Nani loses the plot

Unbelievable. Unexplainable. Whatever prompted Nani to lose his cool and head butt Lucas Neill in tonight's game with West Ham??

Here's how The Times newspaper described the incident:

Just inside West Ham’s area, Nani attempted to emulate Ashton’s goal but failed and ended on his backside. Neill, mockingly, bent down and pinched his inner thigh. In a fury, the young Portuguese jumped to his feet, and as he squared up to the visiting captain, Neill reacted by giving him a gentle slap on the chops. A Nani should be good at diffusing tantrums, but this one succumbed to a temper storm and head butted his tormentor. Mike Riley had been unsighted, but he consulted his assistant and, with some further help form the fourth official, the referee got to the bottom of matters: Nani was dismissed.

It was a totally uncalled for reaction from Nani and this was made worse by him falling to the ground. Definitely play acting. Darn downright foolish. I wonder what Alex Ferguson would be telling him after the match. I know for sure, the manager totally ignored Nani when he walked off the pitch.

The referee had no qualms about sending him off. I wouldn't disagree with that. Nobody who had watched this incident would've disagreed with Nani's sending off.

For a while, I was concerned that West Ham could be staging a comeback against a 10-man Manchester United team. But the visitors played so terribly that even with 10 men on the field, a fourth goal was still forthcoming from Michael Carrick.

Oh, by the way, I'm very glad that Ryan Giggs is inching ever so closely to breaking Bobby Charlton's record of 758 games for Manchester United. He'll go one better than Charlton if he plays against Wigan next Saturday and in the Champions League final on 21 May 2008.

Club historians have been saying all along that Charlton's record stood at 759 games for Manchester United but it was reported in today's The Independent newspaper that Charlton had actually missed one of the matches credited to him: a third round FA Cup tie against Bolton on 6 Jan 1962. He had been laid low because of 'flu and someone had played instead of him; yet he was still credited with the appearance.