Sir Alex Enjoys Strange Game

Sir Alex Ferguson felt the circumstances were strange as United sealed his best start to a season as Reds boss.

Although the champions romped to a three-nil lead over Chelsea in the first half, it wasn't the most convincing of the five league victories so far.

The visitors had some great chances in addition to the ones they converted almost immediately after the restart - had goalkeeper David De Gea not made "an excellent save" from Ramires in the first half and Fernando Torres not missed an open net in the second period ("it reminded me of Diego Forlan against Juventus on a pre-season tour") - then honours could have been even at Old Trafford.

"I think for the neutral it was a fantastic open match," said Sir Alex. "It was strange because games against Chelsea over the years have always been tight affairs. This was a very very open match.

"Some of our football was terrific at times. But I thought we created our own problems for ourselves by giving the ball away so many times in attacking areas and they kept counter-attacking against us. In the first half they could have scored two or three."

United's attacking play again pleased Sir Alex, especially when the Reds utilised the wings instead of trying to feed Wayne Rooney and Javier Hernandez through the centre.

"I think we did okay when we got the ball up to Nani and to Ashley Young, I thought that was our strength and they couldn’t cope with that," said the manager.

"When we tried to be clever in the middle of midfield, we kept botching it up and they kept counter-attacking us. When we got the ball out to Nani and to Ashley Young, I thought that was our strength and they couldn’t cope with that."

Wayne Rooney was unfortunate not to grab a hat-trick for a third consecutive league match, but Sir Alex wasn't concerned that his leading scorer only had to settle for one goal.

"He’s hit the post and he’s missed a penalty kick – I don’t know what he’s trying to do with that. He slipped I think. It’s unusual because Wayne’s normally composed and he takes his penalty kicks very well. I wasn’t worried about him getting a hat-trick or not. I was more worried about us winning the game and we’ve won the game so we’re all happy."