FA Cup, Round 3: Aston Villa vs Manchester United

On a cold Saturday evening in Birmingham, Aston Villa hosted Manchester United in the third round of the FA Cup.

Opening exchanges looked deceptively promising as both teams had their fair share of attacking plays.

Anderson had the first real breakthrough as he ran almost unchallenged through Villa's midfield, only to shoot the ball straight at Richard Green for a relatively easy save.

Aston Villa's first sight of goal came via a Stilian Petrov 35-yard thunderbolt, only to see his shot fail to hit the target. In the opening half hour, it became apparent that Aston Villa's game plan was to sit tight and try and catch United on the counter attack, as they seemed to stick with trying to play the long ball to John Carew at every opportunity, albeit often failing to reach the powerhouse forward.

Manchester United, however, were back to playing a much slicker passing game, and Anderson seemed to be at the heart of almost every attacking play. The first half panned out with not many chances from either side.

The only real chance for United came just before the break. Cristiano Ronaldo unleashed a powerful shot from the left wing, which Green parried straight to Giggs, but the Welsh veteran's reaction time saw the ball pitifully sliced wide of goal.

Half time arrived with a stalemate, 0-0 scoreline. Even Cristiano Ronaldo had looked very sloppy and clumsy. The players left the field and the fans were left hoping the second half would be at least worth the admission fee.

As the second half began, no changes had been made to the playing staff, and no changes in either teams performance seemed apparent either.

As the game wore on, John Carew began to warm up a little in his attacks but failed to make any of them pay off for the Villains. Add to the fact that Nemanja Vidic was possibly the best player on the park, nullifying everything Villa had to throw at him.

An hour into the game, it seemed as though Aston Villa were happy to set up camp in their own half, and wait for United to make any sort of mistake. A lacklustre Louis Saha seemed to be making all United's mistakes on his own, and it wasn't long before the United fans were making themselves heard with chants of "Rooney!" ringing around the stands. They would have to wait another seven minutes before their wishes were granted, with Rooney coming on to replace Park Ji Sung, sending Ryan Giggs onto the left wing.

A rare chance from Aston Villa came on 71 minutes when Luke Young fired wide from about 25 yards.  Aston Villa were starting to build a little confidence and looked dangerous, and it wasn't long before Fergie responded by sending on Owen Hargreaves in place of Louis Saha, switching the formation to 4-3-3, with Giggs, Rooney and Ronaldo making up the front line.

Almost immediately, Ronaldo and Rooney linked up for the best play of the game, culminating in a shot from Rooney which should really have found goal.

United took a firm hold of the game for the remaining 10 minutes. Only one minute after Rooney's shot, Giggs played a slide-rule pass right across the goal mouth—which was knocked in by Ronaldo, finally getting United off the mark.

The remaining eight minutes of football were completely United's to play with and it seemed they were queueing up for shots on goal, with Anderson and Carrick both going close.

The icing on the cake came in the 87th minute, as Ronaldo and Rooney again combined, with a Ronaldo shot deflecting off a Villa defender, only for Wayne Rooney to volley the ball perfectly into the far corner. 2-0 United—and safe to say, it would be the champions to progress to round four.

Final score: Aston Villa 0-2 Manchester United

So, another seemingly low key performance from the English Champions, but they still finished as winners.

Some say to win games while not playing particularly well is a true sign of a good team, a point which judging by this performance I'd have to agree. Although United played well below what we're used to seeing, Villa never really threatened to cause any damage.

Author's man of the match: NEMANJA VIDIC: involved in defending every villa attack