Sporting Clube de Portugal v Manchester United

-VS-

Group F
19th Sep 2007
KO 19:45
Ground: Estadio Jose Alvalade

They are missing Derlei formerly of Porto, he can be a tricky customer so I'm happy about that. However I have a bad feeling about Liedson, his scoring record at Sporting is very impressive no matter how you rate the Portugese league. Their captain is Joao Moutinho, of whom I've heard big things despite not seeing much of him other than at International level. You never know, if he performs he could be a United player next summer

My line-up would look like so:
------------------------------------VDS

Brown---------------Rio------------------------Vidic--------------Evra

Ronaldo-----------Carrick--------------------Scholes------------Giggs

------------------------------Tevez
---------------------------------------------Saha

I don't want to risk Rooney at all, it's better if he's held back.

Prediction: 2-0 to United.

Will United's poor away form in europe continue? There's a chance it might. They ain't scoring many at the moment aswell so i'll go for a draw.

Has Giggs just come back from injury? or did he play against Everton? It would be interesting put Nani on the left and see how he does against his former club, he knows the players of Sporting clube de Portugal well and he'll relish playing against his old team.

It would be Nani's first return to a former club's stadium in his career and it's hard to tell how he'd react to the taunting. I'd pick Giggs too, just to be safe and maybe sub him for Nani later on in the game.

It's a shame that Hargreaves won't be playing, but hopefully Carrick will try to prove a point by putting in a good performance.

He came back against Everton, played 60 minutes and then Saha replaced him.

Should be fine-diddly-ine by now.

Well considering Man U slow start to the season i'm a bit worried about this fixture first up.

IMO, It won't be a 2-0 like ya said Forev

The Portoguese teams usually score at home, and if it looks unlikely someone will dart into tha box and get a penalty...

Key as always is the first goal...

An away draw would be a good result since a large chunk of the United squad isn't 100% match fit.

Sporting are a good team, I hope in a draw

Captain Joao to score

unfortunately, Derlei is injured now, but I hope Izmailov and Moutinho will show their best

Sir Alex has hinted at playing Giggs up front with Tevez as neither Saha or Rooney are at satisfying levels. I don't like that team but I suppose if it has to be, it has to be.



Ronaldo---------Carrick---------Scholes-------Nani

--------------------Tevez----------Giggs

My predicted subs would be...

Subs: Kuszczak, Evans, Pique, Rooney, Eagles, Anderson, Saha

Our injury list worries me...

Ready to unleash the gay on Lisbon!

avast ....get thee cursed pictures away from me eyes ye scurvy yokel ...harrghh jimlass ..

I knew it.

Interesting encounter.... hopefully will b a far better spectacle than the tosh between Porto and Liverpool last night. United are still very off the boil and a little suspect and i have an inkling they might step it up a gear this evening. Lisbon aren't the strongest of opposition but have one or two players who will pose a few problems no doubt.

I predict - Sporting Lisbon 1-2 Manchester United.

Glad I watched the Arsenal match, a typical 1-0 Man Ud win.

Anyone notice besides Arsenal the Premiership teams are usually very boreing.

Well, ManU wasn't boring last season, but it seems we are this year.

I've read that a reason for that could be our trainer's departure. He left us for Real Madrid and we got Blackburn's trainer. Supposedly, our former trainer was possibly the best working today and he left us rather unexpectedly, which surely must have affected the players' condition, fitness and form.

Hopefully, when everyone returns we'll start playing better.

Chelsea are boring even when they win convincingly.

The main point was to win and we did we can leave the fancy stuff for when we play at home or when we have fully fit 100% gelled team, as for now I'll take 1-0 score lines for the time being.

The goal itself was a well taken and the cross by brown was on the money.

Wise up, Dave. United only win 1-0 when they are going through a bad patch, but live it up while you can.

Anyway, it was a flat performance all around by the players and especially the management IMO. But I can't go into that too much because the result was achieved and that's what matters.

One thing is for sure, if we play like that against Chelsea and Roma we will get ripped to shreads.

MOTM: Edwin. Without him we may have been beaten. Top performance.