United Shame

Sir Alex Ferguson’s hopes of overhauling the Chelsea juggernaut to capture another premiership title are in tatters after a humiliating 4-1 defeat at the hands of a Middlesbrough side inspired by midfield genius Gaizka Mendieta, who grabbed two of the goals.

Like him or loathe him, it is almost impossible not to feel sorry for the United boss – though he is hardly a man who would appreciate sympathy, especially now. As he sat grim-faced and inwardly seething, the irony of the situation would not have been lost on him - that the team whose incisive and inventive football was cutting his side to pieces had recently been widely condemned for the dullness of their performances, even by their chairman.

But it was his own players who would have depressed him most. Van der Sar, who had hitherto been hailed the premiership signing of the season, uncharacteristically gifted Mendieta his first goal. Bardsley, O’Shea and Fletcher looked uncomfortable and uncommitted in the face of Boro’s dominance. Ferdinand, with his distinctive ‘candlewick’ hairstyle, was feeble, and never more so than when Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink turned him with contemptuous ease before gleefully slotting in the home side’s second goal. A subdued Van Nistelrooy was all sly digs, nudges and protestations of innocence when his mind should have been on scoring. And if Alan Smith believed that a radical ‘near skinhead’ haircut would be enough to transform him into a midfield enforcer in the Roy Keane mould, he was deluding no-one but himself.

Only Silvestre, Scholes and the industrious Park Ji Sung produced displays that might be considered adequate. So that leaves Rooney – a single star whose fierce commitment and massive talent comfortably eclipsed, and shamed, the lot of them.

When Chelsea come to Old Trafford, United will require 11 players, not just one, who are worthy of their manager’s trust. Then, perhaps, the confidence of the runaway leaders will suffer the same fate as Arsenal’s last season.