But Chelsea take ill-merited point

By our reporter, Billy Bandwagon,

recent winner of the Sir Alex Ferguson award for objectivity in football journalism.

Keeper Van der Gouw was excellent, displaying incredible skills as he parried away shots from foreign players Dalla Bona and Gronkjaer, but it was Chelsea, unbelievably, who opened the scoring after a blunder by Scholes enabled foreign striker Hasselbaink to head the ball into the net. Chelsea’s fans (strange people – what’s the point of supporting a club that doesn’t win the Championship nearly every season?) were jubilant but it was notable that only an uncharacteristically silly error by a Manchester United player gave the home side their goal and it undoubtedly says something about United’s total superiority in the Premiership that their opponents can only score if goals are given to them!

The beautifully engineered machine that is Sir Alex Ferguson’s treble-winning squad came back strongly. A foolish error by foreign player Dalla Bona left the ball waiting for United to pounce. Top striker Solskjaer surged on towards the goal but foreign keeper Cudicini got to the ball first and flicked it away. This flagrantly unsportsmanlike behaviour was rightly condemned by the referee, and the keeper, who escaped with a stern talking-to, was unbelievably fortunate not to get a red card.

There was another flashpoint when Jaap Stam accidentally violently assaulted foreign striker Zola in the area before booting the ball over the line. Chelsea, with typical sour grapes, appealed for a penalty but the referee was quite rightly having none of it and gave a goal kick to United instead.

On the back of this there were then two upsets. Firstly Chelsea foreigner Gronkjaer made a lucky run in which he managed to slip around most of the United midfield and defence. The referee seemed not to notice this and he was able to put a cross over to foreign attacker Hasselbaink, but Silvestre coolly slid in and hacked his feet out from under him, thus ensuring that Chelsea did not add to their utterly undeserved lead over the Champions. Then Zola took the ball right past top defender Neville and gave Van Der Gouw the slip, firing the ball into the net. However, the referee quite rightly decided that shooting at an open goal wasn’t fair play and disallowed the goal.

United now went on the attack, looking to get the goals that would get them their well-deserved three points. Keane kept up the pressure, and also got a hard kick in on Gronkjaer for good measure. United fans were briefly worried that this might result in a booking, but the referee quite rightly decided that Gronkjaer deserved such treatment having made so many crosses into the Manchester United area. England captain and arguably greatest footballer ever Beckham then tried in vain to cross the ball for United’s world-class strikers but foreign defender Ferrer slyly and deviously took the ball from him. Aghast at such appalling behaviour Beckham fell to the floor in shock, but luckily the referee had seen it and duly gave Manchester United a free kick, the Chelsea defender being lucky not to be sent off. Shortly afterwards world-class striker Andy Cole scored the equaliser with a truly stunning goal.

The pressure kept up and Scholes, lining up for the attack, accidentally flattened Zola. Utterly undeservingly, he was given a yellow card, in a sickening display of the sort of petty-minded anti-Manchester United bias that has come to dominate the Premiership these days and often denies the boys thoroughly well-merited points, as it was to do today.

Sir Alex Ferguson, though, seemed happy after the match, even having a good word or two for the referee, saying that he had "a good game". Bearing in mind his clear bias in favour of Chelsea (witness Scholes’ booking) I can’t help feeling that this remark shows the incredible chivalry that is just one of the myriad reasons why Sir Alex is by far the greatest manager in the entire history of football.