Manchester U 1 Reading 0

Wayne Rooney

Man­chester Uni­ted 1 Read­ing 0, Old Traf­ford, Eng­lish Pre­mier Lea­gue, Mar­ch 16, 2013. Man­chester Uni­ted ma­naged to edge out Read­ing 1-0 thanks to a bril­liant goal from Way­ne Roo­ney in the 21st min­ute of the tie. Sir Al­ex Ferguson´s Pre­miership chasers now on­ly need­ed to win an­oth­er thir­teen points to guar­an­tee them­selves the Pre­mier Lea­gue trophy.

Fol­low­ing a dis­ap­point­ing 2-2 FA Cup Quart­er-Fi­nal draw ag­ainst long­time rivals Chel­sea at Old Traf­ford, it was back to the bread and but­ter of the Pre­mier Lea­gue for Man­chester Uni­ted as they took on Read­ing at Old Traf­ford. High-fly­ing Man­chester Uni­ted had beaten South­ampton, Ful­ham, Ever­ton, Queens Park Ran­gers, and Nor­wich City in their pre­vi­ous five Pre­mier Lea­gue fix­tures, whi­le re­leg­a­tion can­did­ates Read­ing had ma­naged to over­come Sun­der­land, and lost ag­ainst Sto­ke City, Wi­gan Ath­let­ic, Ever­ton, and As­ton Vil­la. In the re­verse en­counter of the 2012-13 sea­son, Uni­ted had de­feated The Roy­als of Berkshire to the merry tune of 4-3 at Madejski Sta­dium on the 1st of Dec­ember 2012 cour­tesy of a double by Way­ne Roo­ney and a goal apiece from Olivi­era An­der­son and Robin van Per­sie. And in their last meet­ing on the 18th of Feb­ruary 2013, Sir Al­ex Ferguson´s lads had edged out Read­ing by a 2-1 mar­gin at Old Traf­ford in the fifth ro­und of the FA Cup thanks to sec­ond ha­lf goals by Lu­is Nani and Javi­er Her­nandez re­spect­ively. This time ar­ound, tho­ugh, a single goal from Roo­ney was enough to over­come the The Bis­cuit­men at The Theatre of Dreams.

Man­chester Uni­ted dom­in­ated the pos­ses­sion of the ball from the start and the ho­me te­am ev­entually went in­to the lead in the 21st min­ute of pro­ceed­ings when for­mer Eng­land de­fender Rio Fer­dinand went on a long run up­field be­fore he sent the ball to Way­ne Roo­ney who ham­mered ho­me to re­cord his sev­enth goal in eight ga­mes at Old Traf­ford in 2013. Af­ter the break, Robin van Per­sie came clo­se three min­utes pa­st the hour ma­rk, but his well ex­ecuted from 25 yards out was saved by Read­ing goal­keeper Stu­art Tay­lor. Dur­ing the clos­ing sta­ges, Waz­za was once more the danger man as he went on to try a shot wi­th five min­utes left, on­ly to see his ef­fort go slightly over the cross­bar. Af­ter de­feat­ing Read­ing 1-0, Man­chester Uni­ted now topped the Pre­mier Lea­gue ta­ble wi­th 74 points gain­ed from 29 mat­ches played, 15 points clear of sec­ond pla­ced Man­chester City, 19 in front of Chel­sea in third po­s­i­tion, and 20 ahead of Tot­ten­ham Hot­spur in fourth spot. Man­chester Uni­ted Te­am: Da­vid de Gea, Al­ex­an­der Buttner, Chris Small­ing, Ne­manja Vid­ic, Rio Fer­dinand, Ry­an Gig­gs, Ash­ley Young, Dan­ny Wel­beck, Oli­veira An­der­son, Way­ne Roo­ney, Robin van Per­sie. Sub­stitutes: An­tonio Va­lencia, Jon­athan Evans, Mi­chael Car­rick, Shinji Ka­gawa, Nick Pow­ell, Javi­er Her­nandez, An­ders Linde­gaard. Read­ing Te­am: Stu­art Tay­lor, Ad­ri­an Mari­appa, Al­ex Pe­arce, Steph­en Kel­ly, Mikele Lei­ger­t­wood, Nicky Shor­ey, Jem Karacan, Jobi McAnuff, Gar­ath Mc­Cle­ary, Noel Hunt, Hal Rob­son-Kanu. Sub­stitutes: Sean Mor­ris­on, Chris Gun­ter, Ian Harte, Hope Ak­pan, Nick Black­man, Ad­am Le Fon­dre, Al­ex McCarthy.

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