FA Thank United 'Fans'

The Football Association has thanked Manchester United's incredible supporters. For the second time in six weeks the international hordes who wend their way to Old Trafford each fortnight evacuated Wembley in record time.

The Event Safety Management Team were delighted at the fact that their end of the stadium was empty once again within four minutes of the final whistle, a full FIVE minutes sooner than is required by the Safety Certificate.

So despite their team not even being second best in last night's Champions League Final, Manchester United once again got one over on their rivals by at least breaking another record. An unbelievable achievement in such adversity.

So what does this prove? It proves as we all know that those providing the tourist treasure trove in Stretford are not football fans. They are probably not even United fans. There are simply the transient product of following success. And when the success is not there, then sadly neither are they. Maybe they'll in the queue to become 'socios' of the 'equipo azulgrana' at the Camp Nou next season.

The Green and Golders, having had much of their steam taken away from them following the emergence of the blue and white juggernaut have defaulted to calling us because we allegedly and frequently have '20000 empty seats'. Well, dear unfortunates at least we support our team no matter what life throws at us.

Their achievements of winning the Premier League and getting to the Champions League final are astonishing, but who was there to offer applause when the outplayed, out-thought and frankly weary and destroyed players trooped up the stairs to receive their runners-up accolades? Much more than 20000 empty seats.

The arrogance that pervades Old Trafford was well and truly slapped in the face when Barcelona played them off every park in London. How Van der Sar must hate going down to Yaya's favourite set of goal posts just after half time. At least he won't have to do it again.

What it did show however was how much more will need to be done at Eastlands if City are to anything like try to emulate the style of football delivered by the world's best Club team last night. If Sheikh Mansour was amongst the 300 million watching the live broadcasts, he must have looking in his piggy bank by 9.45pm.

As we saw in the FA Cup, if the draw is kind to you, getting to the final is attainable as the other top teams knock themselves out. But if you come up against true class, you are going to come up short and empty. The Stretford Green and Golders certainly discovered that to their detriment last night. How on earth did they strut around believing they could win? They hardly saw the ball all night. Their manager said he thought he'd learned from their mistakes two years ago. Did he think Barcelona would stand still?

I always remember watching Rugby League matches between GB & Australia and the management group would always say that they needed to become more like the Kangaroos. The GB would improve significantly, then along would come Australia who had also moved up to another level and we would be back to square one. That's what the world witnessed at Wembley last night.

There's only one Hernandez...Xavi

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