Plastics. We remained Top Reds throughout. No need to look back through our previews and reviews over the last 3 years.  The science checks out.

Here’s 5 things we learned:

1. Glad I’m not a Chelsea fan

2. Which team do you support, again?

3. The best one

4. City

5. For now

6. Lol cos Liverpool and City keep swapping who are the best ones and the second best ones.

(@Benglorious)

Lol @ Brett for doing a preview.

M

 (@tom_mcghee)

Not doing one cos I did one and no-one did last week. Losers.

MM

(@bifurcated_utd)

Finally the opportunity to MEAT the Full ham not just the West, or Totten, or Soutpton varieties.

Prediction: Vegan outrage. Which doesn’t amount to much as they are so tired and weak all the time. 0-0 United.

Here’s 5 things we learned as United continued on their voyage of discovering what it feels like to finish 6th in the Premier League table:

1. It is clear now from that one game that Paul Pogba is a consumate fraud and he is solely and entirely to blame for our current plight.

2. It is clear now from this one game that Jose Mourinho is a tactical genius and all previous criticisms are invalid as it is actually all Paul’s fault.

3. Martial is to blame but also not to blame it is important we argue over who is or isn’t to blame especially since it is obvious that it is only Paul Pogba who is to blame.

4. Obviously this is all nonsense just enjoy the 4 goals you weird point-scoring weirdos

5. Make me.

6. I made a fish pie

(@Benglorious)

Well, Howdy partner. I didn’t (do words) also won’t (do words).

Prediction: Well, Howdy partner. I didn’t (do words) also won’t (do words). 0-0 United.

M

 (@tom_mcghee)

‘Who is the best Ham’? is a question that has plagued mankind since we first met pigs and subsequently ate them. In this essay I will try to answer this enigma wrapped inside yet another smaller enigma, itself hiding within Brett’s spleen and/or hairline either way surgery is probably necessary sorry Brett i didn’t invent science.

Fulham:

1. Fully invested in Ham, have to admire how they’ve nailed their colours to this particular pork mast (not prison slang)

2. Nothing else. Literally nobody knows anything about Fulham, I would be surprised and disappointed if their own supporters do.

West Ham:

1. Lol

2. Further lols

Gotham:

1. I like the arrogance; ‘Got Ham’ like a boast and a taunt (to those without ham)

2. Birthplace of Batman

3. A wonderful city full of dreamy police commissioners and delightful characters.

4. I think we can all agree the contest is over now.

Prediction: Someone to do something does anybody give a fuck anymore 1-1 Lukaku scores after falling down some stairs.

M

(@bifurcated_utd)

I don’t agree the contest is over…

Babycham:

1. Though it’s not clear from the file notes what happened to Babyaham, or Babybham – that have been conveniently filed in Yale University’s archives and are inaccessible until the year 2050 – we can assume that in the absence of Babydham through to Babyzham that Babycham was such a successful ham that no further ham was necessary.

Tottenham:

1. What’s with the infant theme?

Prediction: 2-1 United the piano follows up on the first Lukaku goal (see above) with a last minute diving lid.

Benno (@Benglorious):

The Bobbins:  A Tale of Trying

King Alexander had ruled Traffordonia for nearly thirty years.  He was much respected by his enemies and beloved by his people because during his reign the kingdom had flourished, and was the envy of the whole world.  Alexander knew that his time as king was coming to an end and, with no heirs, had been thinking long and hard about who should replace him upon his retirement.  After he’d announced that he would be giving up the throne, all the kingdom was rife with speculation as to who the new king would be.  A lot of Alexander’s loyal subjects agreed that Joséph of the White Royal family would be ideal, but others pointed to his arrogance and the fact that he had previously been at war with Traffordonia as general of the humourless Chelsians.

Others pointed across the sea at Dortmundana, where the canny Jürgen had led his people through a triumphant uprising against their sworn enemies, the Bayernets.  Jürgen admitted to being flattered at all the interest in him succeeding King Alexander, but his unwavering loyalty to his people would prevent him from leaving them to accept the crown.

In the end, it was a man called David whom King Alexander summoned to his palace one afternoon to bestow the kingdom of Traffordonia upon him.  David was the mayor of a place called Toffeetown.  Toffeetown was a nice place to live, even though it wasn’t the town it used to be.  The people loved David, and he them.  Under his rule, Toffeetown was neither a success nor a failure and the community accepted this period of benevolence with their natural good humour.

