Rooney remorseful as United held in Champions League

Munich’s Mario Gomez scored the only goal of the match in the last minute to wrap up a victory against Inter Milan.

MARSEILLE: After wins for three of the four English teams left in the Champions League, Manchester United failed to keep up their side of the bargain with a dreary 0-0 draw at Marseille on Wednesday.

The result leaves their last-16 tie finely poised ahead of the return leg in Manchester on March 15 and United may feel concerned by their failure to create any clear-cut chances of note at Stade Velodrome.

The low-quality fare on show at the home of the French champions was in stark contrast to the performances produced by United’s Premier League counterparts Arsenal and Tottenham in their respective last-16 first-leg ties. Spurs, Champions League debutants, executed a masterful smash-and-grab to beat AC Milan 1-0 in the San Siro, while Arsenal came from behind to defeat the all-conquering Barcelona 2-1 in a thrilling game in north London.

Chelsea also have one foot in the last-eight following a 2-0 win at FC Copenhagen on Tuesday and Rooney sympathised with any fans who had tuned in with high hopes to watch United.

“I can imagine,” he said, when told by journalists that the match had not made scintillating viewing for armchair fans. “I watched both Tottenham and Arsenal games. They were great games and it’s great to see Tottenham doing well in Europe.”

Despite the disappointing nature of Wednesday’s draw, Rooney said the onus was not on United to produce an all-out attacking performance in the second leg.

“I hope we do, but we’ll just look to get the win. At this stage of the competition, the win is the most important thing, however you do it.”

In the absence of the injured Ryan Giggs, Rooney was asked to reprise the left-wing role he adopted during United’s run to the final in 2008-09.

“Obviously, when you’re played out wide it is quite difficult to adjust if you haven’t played there for a while but we’ve got injuries at the moment so if I have to do that, there’s no problem with that.”

Van Gaal surprised by Inter’s attacking attitude

Bayern Munich coach Louis van Gaal admitted he was surprised by Inter Milan’s attacking style as his side snatched a crucial 1-0 victory at the San Siro.

Mario Gomez scored the only goal of the game in the last minute after Inter’s Brazilian goal-keeper Julio Cesar had failed to hold Arjen Robben’s stinging shot. It was sweet revenge for the Germans after their defeat to Inter in the final in Madrid nine months ago and Van Gaal insisted they were clear favourites to progress following the second leg in Munich in three weeks time.

“I was very surprised by Inter’s performance, they wanted to win the game,” he said. “It was a very good game, very attractive and everyone can be happy. It must have pleased everyone. Of course we have a better chance of progressing because we scored an away goal but Inter have a lot of quality.

“They have a good team and although we dominated the second half, in the last 10 minutes they created many chances and that’s a sign of quality. We were lucky to score in the last minute but then again we could have scored before that. In the final Inter were less attacking but the result was different and here it was better for us.”

Return legs March 8

Barcelona v Arsenal

Shakhtar Donetsk v Roma



March 9

Schalke 04 v Valencia

Tottenham v AC Milan



March 15

Bayern Munich v Inter Milan

Man Utd v Marseille



March 16

Chelsea v FC Copenhagen

Real Madrid v Lyon

Published in The Express Tribune, February 25^th, 2011.