Rampant Reds delight manager

Sir Alex Ferguson was delighted to see his side’s voracious approach in swatting aside Newcastle United at St James’ Park.

The Reds romped to a 5-1 victory over Kevin Keegan’s side, despite having played two extra matches since the Magpies’ last action, and the United manager watched with great satisfaction as the hosts were run ragged.

“It was a good performance. We could have scored a few goals, we made chances, but the important thing is that they’re looking really fresh,” Sir Alex told Setanta Sports.

“Coming to Newcastle is never easy. The crowd are fantastic, they urge their team on and it’s a volatile place to come. The first job to do is to try and quieten them. It’s not easy, but I think we did that for the most part of the game.”

Sir Alex made four changes to the side which drew with Lyon on Wednesday, rotating his forward six after the exertions of facing the French champions.

“We freshened up the centre of midfield, because that’s an area in which we have a lot of strength,” he said. “We brought Darren Fletcher and Michael Carrick in after Paul Scholes, Owen Hargreaves and Anderson all played on Wednesday, so it gave us a freshness.

“But the match was decided by the ability of our front players, they were all absolutely fantastic. They all did really well. Obviously with Ronaldo and Rooney scoring two goals apiece, they’re going to get all the headlines, but the movement of Tevez and the penetration of Nani contributed to that.”

Following last weekend’s FA Cup romp against Arsenal, a vital away draw against Lyon and Saturday’s thumping of Newcastle, Sir Alex feels his side have responded in the right fashion to the disappointing defeat to Manchester City earlier this month.

“We’re all disappointed with our performance against Manchester City, and since then the players have done their best to atone for that,” he said. “They performed against Arsenal last week, then in midweek against Lyon it was a very good result for us, and today stresses our urgency to try and do better and get up that league.”