Reserves: United 1 Villa 4: Brilliant Bannan ruins Bebé’s big day out

September 16th 2010, 7pm
Moss Lane, Altrincham

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Manchester United Reserves	1-4	Aston Villa Reserves

Ajose 78		Bannan 6, 43, 90 (pen)
		Clark 37

 
The spotlight was firmly on Bebé as United got their league campaign underway, but it was Villa who took the points and their Scotland U21 midfielder Barry Bannan who grabbed the headlines as the visitors avenged their penalty shoot-out defeat in last season’s Premier Reserve League national play-off with a comprehensive 4-1 win at Moss Lane.

Bannan struck twice in the first half, a superb early free-kick and audacious 43rd minute chip sandwiching an assist for defender Ciaran Clark as the Villans took a commanding lead into the interval. United improved after the break and substitute Nick Ajose gave the Reds a glimmer of hope with just over ten minutes remaining, but Bannan secured the victory and possession of the match ball from the penalty spot after a Villa counter-attack ended with Nathan Delfouneso tumbling under Oliver Gill’s challenge.

Reserves kick off new campaign with Villa rematch

The fixtures for the revamped FA Premier Reserve League have been released and United will get their campaign underway with a rematch against their beaten opponents in last season’s national play-off, Aston Villa.

2008/09 Reserves fixtures announced

Hot on the heels of the academy fixtures being released, the reserve team’s schedule for the forthcoming season has been announced on manutd.com.

The campaign gets underway with a home fixture against Blackburn Rovers on September 18th at the Marstons Arena, home to Blue Square Premier side Northwich Victoria and, for a second season, United’s reserves. The first mini-derby comes on October 21st at the Regional Athletics Arena, with City making the return trip to Northwich on February 26th (new reserve boss Ole Solskjaer’s birthday, for those fond of fairly pointless trivia). Clashes with reigning champions Liverpool (don’t hear that said often) fall on November 6th (home) and March 10th (away).

The most interesting aspect of the fixtures announcement is the slight increase in the number of games, up from 18 last season to 20 this year. This is due to a slightly bizarre rejigging of the two Premier Reserve League divisions. All three teams relegated from the Premier League last season (Reading, Derby and Birmingham City) played in the PRL South, but while promoted West Bromwich Albion and Stoke City take the place of two of those sides, Hull City have been placed in the PRL North, boosting that division to 11 teams and leaving the Southern section with just nine.

There’s been no official reasoning given by this, but it seems likely that it’s purely geographical – placing Hull in the southern half wouldn’t have worked logistically, and that pretty much applies to all 11 teams in the northern section, with probably the two Merseyside clubs being the southernmost. Whatever the reasoning, a couple of extra games can only be good news for United and all the northern clubs.

You can view the full reserves fixture list here. The second string get their pre-season programme underway this Saturday with a game against Blue Square North outfit Burscough – we’ll have a short preview up soon and full coverage of the match up on Saturday evening.