I'm struggling to remember the last time I saw us play Man United at Old Trafford, but there's been some good ones down the years for sure. I was there when we lost to them in the old first division and George Best scored that wonder goal. That was an amazing day out for me as young kid. I've never seen so many football fans in one place and there were thousands more locked outside.
I remember us playing them at Old Trafford back in 2007. Sod's law I couldn't go because I was working. In fact, I was working in the US in the head office near Philadelphia. They are 5 hours behind us of course, so the match was due to kick off mid-afternoon US time - right in the middle of my working day. I kept looking at my watch over lunch, wishing I could find a way to watch it. Then just after lunch, my colleague said, "we're all going to be in a meeting this afternoon, it's about US business, you're welcome to come but it's probably not going to be that relevant to you, so just find yourself a workspace and do your own thing if you like".
I bet you know what's coming next?
I thought, "opportunity!". If they were all going to be holed up in a meeting all afternoon, I might as well get out the office and find somewhere to watch the game, they're obviously not going to miss me! So I checked out the internet for sports bars in Philly, I phoned one up and asked if they were planning to have the game on, and when they said yes, I shot out the office like a bolt, jumped in my hire car and drove the 20 miles or so from the office into Philly centre.
I don't remember a lot about the game other than, we'd been given no chance of getting a result and I don't think we'd been playing well up to that point. Luton Shelton was in the starting line-up for us. I thought it was going to be a mauling. In fact, we lost (2-0?) but we played very good for most of it and Shelton should have had a penalty - he tore them a new one!
There are some similarities perhaps with tonight's game. We come into on the back of a little spell where we just haven't played well at all. We've got a weakened team and I don't know of anyone in their right mind, apart from Stretch, who thinks we can get a result. But football is a strange game. A game of skill, effort and luck. I don't think we can beat Man Utd on the first of those, but if we can get back to putting in the usual 100% effort for the entire match, and have a little bit of luck go our way, you just never know.
v. 
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