Man United 2 Portsmouth 1
Manchester United 2 Portsmouth 1, Old Trafford, English FA Cup Fourth Round, January 27, 2007. After knocking out Aston Villa in the third round of the FA Cup, Manchester United beat Portsmouth 2-1 to reach the fifth round of the tournament. Wayne Rooney netted twice for The Reds before Nwankwo Kanu registered a late consolation goal for Pompey.
Manchester United had trashed Harry Redknapp´s Portsmouth 3–0 at Old Trafford in the previous encounter between the two Premier League teams and were clear favourites to beat the Fratton Park club. The Old Trafford faithful nevertheless had to wait until the minute 77th minute for the first goal of the game as Ole Gunnar Solskjaer replacement Wayne Rooney converted a low cross from Ryan Giggs. Rooney´s bravado surfaced again only six minutes later when the marksman beautifully lobbed the ball over Portsmouth shot stopper David James and into the top left corner of the net to hand Manchester United a 2-0 lead. Nigeria international Nwankwo Kanu, who had replaced fellow striker Andy Cole in the 62nd minute, managed to find the target for the South Coasters with three minutes left on the watch, but as no more goals followed the match ended with a 2-victory to the home side. Manchester United Team: Tomasz Kuszczak, Gary Neville, Nemanja Vidic, Rio Ferdinand, Patrice Evra, Michael Carrick, Ryan Giggs, Ji-sung Park, Paul Scholes, Henrik Larsson, Ole Gunnar Solskjaer. Substitutes: Wayne Rooney, Darren Fletcher, John O’Shea, Mikael Silvestre, Edwin van der Sar. Portsmouth: David James, Sol Campbell, Linvoy Primus, Glen Johnson, Laureano Bisan Etame-Mayer, Matthew Taylor, Richard Hughes, Niko Kranjcar, Gary O’Neil, Pedro Mendes, Andrew Cole. Substitutes: Nwankwo Kanu, Benjani Mwaruwari, Rudi Douala M’Bela, David Thompson, Jamie Ashdown.
Manchester United Quickfacts
Sir Alex Ferguson´s men reached the 2007 FA Cup Final only to lose 1-0 against Chelsea.
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