United extend lead at top of reserve league

Last updated : 19 February 2010 By Tony Scholes
Steven Thompson
Steven Thompson - our only home (Accrington) goakscorer this season
Fielding a strong side at Altrincham, United's goals came in the last few minutes of the first half. In the 44th minute, with Everton very much the better side, United escaped when an effort hit the post with Ben Foster beaten. The ball ricocheted out and eventually found Anderson who went on a storming run before finding Mame Biram Diouf who hit a low left foot shot into the corner.

Into stoppage time at the end of the first half and Cameron Stewart was played in and from the edge of the box the winger drilled another low shot and this beat the keeper to his left.

It ended a week that had seen a full set of fixtures, well almost with our game at Accrington the only one not to be given the go ahead.

The week had started on the Monday with Bolton going down to a 2-1 home defeat to Hull City. It was a youthful Bolton side, and they fell behind in the first half when Kamil Ghilas gave Hull the lead. Nicky Featherstone headed on a long ball up the field from goalkeeper Matt Duke and Ghilas was first onto it to score from close range.

Zoltan Harsanyi equalised early in the second half when he squeezed a shot through the goalkeeper's legs and a draw looked very much on the cards until Amr Zaki won it for Hull with two minutes to go when he converted a Ghilas cross.

It was a North West derby on Tuesday, with Blackburn travelling to Robin Park to play Wigan, and they had no problems in securing a comfortable win against the bottom team.

Blackburn went ahead mid-way through the first half when Maceo Rigters was on hand to head home a right wing cross from Amine Linganzi, and right on half time the pair combined again to double the lead. This time Rigters got clear to run onto a through ball from Linganzi.

The third and final goal saw roles reversed with the pair playing a one-two before this time it was Linganzi who finished.

Manchester City reserves hadn't lost since we beat them at the Athletics Arena back in October, but that run came to an end with a bizarre stoppage time goal in their home game against Sunderland.

It looked odds on a home win when Alex Nimely stormed through early in the game only to be brought down in the box by Sunderland captain Michael Kay. Andrew Tutte placed the penalty in the bottom corner.

By half time City should have had it wrapped up but missed a host of chances. Seven minutes into the second half they paid the price. Andrew Reed played the ball in for David Dowson who hit a screamer that City keeper David Gonzales couldn't hold and it flew into the top corner to bring Sunderland level.

It proved to be Sunderland's only intentional shot on target throughout the entire game, but they won it right at the death. In the first minute of stoppage time the ball was played back to Gonzales whose kick up field got no height and hit Dowson's heel.

The horrified goalkeeper could only look on in dismay as the ball agonisingly trickled into the net just inside the post to give Sunderland all three points.

We've supposedly got a full set of fixtures next week, but time will tell whether Accrington will be able to stage our home game against Manchester City. Below are this week's results and the next fixtures, along with the leading goalscorers.

This Week's Results

Monday 15th February

Bolton 1 Hull 2

Tuesday 16th February
Wigan 0 Blackburn 3

Wednesday 17th February
Manchester City 1 Sunderland 2

Thursday 18th February
Manchester United 2 Everton 0

Postponed Games
Burnley v Liverpool

Next Week's Fixtures

Tuesday 23rd February

Everton v Bolton
Hull v Wigan
Sunderland v Liverpool

Wednesday 24th February
Blackburn v Manchester United
Burnley v Manchester City

Leading Goalscorers

8: Ryan Noble (Sunderland)
6: David Ball (Manchester City), Danny Ward (Bolton)
5: James Poole (Manchester City)
4: Mame Biram Diouf (Manchester United), Nathan Eccleston (Liverpool), Magnus Eikrem (Manchester United), Robert Mak (Manchester City), Roy O'Donovan (Sunderland), Zoran Tosic (Manchester United)

Burnley

3: Steven Thompson
2: Jay Rodriguez
1: Wes Fletcher, Martin Paterson, Joe McKee