Alexander told his people that David was the man he had chosen to succeed him, and that they should love and obey David as they loved and obeyed their current king.  David was known to the kingdom, and was respected as a shrewd tactitian because of  the various skirmishes that had taken place between Toffeetown and Traffordonia.  There was no ill will towards Toffeetown despite this, as both sets of people had a common enemy: the evil Pudlians.  They were reviled due to their underhand tactics, lack of morals and the disgusting behaviour of their famous spearhead, Louis the Tooth.

David’s first act as king was to bring his fiercest warrior, Mary-Ann, from Toffeetown to bolster his troops.  Mary-Ann was a pillar of Toffetown’s army, as strong as a tree, but many wondered where this chesty warrior would fit in with the army Alexander had left behind.  All doubts were soon dispelled as David’s first battle ended with a treasure-filled victory over the Wigs, followed by an even more comfortable defeat of the Swans of the Sea.  The people relaxed, seemingly secure in the knowledge that Alexander had appointed a worthy successor, one who would maintain their proud traditions.

The Traffordonian’s evil rivals, the Pudlians, soon put the dampeners on the feeling of joy felt throughout the kingdom as they swept aside David’s men.  This was followed by yet another defeat, this time to the Blue Moon clan who lived just across the border.  Spirits were raised again for a short time after a rout against the Levers across the sea, but this was short-lived after back to back losses against Toffeetown and Magpie Castle, both coming on home territory.

A poor defeat to the Sons of Derland ruined the chance of capturing any silverware, and this was followed by an embarrassing loss to the Chelsians, led by none other than Joséph who had switched allegiances from the White Royals after being overlooked for the kingship.  Joséph must have felt some sympathy for David, as shortly afterwards he allowed one of his finest soldiers, John the Killer, to join the Traffordonian army.

This didn’t give the nation the fillip everyone was expecting.  A crushing loss to the wildmen of Stokington and a dour stalemate with the vampires of Craven Cottage preceded a toothless defeat to the lowly Olympians on David’s continental crusade.  Mutterings of his unworthiness for the crown were starting to be heard in various corners of the land, which started to gain volume and momentum after yet another defeat to the Pudlians.  Some of David’s subjects started to call publicly for his head, but he managed to keep the wolf from the door by masterminding a revenge victory over the Olympians to continue his crusade.

John the Killer rallied the troops to claim a decisive and much needed win over the Villains of Aston, but the next opponents would not be so easy to dominate.  The Bayernets had one of the strongest and fiercest armies in the world, and now they stood in David’s way.  A tense first battle saw no quarter given and both sides left with honour intact.  The second battle started well for the Traffordonians, with ageing stalwart Pat Everhard taking the fight to the Bayernets and catching them off-guard.  However, this only angered the Bayernets and they swiftly countered before sending David’s men home, their campaign finished.

Rumours of David’s removal as king were now being touted by even the most loyal of his subjects, and it came as no surprise that he was overthrown after his next defeat, ironically to the people who’d once loved him:  Toffeetown.  Ryan Broslayer was appointed as steward of Traffordonia until such time as a new king could be found to resurrect the crumbling kingdom and restore its former glories.

In light of Traffordonia’s failures under David’s rule, both the Pudlians and the Blue Moon clan were vying for control of the kingdom.  Both were longstanding rivals of Traffordonia but had been kept well subdued, for the most part, by Alexander’s dominance during his reign.  He’d actually claimed the kingdom from the Pudlians many, many years ago and had instilled in his subjects the need to never let the evil Pudlians rule again.  With this in mind, the Traffordonians were secretly supporting the Blue Moon clan in any way they could, barring treasonous acts.

For a long time it seemed that the Pudlians, marshalled by their talisman Stee-Gee, would be the ones to claim total victory.  This would lead to a repeat of the dark days, spoken of by elders in hushed tones.  However, calamity struck Stee-Gee on the battlefield as he slipped at a crucial moment, allowing the Chelsians to administer a telling defeat to the evil Pudlians, crushing their hopes and allowing the Blue Moon clan to swoop in and take the crown.  The Traffordians grudgingly accepted the lesser of two evils as their betters, and swore fealty to the Blue Moon clan as their rightful rulers for the coming year.

