Man Utd Win Carling Cup

Man Utd have won the Carling Cup after the tie ended 0-0 after extra time and went to penalties.

United then saw off Tottenham 4-1 in the shoot out, with Jamie O'Hara and David Bentley missing for Tottenham, and Anderson slotting home the decisive penalty.

The man of the match was undoubtedly Ben Foster in the United goal who not only pulled of a string of fantastic saves for the Red Devils but also stopped O'Hara's penalty.

The Carling Cup triumph is the second major honour for Man Utd this season already, having picked up the FIFA Club World Cup in December. They are 7 points and a game in hand ahead of both Chelsea and Liverpool in the Premier League. Newspaper talk tomorrow will focus on Man Utd's bid for an unprecedented quintuple.

Tottenham Transfer Talk

Jermain Defoe has made the move back to Tottenham, reputedly Tottenham generously waived the sell on clause that they had inserted when they sold Defoe to Portsmouth, so they could avoid paying themselves £4m (presumably not tax free). But next to the £16.5m they paid for Darren Bent, it would still appear a good deal.

I think Spurs fans will agree, but I suspect those that may not will change their tune if Defoe starts banging in the goals pretty quick. I don't think this is a case of mistakenly rolling back the clock, more correcting the mistake of letting Defoe go in the first place.

Now for my theory. I think Harry will predominantly set out two up front, so it is likely that Bent and Pavlyuchenko will still feature regularly, with Frasier Campbell coming from the bench when needed. However, I suspect that this will mean that Modric will now drop back to a more traditional midfield role next to either Tom Huddlestone, or Didier Zokora. So I ask the question, where will this leave Jermaine Jenas in the pecking order?

In other news, it would seem Tottenham have had a second bid for Stewart Downing rejected. 'Boro Chairman Steve Gibson has commented that he will work hard to convince Stewart Downing that his ambitions are best served on Teeside. Having acted early in January to prompt a move, Downing will likely hold his ground. I suspect that Downing, like everyone else can see that 'Boro have a young, talented team emerging that will do well in future seasons, I suspect that Downing is no longer willing to be the big fish in the small pond and wants to go to a bigger club now rather than wait for the rest of the team to develop sufficiently which may take three or four seasons and then no guarantee that they will be genuine challengers.

I also have a suspicion that Jamie O'Hara may offered to 'Boro as part of the deal.