams Wolverhampton Wanderers:
Oakes, Irwin, Craddock, Butler, Naylor, Newton, Ince, Rae, Kennedy,
Miller, Iversen (Ganea 80). Manchester Untied: Howard, O'Shea, Ferdinand
(Brown 50), Silvestre, Fortune, Fletcher (Bellion 65), Keane, Phil Neville
(Forlan 68), Ronaldo, Scholes, Van Nistelrooy. |