The Park Police may have been the first to stifle Barcelona, but Manchester United was certainly more than up to the challenge, too. The champions of England defeated the champions of Spain and Europe 2-1 on Saturday night in front of the largest crowd to ever watch a soccer game in the Washington region.
Even though FedEx Field housed a whopping 81,000-plus paying spectators and there was occasionally wonderful football on display, calling the match a professional one was a bit of a stretch. After all, each team carried 25 players (that’s seven more than normal), was allowed 11 substitutions (eight more than normal) and there was hardly the same kind of prestige lent to the World Football Challenge title (which Real Madrid actually won on goal difference, I think, and involved far more convolution than any normal competition) than the UEFA Champions League.
That’s not to say it wasn’t a competitive match — at times, things got quite prickly for a friendly. But analyzing such a preseason friendly/business trip tactically is a bit of a fool’s errand, though it was plainly obvious that Barcelona are a better team when Xavi, Carlos Puyol, Gerard Pique and Lionel Messi are all in the lineup than when they are not. Manchester United, on the other hand, fielded an experimental lineup which included the likes of Danny Walbeck, Tom Cleverly and Jonny Evans — none of which are expected to play an overwhelmingly starring role in United’s starting eleven when they open Premier League play.
Despite United manager Sir Alex Ferguson’s insistence that it’s “important for [United] to win all games,” the product on the field was certainly one of preseason. Barcelona manager Pep Guardiola was “happy with the performance” his team put in, despite the heat.
“We were jet lagged…it was not easy to play,” Guardiola admitted.
After a brief feeling out period, United seemed to grab control of the first half after Nani perfectly timed his bend on a run and put the finish through Victor Valdés’ legs. After the restart, the Catalans woke up. Long spells of possession, the Barcelona standard, eventually wore down United, and eventually, midfielder Thiago — Barca’s best player on the night — took advantage of a back-pedaling Nemanja Vidic to smoke a stunning strike past a frozen De Gea and into the top right corner. But a few minutes later, United displayed their standard — resiliency — Michael Owen returned the favor, spotted sneaking behind the Barcelona backline by Cleverly and then chipping over Valdés to put the English champions on top again for good.
Ferguson was pleased with the end result, of course.
“For Manchester United, it’s never a friendly game,” the manager admitted.
