strong effort by Newcastle falls short losing to Man Utd 2-1

With their backs against the wall, Newcastle put forth a brilliant effort in from of their home supporters against Manchester United but sadly came up short losing 2-1. Unfortunately with both Stoke City and Blackburn gaining points, the Magpies drop to sixteenth position and only one point above relegation.

As expected Alan Smith made his way into the starting eleven against his old teammates and showed quite well, particularly given the long period of inactivity. Newcastle got off to a great start as nine minutes in, Jonás Gutiérrez's shot from the left skidded off Edwin Van der Sar's mitts and Peter Lövenkrands quickly sent the rebound in. With the shocker lead, Newcastle didn't back down and showed great nerve going forward. Eleven minutes later John O'Shea provided Wayne Rooney the ball and the Three Lions international left-footed the ball behind Steve Harper. With six minutes left in the half former Crvena zvezda man Nemanja Vidić missed a close range header off Michael Carrick's corner. Going into the break, the tone of the match took a slightly different break when Ryan Taylor pulled down Cristiano Ronaldo with his left arm. As the Ballon d'Or winner clutched his untouched face, presumably dying a horrible painful death, a yellow card was shown to Ryan Taylor and Ronaldo made a miraculous recovery. Eleven minutes after the restart an unfortunate blunder lead the Man Utd's third and deciding goal as Ryan Taylor seemed to slipp as he attempted to chest a deep ball back to Steve Harper and Ji-Sung Park jumped on the ball to send in across to Dimitar Berbatov who finished professionally. Down 2-1, Newcastle showed fight and introduced both Andy Carroll and Kazenga LuaLua for Alan Smith in the final stages but neither could find the needed magic and the match concluded without further mark.

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