PLAYER RATINGS

Given: 8 - Did what he needed to do well.Top class keeper

Hughes: 8 - Best performance for us for some time. Got foward well and defended well

Woodgate: 10 - Absolute class.won EVERYTHING in the air and had van Nistelrooy in his pocket

O'Brien: 8.5 - Battered and bruised but did his job excellently

Bernard: 7 - Didnt do much wrong

Solano: 8 - Hard working performance,tracked back well,why was he subbed

Speed: 7 - Quiet but hard-working display

Jenas: 8 - Had a good game,worked hard,tackled and very unlucky not to score

Robert: 6 - Poor game by his high standards.Set pieces were dreadful

Dyer: 7 - Tried hard but struggled to get involved

Shearer: 7.5 - the usual battling performance

Bryan Mulhall

---

An ignored penalty claim against Newcastle striker Alan Shearer and a Mikael Silvestre goal disallowed formed the base of Newcastle's 0-0 draw at Old Trafford.

Jermaine Jenas came closest to breaking the deadlock in the 56th minute when his header came back off the crossbar.

After 26 minutes, Shearer reached an under-hit Gary Neville back pass before goalkeeper Tim Howard took him down. To his (and my) surprise, the referee (Paul Durkin) waved play on!

However, the referee later admitted that he was WRONG about the penalty descision, following an "ask the ref" comment from Shearer.

A storm of protest from travelling Magpies' fans followed, along with skipper Shearer racing 40 yards to make his point clear too.

The game was totally out of character, as the Magpies carried just about all of the threat upfront.

Reds defender John O'Shea headed away a Laurent Robert free-kick before Silvestre did even better to block a piledriver from Jonathan Woodgate.

Diego Forlan for Ryan Giggs arrived on the pitch for the home side at half-time, but neither could get a goal. O'Shea and Kleberson both failed to deliver decent crosses from wide positions.

The game was full of chances, as Gary Speed clipped a Forlan cross away from danger under pressure from Ruud van Nistelrooy.

Silvestre put the ball in the net on 65 minutes following a Kleberson corner - but he debatably "shoved" Newcastle's Andy O'Brien and had the goal disallowed.

It took Irish 'keeper Shay Given two attempts to save a Paul Scholes shot, before Diego Forlan forced another full-length stop from the Newcastle goalkeeper (after Gary Speed gave possession away).

Rio Ferdinand did brilliantly to stop Laurent Robert in the closing stages and Silvestre did equally well to stop Kieron Dyer's progress.

Matthew Jones

What do YOU think? Post a message on our forum!