Ryan Broslayer’s tenure as steward came to an end after the Blue Moon clan’s ultimate victory.  The highly-decorated Louis Vangelis took over the reins in Ryan’s stead, but kept him on as his right-hand man.  What happened after that?  Well, that’s a story for another time.  However, Traffordonians know deep in their hearts that the day will come when it is they who will be ruling once more, the balance will be restored and all will be right with the world.

The End

Tom (@Tom_McGhee):

So it’s all over; another roller-coaster ride of thrills and excitement, culminating in a ‘down to the last day’ scenario and one more title. Oh UNITED? Why didn’t you say….

Got to be honest, I’ve already repressed most of this season (expecting it to come back to me in senility and those lonely nights in the home circa 2040) and as such, the review is going to be somewhat slap-dash; for the regular readers (who am I kidding? ‘Reader’. And thanks Dad) I know this lack of professionalism will shock and dismay you but hey, if fellas earning £200000+ a week can do it…

August 2013: Sir Alex who? A 4-1 drubbing of Mighty Swansea and a 0-0 draw againts the all-consuming genius that is Mourinho?! Business as usual then lads.

N.B If we were Liverpool, we’d’ve started singing ‘We’re going to win the league’ about now.

September 2013: Little bit of a speed-bump September; alright we got hammered by City, but it wasn’t 6-1 and yes, we did also lose to Liverpool but these things happened in the Fergie era – it’s a team in transition! We beat Palace for chrissakes. The West Brom thing was probably just a one-off freak result. And just look at us go in Europe!

October 2013: See? Beating Sunderland and Stoke is nothing to be sniffed at (See also: draws against European heavy-hitters Shakhtar & Real Sociedad).

November 2013:  Victories against Fulham and league-leaders Arsenal put us right back in the hunt and Cardiff away is never easy. Megalolz at Fellaini in Europe – what a signing he’s turning out to be – but 5 against Leverkusen away is just the tonic we need. Now we’ll turn the corner.

December 2013: Four wins and a draw. Yes, defeats at home to both Everton and Newcastle do seem to be a negative but Dave is really trying and I’m sure we’re just not seeing his vision. Buy a gun just in case.

January 2014: Oh THAT Sir Alex. Sweet Jesus. Still, take that Wales. Oh wait. Beginning to think David isn’t the tactical super-genius we thought.

February 2014: Set new world record for number of crosses. Take this as a positive. And if you ignore the defeat to Stoke and the draw against Fulham, not a bad month – I mean, we drew with 4th place winners Arsenal. That Olympiakos thing was just West Brom all over again. Oil gun on daily basis now.

March 2014: Magnificent vengeance against the mighty West Brom, and we continue to lure Liverpool & City into thinking we’re not even trying to win the league and really stick it to Villa who, once again, are challenging for worst thing ever. What goes around comes around as Olympiakos get their just desserts at OT and we make the last eight.

April 2014: Get knocked out – comprehensively – by Bayern; I don’t think its hyperbole to say it was the biggest shock since sliced bread. However, now we’re rid of the tiresome distraction that is CL, starting to think Moyes is leaving it a bit late to make that final charge – mathematically, it seems impossible.  In other news, Moyes sacked. Hand my gun into police – won’t be needing it now. Relative unknown Ryan Giggs made interim boss, smiles all across the land.

May 2014: Prepared suicide note in event of Liverpool win. Turned it into party invite where Steven Gerrard’s slip is shown on continuous loop. Season ends with Vidic and Rio leaving (I knew Vidic was going when I saw him sign that Milan contract), hope ensuing vacuum sucks both Cleverley and Young to a parallel world where they aren’t subjected to constant ridicule. Seems unlikely. Louis Van Gaal touted as next boss but at the time of writing, no official confirmation. Thousands of Vines though. So that’s good.

Its quite probable that having read this review, you might’ve noticed some glaring omissions – there’s no mention of the league cup for instance – but this is because I don’t believe in it; either way, feel free to not bring any of them to my attention. Its also highly probable that if you started reading this, you possibly – and justifiably – gave up way before now. If so, you’ve gone up in my estimation.

About the author:

Invented Glass, starred in Miss Saigon for 24 consecutive years.

