manchester united @ reading

in a little over an hour, it’ll be kick-off at the madejski stadium between manchester united and reading. reading haven’t lost a home game for 24 matches and are playing well at the moment after their long absence in the premiership (in fact, they’ve never been promoted to the premiership ever since the league rebranded it as the premiership). having said that, they look to be enjoying football at the moment, sitting at mid-table while the other promoted championship sides haven’t been enjoying the kind of success they’re having at the moment. man utd on the other hand, just came-off from a disapponting home lost to arsenal. i’m hoping carrick will partner scholes in the midfield, although it wasn’t sure whether van der sar would’ve recovered from the stomach flu he was suffering. kuszczak though is a worthy replacement and should be gaining more confidence after a solid debut against arsenal. giggs will still be out, as well as park ji-sung, with cristiano ronaldo expected to be playing at the left flank along with fletcher on the right flank. at front, saha needs to have a better game than that of arsenal, while rooney needs to pick up his own game as he admitted that he needed to improve his game. at the back, the usual service of neville (c), ferdinand, brown is expected to resume, while evra would probably given the nod ahead of silvestre. on the bench, i’d like to see solskjaer to have some good minutes as well as it would be interesting to see some actions from kieran richardson on the left flank.

mindcubes’ 2 cents:

lineup: kuszczak, neville (c), ferdinand, brown, evra, ronaldo, carrick, scholes, fletcher, rooney, saha.

united will resume normal services after a little tactical slip last weekend, as saha should be firing all cylinders, and a solid midfield controlling the high tempo of the game. READING 0 – MAN UNITED 3