By Frank Mead
Exactly ten years on from what was the obvious highlight of a very mediocre campaign at Old Trafford, the latest instalment of our Classic Matches section features a match no Manchester United will ever forget.
BACKGROUND
It’s not exactly necessary to go over the rivalry between these two teams at that particular time – but we will do because it’s fun. Since Arsene Wenger had taken charge of Arsenal in 1996, he had turned the Gunners from Premier League also-rans into champions in less than two years. Most neutrals will fondly remember the battles between the two teams in the late 1990’s and early 2000’s. It might not have had the history of the United – Liverpool games, or the local rivalry which comes in a derby. No, it had something much better than that – two teams, packed with quality players, but who also knew how to fight, how to scrap, how to win even when you aren’t playing well.
Every time these two teams met, it was always a game which you couldn’t take your eyes off. From the day that Marc Overmars scored the winning goal at Old Trafford in 1998, the matches that followed as the two sides battled it out for the titles were usually classics. The F.A. Cup Semi Final in 1999 when United were down to ten men after Roy Keane was sent off (imagine that), the flick-up and volley by Thierry Henry in 2000, Dwight Yorke’s hat trick in the 6 – 1 win at Old Trafford a few months later, to name just a few.
The “Battle of Old Trafford” in 2003 is a sight that still enrages a lot of United fans, most of whom have never forgiven Martin Keown for his reaction to Ruud van Nistelrooy missing a last minute penalty, jumping up in the air and bringing his arm down hard on the Dutchman’s back, blaming him for his part in getting Patrick Vieira sent off in that match, which led to a mass kick off between the players, in which Roy Keane acted as a peacemaker. United, champions at that point, surrendered their title to Arsenal, whose team of “Invincibles” went through the whole season without losing a Premier League match.
Just three months prior to this match, Arsenal had arrived at Old Trafford looking to make it 50 Premier League games without defeat. Thanks to a dubious looking penalty, won by Wayne Rooney (much to the displeasure of Sol Campbell) van Nistelrooy had put United 1 – 0 up midway through the second half, banishing his own demons from his missed spot kick a year earlier. Rooney added a second in injury time, his first Premier League goal for United sealing a 2 – 0 win, and confining Arsenal’s unbeaten run to the realms of history. The aftermath of that particular match also saw “Pizzagate” in the Old Trafford tunnel after the game – Fergie still isn’t sure who covered him in mozzarella to this day.
The match didn’t need much hype, these were two teams who just didn’t like each other. There was always going to be fireworks, but the way the evening actually unfolded, not even the most creative football fan could have predicted.
THE MATCH
Since the defeat at Old Trafford, Arsenal had seen Chelsea overtake them at the top of the table, with their expensively assembled side gunning for their first ever Premier League title. Manchester United were having an inconsistent season, not helped by a constant string of injuries to star striker Ruud van Nistelrooy, who would miss the game at Highbury.
The sparks began to fly before a ball was even kicked, as Arsenal captain Patrick Vieira, on his way back to the dressing rooms after the warm-up, “politely” advised Gary Neville that if he touched his team-mate Robert Pires, that he would come after him. When Neville mentioned this to Roy Keane, the United captain confronted Vieira in the tunnel, informing him that he would “see you out there!” and that he should “shut his f****** mouth”. It took several players standing in front of Keane to prevent him getting at Vieira – it certainly would have been interesting to see what would have happened if the spoilsports hadn’t got in their way, and just let them have a scrap.
As the teams lined up on the pitch before the match, Vieira couldn’t find anyone to shake hands with – oddly enough except Gary Neville (you won’t intimidate a Bury lad, Patrick). My thoughts on this pre-match incident were that the Arsenal captain was trying to get back the fire in his belly, which seemed to have disappeared in the aftermath of Vieira turning down the opportunity to become one of Real Madrid’s “Galactico’s” the previous summer.
Vieira, determined to attempt to hog the limelight, put Arsenal ahead after eight minutes, getting in front of Gabriel Heinze to head home a corner. The lead lasted just ten minutes, with a poor clearance from Sol Campbell finding its way to Paul Scholes, who lofted a typically brilliant ball over to Wayne Rooney, who cut the ball back for Ryan Giggs to fire into the bottom corner, thanks in part to a deflection off Ashley Cole.
Arsenal took the lead once again ten minutes before the interval, as Thierry Henry superbly controlled a long ball, turned and fed a simple pass through to Dennis Bergkamp, who slotted it through Roy Carroll’s legs with typical aplomb, the type of cool finish we had come to expect from him.