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Abhay (Ab5Y) :

The unholy has been avoided. Liverpool will go another season without adding to their eighteen league crowns. While this may bring some amount of solace to Man United fans (especially the ones of a certain vintage who have seen the Merseyside team truly dominate English football), it does scarce to ease the pain of a season which to date is the worst United have had to endure in the Premier League era.

What does ease the pain, however, is the tangible hope that the 2013/14 season will go down as a blip rather than a turning point in the history of Manchester United FC. Strong rumours of the impending arrival of Louis van Gaal mean that the fans, and a fair portion of the players (not least a certain horse placenta connoisseur) remain optimistic of returning to their rightful place at the helm of the league table in the coming season. Along with that, there is also the indication that United are keen on buying football players actually worthy of playing for Manchester United, especially in the center of midfield. This is certainly heartening news for those who aren’t entirely pleased with Michael Carrick, Tom Cleverley, Marouane Fellaini and the soon to be former Manchester United player/personal entertainer and jester to Alex Ferguson, Anderson.

If and when van Gaal takes charge of this Manchester United squad, one can expect a throwback to the heady days of 90s attacking and flair football. Old Trafford hasn’t seen such football, featuring gay abandonment, consistently since Vincent del Bosque’s Real Madrid were the victors in a clash between tactical astuteness and “tactical anarchy”. Since then, Sir Alex Ferguson became decidedly more possession minded in the way he set out his playing elevens. It was a transformation that was largely accepted whilst the trophies kept rolling in. But with two trophyless years since 2011, the return of attacking football in its purest essence will be a welcome sight for those making the trip down Sir Matt Busby Way.

If the hopes of the reported 600 million people worldwide, who claim to support “Man U”, are realized, the 2014/15 season could see Manchester United and Liverpool compete for the title. But unlike the last time it happened (2008/09), this time promises to be the start of rivalry that could last more than just one season.

For starters, there seems to be no danger of Brendan Rodgers going off on a rant about how van Gaal has, or will doubtless have, the FA in his pocket. For the main course, Rodgers also seems to be hell bent on not wanting to exchange his best players for Gareth Barry. For dessert, Rodgers is just a good manager through and through, and not a ‘flawed genius’.

With Chelsea under Jose Mourinho looking set to buy a world class striker in the summer, and Arsenal and Manchester City also almost certain to strengthen in order to build on their numerous positives this season, the fight for the league will be might tougher next season than it has been these past eight months. If Tottenham finally manage to find a manager capable of getting the best out of an expensively assembled squad, and Everton continue their rise under Roberto Martinez, even getting top four will be a sizable challenge.

Yet, barring City, none of the teams in the PL have the same quality in their squad that Manchester United already possess. But while City have a treasure trove of world class players to call upon whenever a need arises, Liverpool have something far more powerful: the call of destiny. Whether one believes in such a thing or not, it is undeniable that Liverpool supporters and a large proportion of their players know and understand the rich history of their club. There is an aura about Anfield, the Liver bird, the kop, the Shankly gates, and everything that goes with that club, that, though dimmed in the past two and a half decades, can still turn LFC into a fearsome and dominating trophy machine. Only Manchester United’s own history and traditions can compare, and hence only United can stop the mayhem that Liverpool will create under Rodgers now that they have tasted blood.

Brett:

I did one for ROM on Vidic and then ran out of

Ben (Benglorious):

By now, you should have experienced enough fallout from the Fulham travesty to be screaming for Moyes’ head to be removed, covered in tar and placed next to that unlucky Stark fellow’s bonce on the ramparts of King’s Landing.  A bit of sword-breathing, topless dragons and incestuous dwarf-action would serve as a very welcome distraction from the Afternoon of a Gazilbillion Ineffectual Crosses we all witnessed on Sunday, but who can afford a train ticket to Liverpool in this economy?

After the aforementioned debacle (always good to crowbar that word in whenever possible), a trip to Highbury would normally fill most fans with trepidation.  Luckily, that Art Deco colosseum is now a dog park.  Or a golf course.  Or a quarry.  I don’t know, it’s not like I’ve got all the information in the world at my fingertips, is it?  My point is that we have to go to the Emirates.  Which is thousands of miles away and you can’t even get a drink once you’re there.  That wasn’t actually my point.  My real point is that Arsenal appear to be the only team in the Premiership that still fear our broken band of misfits this season, and they’re also coming off the back of an absolute spanking at the hands of the most successful team that has an L4 postcode.

