Late flourish gives Deportivo 2-1 win over Manchester United

Late flourish gives Deportivo 2-1 win over Manchester United

LA CORUNA, Spain, September 25 (AFP)
Two goals in the last four minutes gave Deportivo La Coruna a crucial 2-1 victory over Manchester United in their European Champions' League group G match on Tuesday.

After a disappointing 2-2 draw at home against Olympiakos last week, the Galician side looked down, and possibly out, of this season's Champions League until the dying minutes when first Walter Pandiani and then Nourredine Naybet found the net.

"It was a disappointing finish-- it's hard to believe," said a downcast Alex Ferguson, the Manchester United coach.
"We were careless with our possession in the second half at times, I thought we could have done better with that. But we had one or two chances to finish the game when Ryan Giggs went through and Veron went through, you need a bit of composure at that point. You have to do it in all games, when 1-0 up-- it only takes a second to score a goal," added Ferguson.

"They fought hard, threw all their players on and kept it at a high tempo, it was a good game actually, but I am just disappointed that we lost it."

Ferguson had every right to feel fed up as neither side truly deserved to lose a thoroughly entertaining match.
Both teams were committed to attacking for the full 90 minutes.

United broke the deadlock after 40 minutes with an outstanding goal from Paul Scholes, who got his first goal of this season's Champions' League campaign after six strikes last year.

Following some good work from Ryan Giggs, Ruud van Nistelrooy laid the ball off for Scholes to blast the ball home with his right foot, from just inside the area.
Deportivo's best chance in the first half came after 32 minutes when United's French goalkeeper Fabian Barthez could only parry away a corner and the ball went to the feet of Roy Makaay.

However, Deportivo's Dutch striker, despite the fact that he had time and space to hand, contrived to send the ball flying over the cross bar and was left to hold his head in his hands rather than wave them in the air in celebration.
On the hour, Deportivo coach Javier Irureta sent on Pandiani for the luckless Makaay and it proved to be a prophetic switch as the Uruguayan striker found the net from the edge with just four minutes remaining.
Last season, Pandiani gained a well-earned reputation as a super-sub, coming on late in matches to grab crucial goals, and it looks as though he has not lost his touch after connecting with a Juan Carlos Valeron cross.
In a stark reversal of fortunes to the way Manchester United won the Champions League three seasons ago, with regular time about to run out, Deportivo's Moroccan defender Naybet unleashed a thunderbolt from the edge of the area, after a speculative pass from Spanish international striker Diego Tristan.

"I said we were going to play for a victory. OK, we left it late, but I think we proved that we can go along way again in this season's Champions League if we can beat a team of United's calibre like that. I don't think at any time they were significantly better than us. We played as good football as they did," said an exhausted Irureta.

The Deportivo defeat extends United's sorry streak of having never beaten a Spanish club on Spanish soil in the Champions League, despite the fact that they became Kings of Europe three years ago in Barcelona.


source: []dailysoccer.com[/i]

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Được sửa chữa bởi - kocotengica on 26/09/2001 08:58