Jim D

He'll get a two match ban.

Gray will be back to his usual self next weekend when we take on the Bitters and Arsenal in the Champions League. I think he stuck up for us today because he wanted to see an exciting finish to the Title race.

Its just that we were so s***e today we made you look like they you weren't a one man team.

Arsenal are on a terrible run of form, taken 4 points out of a possible 15, Chelsea are now the only team who can challenge the Mancs for the title.

Pretty much anonymous today apart from the goal which was gifted by us. See he was up to his old tricks, diving and complaining to the ref.

Past three seasons I have been keeping a record of our performance in the league under Rafa. The following graph shows where we have picked up points along the way and it looks like we are pretty much status quo in terms of progression. Looking at that there are some keys things: 1. Around the 30 game mark we are pretty much at the same number of points than we have been for the past 3 seasons. 2. This season we have had a much better start than the previous two. 3. Half way through the season we always seem to hit a major slump but that was an exception to last season because we had such a poor start. 4. Saying that we finish strongly towards the end of the season because of rotation appears to be a myth. Can anyone shed some light onto these trends, in terms of how Rafa treats his squad? This has nothing to do with the result today, it is not a knee jerk reaction but an overall assessment of Rafa's tenure in English football.

What Mascherano did was no worse than what Wayne Rooney has been doing to referees for the past few years. Going to the referee, hurling abuse and swearing left, right and centre. In the current climate Chelsea are probably the worst for it but also this is something the Mancs have been doing for years. Andy D'Urso springs to mind and Ferguson's endless abuse of officials on the pitch and in front of the media cameras. So how do we take today's decision from Bennett? Back chat of any form to the officials is now an automatic yellow card? If so the next time I see a Manc player giving the referee back chat or abuse I expect to see an immediate yellow card.

No chance of 3rd after today's results, 8 points adrift, the Derby game next week now takes on significant importance to clinch that 4th place. Arsenal have now only taken 4 points from their last 5 games and Chelsea are now second in the table.

1. Reina 2. Torres 3. Alonso

To be fair we do give the Mancs more of a game at Anfield, it is just at Old Trafford we've hit a mental block big time. Talking about Carra, can we judge on this game alone that he can no longer be first choice centre back when Agger returns?

We just roll over and die for them, lesser teams this season have gone to Old Trafford and taken the game to the Mancs, shown some fight and spirit. We don't, we haven't done for a few years, for some reason we don't have the right mentality when going into the game.

To be honest I'd be more critical of Alonso, he held him back initially then just let go of him and then gave up.

As early as the sixth minute you just knew it wasn't going to be our day. Long ball over the top, Rooney controlled and skimmed easily passed Carragher which brought out a good save from Pepe. From that point onwards was a chain of events that led to us surrendering the lead so easily and then self destructing with the Mancs coming out with an easy victory. Straight after that incident it caused an unrest in our back line, a nervousness which never disappeared throughout the game. That nervousness then spread to the full backs and then to Reina. This despite the Mancs not really threatening us and we then go and concede a soft goal. Bloody deja-vu, its happening again, you could almost write the script of what was going to happen. One nil down, we start to lose our discipline, we've bottled it and then with no help from the referee we get some silly bookings and ultimately Mascherano gets himself sent off. The game was over, we self destructed simple as, we are weak mentally particularly in the big games against the Mancs. I don't know why because we can go to Camp Nou, San Siro and the Delle Alpi and come away with a decent result. We've beaten ourselves up again against them, they did not beat us, we beat ourselves and I'm sick of it, really sick of it, when is it going to end? The second goal conceded was cheap and the third just rubbed salt into an already wide gaping wound. Another bad day at Old Trafford, when again we have crumbled under expectation and pressure of the occasion. We've played in bigger games than this in the past under Rafa and we've come through with flying colours. What is it about the Mancs?

Lack of communication between the defence and the goalkeeper has been our downfall.

Another fantastic save from Pepe......I think he has more than made up for error earlier in the game.

I think if Torres asks Bennett what he had for dinner last night, he'll be off. I think Gerrard just called Bennett a "cheat"

Good save from Pepe again but has not shown any composure today, he has been jittery and it has spread throughout the team. Defending has been awful.

That about sums up the whole situation, I could not defend Masch's actions if he did indeed throw a wobbler about that decision. But the fact of the matter is he didn't and just asked the ref a question, so did Torres and they both get a booking for it. Ridiculous.

What makes it worse was that Torres booking was a complete f***ing joke as well.

Especially the spine of our team, once again they have gone missing. That's it we've committed suicide, Mascherano showing petulance, ridiculous. Now Rafa is kicking off.

Sick of this against them, finely balanced game, the Mancs don't look threatening at all and we shoot ourselves in the foot. We've bottled it again, defensively and Reina's a*** has gone, ridiculous this. Another line of Manc defenders scoring against us, Silvestre, O'Shea, Ferdinand and now Brown.

Great, Wes bloody Brown scores against us, off his back! Reina has got to come with more conviction. That is a bad goal to lose the Mancs have hardly done nothing to us.

Blatant corner not given to us............and the Mancs almost score down the other end. Reina just about keeps it out! Crumbs! Corner to us now.

Given away an unnecessary corner, lack of communication in the defence, no man was on him, puts the Mancs on the front foot.

That is the crux of it, again our big named players have not turned up. Saying that good shot by Gerrard but deflected over, corner to us. Nothing came from it.