This means that we can probably take advantage of their shellshock with some solid wing-play and plenty of crossing to beat their shorter-than-average centre-halves.  Failing that, we could try playing the ball on the floor, maybe even getting the triumvirate (another great word carelessly shoehorned in) of Rooney, Mata and RVP linking up for some liquid football.  Like my commanding officer in ‘Nam used to say: “Liquid football equals goals, lads,”  before he lost both arms and both legs hunting buffalo in Hoi An back in ’71.  I don’t know why he stopped saying it after his mishap, he could still speak perfectly normally, but something had inexplicably driven him into a state of depression which led to our eventual mutiny two days later.  The rest is history.  Not history that you’ll read anywhere, so it’s probably for the best if you don’t try and look it up.

The other, and far more likely option, is that Arsenal will be looking for some sort of Chuck Norris-style revenge after their drubbing, and, luckily for them, it just so happens that it’s their old rivals from up the [look up name of London-Manchester motorway in road atlas] who are next on “the most unfair fixture list in the history of football”- D. Moyes, 2013/4.

Prediction:  Hopefully Moyes has finally woken up to the fact that nothing is working on the wings, so will change tack.  We all know he won’t, so I’m going for a cracking goal-fest of 3-2 to Arsenal, with goals from Thierry Henry, Charlie Nicholas and Kim Kardashian.  United’s will be two Rafael headers off crosses from Phil Jones, and all the players will shake hands at the end and go off to enjoy various jellies and ice cream.

I realise that’s all a bit doom and gloom so I’d like to finish with a Smiths song that I’ve changed the lyrics to.

About the author:  I seen some things, man.

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Tom (@Tom_McGhee):

With Arsenal’s inexorable decline now in full swing and United’s march on a 21st title a mere formality, there’s never been a better time to play the true blue gunner gooners. Indeed, coming off the back of such a crushing defeat, the fact that Arsene is still in a job – 81 crosses!? – whilst our David simply goes from strength to strength, can only make the coming fixture seem like a stroll in the park for United. So much so, it’s hardly worth discussing further; even their Gollum lookalike has nowt on our Dave (Moyes lends Smeagol a certain gravitas –  Ozil just has big eyes).

So what to expect? With Wenger desperately clinging to the vain hope of 4th place and the Champions being in such devastating form – and they said our midfield wasnt up to it! – I expect a high tempo passing game, with players in their correct positions and scoring chance after chance in a dazzling display of creativity and adventure; Arsenal will probably just stick to playing hoofball  – and I do feel bad flogging a dead horse –  trying cross after inaccurate cross in the misguided hope that at some point Van Per…Giroud can maybe get a lucky touch to somehow score. And whilst it seems slightly unkind to mock the afflicted, with our back four, in the form they’re in, I just can’t see that as anything other than completely naive.

Prediction: This being the case, it’s very hard to see past a routine victory for a United team who’ve broken records wherever they’ve played this season, and I can only predict a 16-0 rout  (Wayne scoring the first 8 and dedicating them to the fans he’s always loved) and Arsene collecting his P45.

Disclaimer: please excuse any poor grammar etc – I was pelted with rocks earlier this week (We had a powercut and I produced a torch…. the villagers did not like it) and received quite a serious blunt trauma to the head. No side effects so far.

Brett:

With our proclivity to lose hope, I’m only listing positives…

*press play before reading on*

Okay, you can start reading the list when the vocal comes in. Wait. Okay, here it comes … no, wait, it’s coming up now… no, wait. Here it is … no. Okay, here it comes … no, wait, it’s coming up now… no, wait. Here it is … no. Okay, here it comes … no, wait, it’s coming up now… no, wait. Here it is … no. After this loop … no. Dum-dum-dum, oh yeah, I remember now, here it comes… no. After this loop … no. Dum-dum-dum, oh yeah, it’s a good loop this … Aaaand now, here it comes… no. Okay, just wait for the vocal and then proceed to the list…

1. Dying inside is not real dying.

As for Arsenal…

When they were buying Ozil I was in Madrid and the fans on the telly phone-ins were very happy to see him go because they thought he was a right ‘perezoso tal y por lo’. When I came back from Madrid I shared this information in the interests of making myself appear knowledgeable. I remind you of this now, not because I want to be able to tell you ‘I told you so’ when it all goes wrong, but because … oh no, wait, that is why I’m doing it.

