Wednesday, 21st October 2009 – KO: 17:30

An unusual kick-off time for this one in order to cater for the Russian TV audience which somehow just won’t be the same for us Brits but there you go.

Onto the match…

As I have said on this site before, Fergie’s formula for success in the Champions League Group Stage has always been to win the home games and get what he can from the away games.

Whilst neither performance has been particularly convincing, we have won each of our opening two games by a solitary goal and we currently sit top of the group. The “bonus points” probably came from our away win against Besiktas.

A win here tonight would put us within touching distance of qualification from the group phase (we would probably need one more point from the remaining three games to be sure).

Personally, I think a draw is the more likely result here tonight and would probably be considered more than acceptable.

CSKA Moscow have a very good record at home and have won their last six European matches at the Luzhniki Stadium.

Apparently they like to play a 4-5-1 formation, hoping to hit teams on the counter, even when at home, which could be interesting because that is often the way we play European ties away from home.

I have been mulling over this one quite a bit for the last couple of days and whilst I cannot see a CSKA Moscow win here, I cannot quite decide whether we will win or draw. The value in such a situation would lie with opting for the draw here but I do still have a slight bias towards a United win.

Much could depend on how we start here tonight. We have scored a couple of very early goals in our recent games as we have come flying out of the traps but away from home in Europe against a counter-attacking side, Fergie might be more cautious in his approach.

CSKA Moscow need the points more than we do here tonight and it may be that it will be up to US to soak up a bit of pressure and hit THEM on the counter.

Given the two similar styles and formations, it would not surprise me if we cancelled each other out a lot in this one with perhaps a solitary goal for either side deciding the outcome.

I just have a strong feeling that this is not going to be a high scoring game.

The bet is 4 points UNDER 2.5 Goals @ 1.72 with Stan James.

I think this one went pretty much according to plan.

We were in control for the vast majority of the game although, of course, as you would expect when playing a decent team on their own ground, they did have their moments and even had the ball in the back of the net which was luckily (although correctly) ruled offside.

As the game wore on, particularly in the second half, it was as though the United players realised that they had seen just about the best that CSKA had to offer and decided to actually go for the three points rather than settle for the single point.

The wide men, Valencia and Nani, came inside a lot more to make a more spear-headed attack and offer some more support to the lone front-man, Berbatov.

As full time drew ever closer we kept on piling on the pressure until eventually the goal came from Valencia for his second United goal ever (and in successive games).

United won 1-0, the bet never really looked in danger and we are now officially one point away from certain qualification from the group stage.

A great day.