Preview Man U - Sunderland

For some reason Sir Alex always manages to keep his team in the top two season in season out and this campaign is not an exception. So how has he been able to maintain the stability and outstanding performances? Most people would answer Wayne Rooney or the stability of the centre-halfs Vidic and Ferdinand. In my opinion it lies in something else entirely. As any humble manager would act if they led the EPL, Sir Alex focuses on what can be improved rather than giving the players humungous credit and such. United have conceded far too many goals during the first half of the season, the injury on Vidic probably playing a part in that. The key to why United have maintained their superiority in the premier league lies in the midfield. During the latter parts of the 90's and the entire 2000's they had the immense machine of Paul Scholes orchestrating the United attacking. With picture-perfect passes Scholes has managed to pick out the likes of Van Nistelrooy, Rooney and C. Ronaldo. Scholes is still a member of the first-team squad at Old Trafford but not a starting-11 player. Sir Alex has now, through years of individual training with them formed a fantastic centre-midfield duo. Young Tom Cleverley together with the Brazilian Anderson have been phenomenal this season. Not only have they been supplying wingers Valencia and Young with through-balls but have also managed to score some goals of their own (Cleverleys goal at St. James Park was sublime). Valencia and Young have in their turn found the balls into the likes of Rooney and Van Persie who have done their simple jobs of slotting home goal after goal. This was most notable last weekend at the City of Manchester during both Wayne Rooney goals. So the key to winning today will be to keep maintaing the midfield superiority, then Ferdinand and Smalling will have an easier job today.
Sunderland have had a dreadful season with loss after loss after loss.  This mainly being because of the lack to find the net. During the first weeks Sunderland had only scored 5 goals, all of them coming from new signing Steven Fletcher. After a 1-3 loss against Chelsea last week the rut seemed to be endless. However there is a silver lining, during mid-week they played a hanging-match against newcombers Reading and snatched a seemingly easy 3-0 victory from the Stadium of Light. As most people know, with any knowledge about the premier league ; there is a large difference between being guested by Reading and traveling to Old Trafford. In my mind there is no other outcome than United maintaing their six point lead at the top of the EPL (Depending on Newcastle-City the gap could be larger).

Possible line-ups:
United:
De Gea
Rafael - Smalling - Ferdinand - Evra
Valencia - Anderson - Cleverley - Young
Rooney - Van Persie

Sunderland:
Mignolet
O'shea - Bramble - Cuellar - Rose (Depending if he is fit)
Johnson - Larsson - Gardner -  Colback
Sessègnon
Fletcher