Prediction: 1-2. Danny with his customary two, both cross-cum-shots. Not like that.

Ben (Benglorious):

I should know a lot about Fulham.  I once lived in Hammersmith, which meant Coward House (not the Kiwi band) was my closest Premier League ground for nearly five years (Stamford Bridge was pretty close as well, but seeing as it’s also in Fulham you can just count everything I say for Chelsea as well).  Let’s see:  They play in white;  Their owner also owns a big shop, but ironically it’s not somewhere you’d do your big shop (unless you’re getting Bifurcated money);  Their owner is not from these parts but doesn’t have a passport, so I assume he must have been posted here, most likely as a baby because they’re smaller and would need fewer stamps and bubble wrap; Their owner loved Michael Jackson so much he built a statue of him outside the ground to commemorate him being Fulham’s all-time top goalscorer.  It would appear that I actually know more about their owner than I do the football team.  Apart from his name.

[Phone rings: “Hello? …… Oh, hi Mum. …… I’m actually in the middle of wri… …… WHAT?!? …… WHEN?!? …… Well, why would he sell it? More importantly: how do you bloody know this? …… Oh. …… Mmmm-hmm. …… I see. …… And neither of them are dead? …… Okaaaaay. …… But Prince Phili… …… You’re sure abou… …… Yes, yes, of course I believe you.  One more question: how do you know what I’m writing as I write it? …… Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaah! …… Do you want to come in? …… Okay.  Well, be careful getting back down that ladder. …… Yeah, you too.  Nanight.”]

Well, it seems that the owner of Fulham hasn’t been the owner of Fulham for nearly a year.  Who knew?  Apart from my Mum?  Who owns it now?  Didn’t Beckham just buy a team or something?  Are any of these questions suitable for the Rantcast?  Is that one?  What about this on…  STOP.

I’ve seen a lot of annoyed fans on Twitter this last week.  There’s the fans who are annoyed at how badly United have been playing, there’s the fans who are annoyed at the fans who are annoyed at how badly United have been playing and there’s the fans who are annoyed at the fans who are annoyed at the fans who are annoyed at how badly United have been playing, although this third group of fans are mostly comprised of the first group of fans.  Still with me?  Me neither.

Prediction: My record so far is 50% on the match results but that was me being cheerfully optimistic both times.  Anyone at Bet365 will tell you that that’s 50% better than any of my predictions on their website, stressing that I’m an extremely valued customer before telling you that I should look after myself as thumbs can break accidentally at any time.  Anyway, after Berbatov gets Fulham away to a flier with an early goal [Phone rings. Phone is thrown out of window.  Phone hits old lady in face] the score remains at 0-0 because that was a DREAM SEQUENCE.  Patience, Mother.  The pessimist in me is going for a 1-1 draw.  “BUT FULHAM ARE SHIT!” I hear you cry.  Yeah, so are Stoke, Sunderland and Yokohama F·Marinos.

About the author: I like questions?

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Brett:

David Moyes is so damned good at shuffling his pack that he does this thing yeah, where he pretends yeah, that he’s really bad at it yeah, just because he’s so bored with being so damned good at it yeah, and this week will be no different.

Can you remember that time he was playing cards and he couldn’t shuffle properly and he had to put them all out on the floor and stirred them with his finger and everybody was laughing at him, even his mum. Oh no, that was me. And there was no-one laughing. I was all alone. Anyway, where was I? oh yes…

This game like last week, and the week before, and the week before that, and the week before that, and the week before that, is probably going to go ahead, so like last week, and the week before, and the week before that, and the week before that, and the week before that …  that’ll do. That one was for all the skim readers out there, wouldn’t want them to miss out on a good point when only really reading the first and last paragraphs.

My point, I haven’t just come up with to legitimise this, is this: Everything has been talked about to death. There’s nothing new to talk about where United are concerned. Nothing. Stop talking. Nothing. Ah! Nothing.

Prediction: 3 – 2. Danny to score his customary two. I wrote this before I said stop talking.  

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p.s Because there’s no Berba at Fulham anymore this fixture is dead to me. Here’s a couple of Berba things…

p.p.s I’m allowed to write this because it’s not about United (and that doesn’t count)…

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What a really good result for Moyes (and us) all round. This post is brought to you today, in association with the word ‘good’.

