Manchester United v Schalke – live!

• Hit the auto-update button for the latest posts • Send your thoughts to barry.glendenning@guardian.co.uk • Tweet Barry if that’s your bag More emails: “There seems to be a lot of former Middlesbrough coaches out of work,” writes Brett LeQuesne. “Who gets a job first? Southgate, McClaren or Strachan?” “You’ve stumbled on Fergie’s tactical blackspot- he has a weakness for central midfielders called Darren (or variant),” writes Nick McLoughlin. “Fletcher was poor for his first 3 years, Gibson unproven, Ferguson blatant nepotism. Obviously the sort of genius that will secure you a podcast punditry award!” Speaking of podcast punditry awards … Not long now: Click-clack, click-clack, click-clack. The teams emerge from the tunnel down by the Stretford End at Old Trafford and ITV cut to an advert break. Their programme is sponsored by Ford, don’t you know? In the ITV studio: “There’s no way Sir Alex Ferguson is ever complacent but he’s obviously got one-eyed firmly on Chelsea,” says Gareth Southgate. “Berbatov’s got to take the challenge on tonight,” adds Gordon Strachan, shortly after talking about players who get the hump when they feel their manager doesn’t trust them. Another email: “I thought the bride looked lovely. Didn’t you?” asks Tim Smith. If you’re alluding to the Royal Wedding, Tim, I’m afraid I missed it. Like Gordon Brown (no, the other one), I wasn’t invited. I did, however, see photos and thought Kate looked very glam, if worryingly thin. An email: “Good to see Darren back in contention,” writes Gordon Brown, who feels compelled to write “real name, honest!” in brackets next to his sign-off. “He could be very useful over the next 5 games.” Please note: he wrote Darr e n, not Darr o n. Distinctions don’t get more important. Man Utd: Van der Sar, Rafael Da Silva, Smalling, Evans, O’Shea, Gibson, Scholes, Anderson, Valencia, Berbatov, Nani. Subs: Kuszczak, Evra, Owen, Giggs, Hernandez, Vidic, Fletcher. Schalke 04: Neuer, Uchida, Howedes, Metzelder, Escudero, Papadopoulos, Jurado, Farfan, Baumjohann, Draxler, Raul. Subs: Schober, Sarpei, Edu, Schmitz, Karimi, Huntelaar, Matip. Referee: Pedro Proenca (Portugal) Good evening everybody and welcome to tonight’s minute-by-minute coverage of Manchester United v Schalke in the Champions League semi-final second leg. Sir Alex Ferguson’s side won the first leg doing handstands , with only the heroics of Schalke’s highly coveted goalkeeper Manuel Neuer helping a surprisingly over-awed German side avoid total humiliation. Manchester United’s manager has said that complacency won’t be a problem in a second leg many are considering a formality for the Premier League leaders, but Wayne Rooney’s tight hamstring, last Sunday’s league defeat at the hands of Arsenal and what looks suspiciously like complacency have forced Ferguson to make nine changes and draft in the second string in order to rest several players ahead of United’s potential title-decider against Chelsea this Sunday. Should his plan backfire and United lose, he’ll have a lot of difficult questions to answer. With a berth in the final against Barcelona at stake, Ralf Rangnick’s Schalke squad have been making all the right noises ahead of tonight’s encounter, even though they almost didn’t make it to Manchester – their departure from Dusseldorf airport was delayed by 90 minutes yesterday as a result of visa problems encountered by their five non-EU squad members. Having put five past reigning Champions League holders Inter at the San Siro, they’ve every right to feel confident about pulling this tie out of the fire. After all, it is surely inconceivable that they can play any worse tonight than they did last Tuesday, isn’t it? Interestingly, only two of Schalke’s players have played at Old Trafford before: Raúl and Angelos Charisteas, with both finding their way on to the score-sheet for Real Madrid and Greece respectively. A portent for the night’s entertainment ahead? Probably not, but it’s something for neutrals to cling to. History, however, is very much on Manchester Un ited’s side: they’ve never lost by two goals at home in Europe and never surrendered their advantage after winning the first leg away from home. Champions League Manchester United Schalke Barry Glendenning guardian.co.uk

Posted by on May 4, 2011. Filed under News, Politics, World News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.