Casemiro scores a ‘bizarre fluke’ as Wayne Rooney gets all ‘cryptic’ about Man Utd

Another Man Utd victory brings another round of Man Utd nonsense in the media, where Casemiro’s winner is discredited and Wayne Rooney is click-baited.

Fluke who’s talking
We know how The Sun‘s main man Dave Kidd feels about Erik ten Hag; we covered that extensively in Mediawatch last month.

He then went to Luton desperate for a Hatters win and tried to wrestle the narrative into Manchester United being let off by the officials, and now you can positively taste how disappointed he was to see them win late at Nottingham Forest.

IT might sound like a proper ‘glory, glory Man United’ moment – an 89th-minute winner to settle a tense FA Cup tie.

But the decisive goal from Casemiro had an element of bizarre fluke, after another horribly flat performance from Erik ten Hag’s side.

‘Bizarre fluke’? He headed home a Bruno Fernandes free-kick. Manchester United might have been poor but that goal was not a ‘bizarre fluke’. And it was their 20th attempt on goal of the night. It was hardly a shock that one of them eventually went in.

Kidd certainly had it in for Casemiro, writing: ‘Taiwo Awoniyi, a serious threat through the middle, had an angled shot repelled by Andre Onana and there was plenty of sloppiness in United’s midfield, where rumours of Casemiro’s “legs going” were looking pretty accurate.’

Which is pretty odd as Graham Hill – tasked with doing the player ratings for The Sun – gave Casemiro 8/10 and wrote: ‘Kept a cool head under pressure during the game – and was there to use his head when it mattered most at the end.

‘Produced a steady, solid display and stepped up his game whenever Forest looked more of a threat.’

It’s almost like he didn’t have an agenda.

READ: £89m flop Pogba 15th and Rice 2nd in ranking of all 20 Premier League clubs’ record signings

Cheeky guys
You know what is truly bizarre? The top story on the Sun football page on Thursday morning:

Wayne Rooney gives cheeky smile as he cryptically reveals ‘we all know changes are coming’ at Man Utd

Are we supposed to think that means Wayne bloody Rooney is taking over at Manchester United? ‘Cheeky smile’? When does a smile become ‘cheeky’? When you want to suggest something preposterous. Obviously.

‘Cryptically’? We all sodding know that there are going to be changes coming at Manchester United; they are literally overhauling their whole sporting structure.

Rooney has no insight; there is nothing ‘cryptic’ about saying there will be changes at a club very publicly making changes.

And as usual, where one leads, others follow in the Mirror:

Wayne Rooney sets his sights on Man Utd job after dropping cryptic Jim Ratcliffe hint

Honestly, if these people think this sh*t is cryptic, they’re going to have a rude awakening if they try one of those batsh*t crosswords.

Ranted
But somebody from The Sun was clearly watching the BBC coverage very closely because…

Alan Shearer lays into Marcus Rashford in 40-second rant live on BBC and even Man Utd fans think he is ‘spot on’

Or not that closely because the audio included by The Sun clearly shows Shearer talking calmly for 30 seconds.

He did not ‘speak or shout at length in an angry, impassioned way’. And it didn’t last 40 seconds. Other than that, an excellent story.

Standard issue
Rooney was a little more considered in his comments about Rashford, speaking at length as a very successful No.9 about what he can do to become a better goalscorer again.

So of course..

Wayne Rooney issues four-step guide to get Marcus Rashford firing again as Alan Shearer slams Manchester United star

Genuinely, when did speaking eloquently and intelligently on a subject become ‘issuing a four-step guide’? Do words no longer mean anything at all? Certainly not at talkSPORT, who also claim that ‘Mauricio Pochettino issued a witty response to Gary Neville’s strong label for his Chelsea squad.’

Sorry but did he f***.

Et tu Antony
Mediawatch really should move on from The Sun but what the actual f*** is this?

How Man Utd had a line-up worth £500MILLION that they couldn’t even use as Ten Hag’s miserable season continues

We will not linger too long on the notion that this line-up would be ‘worth £500MILLION’ as we all know the prices Manchester United pay for players is far, far removed from their ‘worth’.

READ MORE: Manchester United should learn from Arsenal and Arteta if they really want Antony ‘value’

But included among these players who Ten Hag ‘couldn’t even use’ v Fulham is Antony, who did actually get used for one minute, after all other options had been exhausted.

Also included are Donny van de Beek and Jadon Sancho, who Ten Hag ‘couldn’t even use’ because he has sent them on loan.

His miserable season really has continued. The poor sod.

Spotter’s badge
Mediawatch does not often spare a thought for the Manchester Evening News man Samuel Luckhurst but, having written a 900-word-plus colour piece from the City Ground, we can only assume that the sh*t-housing headline was not his choice:

I spotted Sir Alex Ferguson and Sir Dave Brailsford’s full-time reaction and scenes give Man United hope

Ludicrous headline.

It’s not a piece about Ferguson and Brailsford’s reaction and at no point does Luckhurst claim to have ‘spotted’ anything.

This is the sum total of those eagle-eyed observations, in the seventh paragraph of the piece:

This result was in keeping with United’s oscillating form, with a crisis staved off by a belated winner in front of the delighted Sir Alex Ferguson, who stood to applaud the players at full-time. Sir Dave Brailsford was still in the stands long after the matchgoers had vacated their seats, gesturing thoughtfully to a director.

Not sure how you ‘gesture thoughtfully’ but for now our sympathies lie with Luckhurst, until somebody tells us the headline was entirely his idea and then we will revert to our usual stance of thinking him a self-obsessed, shiny-suited [redacted].

No news is good news
Check out the Mirror for the latest on Xabi Alonso to Liverpool:

Xabi Alonso will have to change long-term plan if he opts to ignore Liverpool approach

In short: If Xabi Alonso turns down Liverpool, his long-term plan to manage Liverpool will have to change.

More as we get it.

READ: Erik ten Hag looks more Van Gaal than Fergie despite FA Cup heroics