– Good form: Rooney (*spit*) and RVP amongst the goals and hitting a bit of a patch – together and as seperate entities.

– Good times: Adnan continuing his exponential growth.

– Goodness sake: his man, coming to ‘the rescue’ of Adnan, and affording him a little bit of slack, perhaps.

– Good form: a comfortable victory, as (unfairly) expected.

– Good PR: showing his loyalty to  “The Manager’s Club” by praising Jol after the game.

Fulham (and Berbs, sob etc) didn’t turn up. Oh no, wait, they did. I saw them. They just didn’t play very well.

Iwan (@IwanLehnert):

I could waffle on about how abject parts of Wednesday’s display were, but to be honest, a prominent United fan named Paul on Twitter (@thisistheone99) summed it up so effectively that I don’t need to: “Fulham away Saturday! Less said about that shambles tonight the better.”

Tidy.

Besides, we WON. So I’d rather break the habit of a lifetime and not criticise the poor blighters to death. Although I’m inclined to blame the Bugs Bunny pj’s.

There’s barely any way that Fulham will be as abject tomorrow as they were last weekend. Just isn’t going to happen. They bucked their ideas up quite nicely on Wednesday against West Ham, so they’ll at least go into the game in a better mood than they might have done had a few days ago. The loan signing of Urby Emmanuelson from AC Milan could reinvigorate a team who’ve had an utterly unremarkable season so far. Honestly, I doubt that’ll be enough.

The main thing for us tomorrow is that shiny opportunity to go ten points clear. With that in mind, I expect us to win regardless of the performance. Fulham haven’t been remarkable at home this season at all, and even if we don’t hit our peak then the mere opportunity to take a lead that large, even if it only last 20 hours or so is one that we can’t afford to miss. To be honest, I don’t think we will.

Prediction: 1-3 to ourselves. Welbeck to not score, because he probably won’t (reverse prediction there, y’see?), Rooney to continue his recent goal splurge.

Hopes: No repeat of that awful little 4-3-3 we saw on Wednesday. Trust our wingers for the first half. If it doesn’t work, hook ‘em off and put Kagawa through the middle with someone who can tackle behind him. Preferably Jones. Man, Phil Jones. That boy can just do it all, can’t he?

Brett:* ** *** ****

*If the following sounds familiar to last week’s Fulham prediction, it’s cus it is. It’s Groundhog Day and there are strict laws you have to adhere to. Don’t be surprised to find the appropriate blogging authorities battering your front door down in the early hours of tomorrow Mr. Lehnert. 

**Iwan and me will be touring our Cannon and Ball tribute act at the back end of 2013. Rock on Bifurcated!

***I know Berba is injured.

**** I may or may not be smuggling through a point about repetition. I repeat, I may or may not be smuggling through a point about repetition.

If how much Fergie cares about a particular competition is reflected in the teams he picks, then you’d be forgiven for thinking, in spite of the endless views to the contrary, that he actually wouldn’t mind winning the Prem this year. My heart does often sink a little when some of the team sheets are released, but that’s not the case in the Prem this year. I’m sure Fergie genuinely believes the teams he puts out in any game are good enough to win them (without endorsing all of them) – whether they actually are, is another matter. One thing is for sure, you can’t always put out your strongest team. Why am I still talking?

In sharp contrast to what I’ve just said, the fact we haven’t got a midweek game, should guarantee us putting out a better team that you might expect, were we to be playing Real, for example. I’m still talking!

I do love Berba and am looking forward to seeing him get a good ovation from our fans. There’s a script somewhere with him scoring the winner, but when he’s trying really hard to make a point, he often doesn’t   or in this case, more   I like Fulham, Martin Jol and Brian Ruiz are definitely amongst my favourite things in the Prem and I think we can look forward to them giving us a good game. I’m going to shut up soon.

Rooney needs minutes, so will I’m sure feature, possibly in behind Danny? Fingers crossed (though either RVP or Chicha are always more than welcome). What a lovely collection of strikers we’ve got. Always nice to remind yourself of that from time to time. A little more choke and I think Tony’s engine will start – hopefully he’ll play.

*Yuck* (I apologise for almost making some serious points there, normal nonsense will resume next week.)

Prediction: 3 – 4 (to us)

Goals: Danny! Danny! Danny! Danny! What?

Oh, look our film saying goodbye to Berba … how did that get there?