Manchester United has endured tremendous pressure to maintain the suspension of the world most precious is still ahead and open the English football season with problems in attack.
Soon the joy caused by Cristiano Ronaldo's decision to stay with United will be felt when the Premier League champion takes in the FA Cup winner Portsmouth in the Community Shield on Sunday without their two most potent weapons.
Ronaldo, who finally confirmed this week that he was staying with United despite the public interest from Real Madrid, is out until October because of an ankle surgery. Wayne Rooney is on the sidelines after having contracted a virus in a pre-season visit to Nigeria.
Added to this, reserve striker Louis Saha has not played in the United pre-season and has been linked with a transfer to Paris Saint-Germain or Sunderland.
This means that Carlos Tevez, who scored what turned out to be the winning goal when the teams met in a friendly match in Nigeria's tour, probably the fulcrum of United's attack in the 90000-seat stadium. "It's a concern," said United manager Alex Ferguson. "Wayne probably miss the start of the season and Louis Saha's future is undecided at this time. It's left us a bit short up front."
United will be without Rooney for the start of the Premier League season at home to Newcastle next weekend, and must be ruing their inclusion in the trip to Africa, especially bearing in mind that not even play in Abuja, due to troubled leg. Lack of fire Ferguson could lead to increase their efforts to sign Dimitar Berbatov from Tottenham, which has already rejected an approach for the Bulgaria international.
That surely will not happen in time for him to play at Wembley, but at least you know that United can beat Pompey attack without its two stars. And although the game is essentially a mutual agreement - one that United won last year by a penalty shootout victory over Chelsea - United may feel they have unfinished business with Portsmouth.
United won the Champions League and the Premier League last season, but was denied the opportunity to emulate his only triple of Portsmouth 1999, when it gained a surprise 1-0 win at Old Trafford to draw the home side of the FA Cup . Manchester United will make its 12 th appearance in the tournament for 16 years. Portsmouth has not been in the party - which until six years ago was known as the Charity Shield - the second since their victories over Wolves in 1949.
But even with such inexperience, the line Portsmouth is the man who has the goal of victory in the Community Shield only two years ago. Peter Crouch scored a 80th minute header to give Liverpool a 2-1 victory over Chelsea in 2006 but moved to Portsmouth last month in a transfer and is likely to line up alongside fellow England striker Jermain Defoe."I have good memories of the Community Shield," said Crouch. "A few months earlier, in the FA Cup final against West Ham, scored and obtained improperly rejected by offside. So it was nice to offset that."
The football associations decided Thursday to change the referee for the match, the appointment of Peter Walton after deciding to investigate complaints of alleged debts owed by companies linked to the original choice Mark Clattenburg. "It's in the best interest of Mark Clattenburg and the game that these reports are fully investigated and, during that time, he did not match any referee," said Professional Game Match Officials Limited, which provides referees for the FA. "Mark Clattenburg's leading referees in England and hopefully resolve this issue quickly."
Clattenburg not take over any other matches until the investigation is complete.
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