Manchester United and Everton met at Old Trafford in the first of Sunday's two highly-anticipated Barclay's Premier League matchups. Both teams were desperately in need of a win, but Everton had the added challenge of battling travel fatigue after playing in Russia on Thursday. In the end, United were better able to convert their chances and came away with both a 2-1 win and three critical points.
The first half was a testy affair, as two players from both teams received yellow cards amid a slew of fouls from both sides. Manchester United controlled much of the play and created the majority of the chances throughout the opening 45 minutes, and clearly looked the better side and were finally rewarded in the 27th minute. Midfielder Angel Di Maria took a beautiful feed from Juan Mata, and hammered an even better finish past Everton goalkeeper Tim Howard:
Everton had a golden opportunity to equalize seconds before halftime, as Tony Hibbert was taken down in the box by United's Luke Shaw, resulting in a penalty being awarded to the visitors. Leighton Baines-who had successfully converted all 14 of his Premier League penalty attempts in his career-stepped up to the spot, only to see his shot saved by Manchester United goalkeeper David De Gea:
United had history on their side to start the second half, having never lost at home in 228 Premier League games when leading at halftime (213 wins, 15 draws). After some dangerous early chances from United in the opening 10 minutes, it was Everton who scored the first goal of the second half. Baines shook off his penalty miss to strike a sensational cross, which was met by the onrushing Steven Naismith for an equalizing header:
It took barely over five minutes for United to pull back ahead, as new signing Radamel Falcao got his first goal for his new team, redirecting a mishit shot from Di Maria into the back of the net to give his team a 2-1 lead:
De Gea came up huge in the final 10 minutes of the game, making three tremendous saves to keep Everton at bay, none better than this one with just seconds to play:
In the end neither team played especially well, but the second half was a wide-open and entertaining affair that saw very good attacking chances generated from both sides. In the end, the home side got the three points they needed, and Everton were left to wonder what might have been had De Gea not played so brilliantly down the stretch.
