Man United 2 Spurs 3

By Mark Ogden

Clint Dempsey secured Tottenham Hotspur’s first league victory at Old Trafford since December 1989 as Manchester United suffered their second defeat of the campaign in a five-goal epic.
 

Having led 2-0 at half-time, Spurs appeared to be coasting to the points until a flurry of three goals in three minutes – the last coming from American forward Dempsey – ensured a late onslaught by Sir Alex Ferguson’s team.
 

But despite carving out a host of chances and hitting the woodwork twice, United, who ended the game with centre-half Jonny Evans limping heavily with a thigh problem, lost out.
 

Considering that Andre Villas-Boas had woken to tabloid headlines claiming that his Tottenham players were on the brink of revolt due to his ‘tiring’ training regime and supposedly negative tactics, a trip to Old Trafford was hardly likely to offer comfort.
 

A 3-1 defeat at this stadium last September was the first chapter in a catalogue of bad days for the Portuguese coach during his brief reign as Chelsea manager and that painful memory, combined with Tottenham’s 23-year winless league run at United, hinted at another difficult day for Villas-Boas.
 
But having gone unbeaten since an opening day defeat at Newcastle, Spurs are growing in confidence under the former Porto coach and their bold start against Ferguson’s team emphasised the new belief at White Hart Lane.
 
A quick glance at the United team-sheet would have done little to worry Spurs. With injury depriving the home side of captain Nemanja Vidic, the selection of veterans Ryan Giggs and Paul Scholes together in midfield also highlighted a glaring area of weakness in the red shirts.
 
Iconic figures that they are, Giggs and Scholes are no longer the dominating forces they were a decade ago. Both can change games when introduced as substitutes against tiring legs, but against the pace, power and relative youth of Bale and Moussa Dembele, Ferguson’s selection was an accident waiting to happen.
 
In fairness, neither were culpable for Vertonghen’s second minute opener, but the Belgian full-back was somehow given a free run through the centre of the pitch before scoring.
 
Vertonghen, a rangy a left-back signed from Ajax in the summer, brushed past Nani and Rio Ferdinand during his 40-yard run before seeing his shot deflected into the net off the sprawling body of Jonny Evans.
 
It was a stunning goal by Vertonghen, but an awful one for United to concede. Their protection of the back-four was simply non-existent.
 
And so it continued. Six minutes later, Clint Dempsey was left unmarked to shoot narrowly wide from 20 yards.
 
United, with a fit-again Wayne Rooney named on the substitutes’ bench, were flat and lacking in imagination and, on a rare occasion when they entered the Spurs penalty area, Robin van Persie earned himself a bruising whack on the ankle from William Gallas which resulted in lengthy treatment for the United forward.
 
Spurs were simply too strong for United in the middle of the pitch and Dembele, a summer-long target for United prior to his move to Spurs from Fulham, showed why Ferguson should have lavished some of Old Trafford’s money on the Belgian by dominating the game.
 
It was Dembele’s pass to Bale, two yards from the halfway line, which led to the Welsh midfielder – mistakenly referred to as Christian Bale, the Hollywood actor, by Ferguson on ESPN prior to kick-off – scoring Tottenham’s second.
 
Bale burst into the wide-open spaces in front of him and brutally exposed Ferdinand’s lack of pace by gliding past the former England captain before guiding a right-foot shot past goalkeeper Anders Lindegaard.
 
Ferguson might have added a gilt-edge to his attacking options by signing Van Persie and Shinji Kagawa this summer, but he inexplicably overlooked the midfield problems which Tottenham laid bare.
 
With his team being over-run, Ferguson withdrew Giggs at the interval and replaced him with Rooney, whose introduction injected energy and purpose into United.
 
The added threat posed by the England forward also forced Spurs to check their cavalier attacking, but once Nani pulled one back for United, with a deft near-post finish from Rooney’s 51st minute cross, the game opened up dramatically.
 
Within sixty seconds, Spurs responded to Nani’s strike by regaining their two-goal through Clint Dempsey following another example of Ferdinand’s vulnerability when defending against pace.
 
The United defender should have shepherded Jermain Defoe down the line, but the striker outfoxed Ferdinand and laid off to Bale, whose strike was only palmed away by Lindegaard into the path of Dempsey, who buried the rebound from six yards.
 
But just as Dempsey had taken the wind out of United’s sails, Kagawa did the same for Spurs by scoring United’s second within a minute.
 
The Japanese midfielder, a peripheral figure for much of the game, sent a left-foot shot in off the far post after escaping Kyle Walker to latch onto Van Persie’s pass in Spurs penalty area.
 
Spurs now did not know whether to stick or twist, but they chose to stick and invite United forward. It proved a dangerous tactic.
 
Kagawa was denied another strike on goal by a robust Walker tackle before Rooney rattled Brad Friedel’s right-hand post with a 20-yard free-kick.
 
Van Persie then wasted a glorious chance to equalise on 69 minutes when he scuffed wide from close range after being free by Michael Carrick.
 
Spurs continued to concede space and Nani forced an important save from Friedel with a powerful right-foot strike, as did Scholes.
 
As the clock ticked down, Carrick headed against the Spurs bar, but Villas-Boas’s team held on for the points and win they deserved. /Telegraph