In the second half, United took the game to Arsenal and levelled the score with a fantastic counter attack in the 54th minute. Rooney, upon receiving Darren Fletcher’s pass, turned and played a lovely forward pass to Giggs, who played an equally brilliant ball through to the advancing Cristano Ronaldo for the Portuguese winger to slot a beautifully placed shot past Manuel Almunia in the Arsenal goal. Ronaldo, cocky as ever, made a lovely point of celebrating his goal by telling the Arsenal fans to “shush”.
Just four minutes later, Giggs set up Ronaldo again, as Almunia went walkabout in his own area, the Welshman outpaced Vieira and slid the ball across the unguarded goalmouth, for Ronaldo knock the ball into the net, and then fall into it himself (as long as it goes in, Ronny, as long as it goes in!). Again, he advised the Arsenal fans to keep quiet, and got a yellow card for his troubles.
The game reached another boiling point with just over twenty minutes to go, from a very unlikely source. United’s French defender Mikaël Silvestre chose that particular moment to earn the only red card of his Old Trafford career, head-butting Freddie Ljungberg.
Arsenal rallied but United held their nerve and, with two minutes remaining, added a sublime fourth. Paul Scholes, after receiving a pass from Louis Saha, fed a lovely through ball to John O’Shea (who had, for some reason, wandered into the Arsenal penalty area) and the Irish international defender lofted a lovely chip over Almunia, and walked away with an almost Eric Cantona-like arrogance in his celebration, as though he did that sort of thing every week – either way it was a goal fit to win any game of football, and certainly a great way to crown a fantastic advert for the Premier League.
AFTERMATH
There was no post match brawl in this match, the fight, it seemed, had been taken out of Arsenal by United’s more-than-spirited performance – and not just on the night. The defence of their Premier League title virtually collapsed after that, allowing Chelsea a free run at the title. Although the result meant United overtook the Gunners in second place, the Red Devils’ inconsistent season continued, and they eventually finished third.
The two teams would meet again in the FA Cup Final a few months later – a match which, to this day, no United fan can believe we lost, after having twenty shots to Arsenal’s five (their only shot on target didn’t come until extra time). On another day, van Nistelrooy would have emulated George Best and bagged a double Hat Trick. The match finished 0 – 0 after extra time and went to penalties. Paul Scholes missed his spot kick, and although Keane, Rooney and Ronaldo all scored theirs, Arsenal didn’t miss a single one.
The cup was won when Patrick Vieira scored the final penalty, which turned out to be his last kick for the club – he transferred to Juventus that summer. In November of that year, following his now-infamous MUTV outburst, Roy Keane departed Manchester United by mutual consent, joining Celtic in the January 2006 Transfer Window.
In the following seasons, the rivalry between the two clubs became more and more diluted, almost as if Keane and Vieira had been the only ones keeping it going as new faces were brought into both clubs. Ray Parlour, Martin Keown, Nwankwo Kanu and Sylvain Wiltoord, had left the club the previous summer. Tony Adams had retired in 2002 and by 2007, Robert Pirès, Freddie Ljungberg and Dennis Bergkamp had all left the club, and their replacements, however talented, just did not have the “nasty” factor of their predecessors.
It’s also worth noting that Arsenal haven’t really provided a convincing title challenge since Vieira left, as Chelsea, and later Manchester City, provided new challenges which the Gunners never really rose to – we’ll forget about William Gallas’s advertising board-kicking hissy fit at Birmingham City in 2008, which is probably the only season they have come anywhere near it since.
When Manchester United and Arsenal were England’s best two teams (between 1996 and 2004, they were the only two teams to lift the title), the fire was there. Whoever got the best from the games between the two would usually go on to lift the title.
Although we have seen it kick off in matches involving Chelsea, United, Arsenal, City and Liverpool in recent years, there’s nothing that even comes close to the on-pitch rivalry shared by these two sets of players, and I haven’t even mentioned the rivalry between Fergie and Wenger - we’ll save that for another time, surely that deserves an article all of its own?
A lot is made of the rivalry between United and Liverpool, always the first fixture I look for at the start of the season, and of course the derby games against City. But for a few years, when these two were the undisputed top dogs in England, this game became more important than anything to a lot of Reds. It usually decided the destiny of the title. You have to wonder if we’ll ever see that sort of long term rivalry between two sets of players ever again.
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