The English Community Shield match between Chelsea and Manchester United signified the start of the European season. The top football leagues of Europe will resume their seasons soon and this match indeed serves the widely dubbed purpose of the match, and that's none other than the curtain raiser for the English football and effectively the European season, especially if one asks an Englishman. Actually, many people still dub this match as merely a pre-season friendly with a trophy and nothing more. However, if we look deeper into this one off match, it is technically the English Super Cup, in which the winner of the previous season's Barclays Premier League is pitted against the winner of the FA Cup, or the runners-up of the league if the Cup was also won by the league champions. This edition of the Community Shield was won by Manchester United in a rather impressive 3-1 victory over Chelsea. Both teams clearly wanted to win the competition as evident in the match itself.
Two points of note for Manchester United would be the fact that they should count themselves fortunate for still having Paul Scholes in their squad. Even though he's now at a rather advanced age of 36 in football terms, he showed why he still merits a place in the Man Utd first team with his laser guided passes in which the sheer accuracy and grace can only be matched by another legend Guti, the Real Madrid legend who is now plying his trade in Turkey's Besiktas. The England manager, Fabio Capello wh was in attendance might have wondered how his World Cup 2010 campaign might be markedly boosted by the presence of the ginger haired veteran midfielder. Man Utd will do well to have Scholes fit all season as barring a credible reinforcement and/or readjustments to their midfield, if Scholes is out, especially for a prolonged period of time, they might find it difficult to score goals as evident last night where 2 of their 3 goals came from the marvelous passing of Scholes. There could have been many more goals had their strikers especially Berbatov were not so profligate in front of the goal.
Another point of note in the Man Utd side would be none other than the new signing Javier “Chicharito” Hernandez. Many are expected from him especially with his impressive World Cup performance for Mexico, and his signing might prove yet another great one for Sir Alex Ferguson. The Mexican striker injected plenty of pace into an otherwise slow and stoic strikeforce led by Berbatov. For him to score a goal on his official debut can only boost his already sky high confidence from the World Cup even more for the upcoming season.
As for Chelsea, unfortunately with only so little reinforcements especially to replenish their squad after the massive clearout of ageing players such as Michael Ballack, Deco, and Belletti and of course Joe Cole's departure to Liverpool, their squad looked “tired and old”, and Chelsea fans have to be alarmed as their team is now starting to show the symptoms of the AC Milan team prior to Carlo Ancelotti's departure around 2008 and 2009. Even though it would be too far to suggest that Chelsea won't last the distance this time in the league as well as other competitions, as evident in their fightback even after being 2-0 down in the match, it is still alarming nevertheless for Chelsea. Their only reinforcement to date, Yossi Benayoun who is nothing more than a direct swap with Joe Cole was not really impactful in the minutes he was on the pitch.
However, Chelsea are able to take solace in the fact that Daniel Sturridge, the promising striker signed from Man City a couple of years ago showed signs of maturity and he had a huge role in Chelsea's 1 goal in the match and he's as good as having a new signing for Chelsea.
As for the imminent arrival of Ramires, It remains to be seen how it would improve Chelsea's squad and it also remains to be seen on how Ramires would adapt to English Football.
From what could be seen from the Community Shield, the intensity of both teams to win the season's curtain raiser proved that we have just witnessed the two teams who will directly tussle for the title, with Chelsea trying their best to defend their crown while Man Utd trying their utmost best to overtake Liverpool's record of League titles won.
