Besart Berisha scores against Manchester United

The Manchester United vs A-League All Stars game didn’t quite live up to its billing on the pitch.  Firstly, three of the A-League’s biggest marquee players (Del Piero, Heskey, Ono) all declined to play in the game.  Secondly, the rest of the best of Australian A-League talent was in Asia playing international matches against Japan and China for the Socceroos.  So what we got was Besart Berisha, Thomas Broich and the best of the third-choice A-League stars playing against Man Utd.  The game ended up finishing 5-1 in a lopsided encounter but I didn’t care too much really since I got to see Berisha score against United after a nice link up with Broich.  That was what I wanted and I got my birthday present.

The concept of traveling superstar teams is a popular one in Australia.  Manchester United vs A-League All Stars and Liverpool vs Melbourne Victory were attended by a combined crowd of over 190,000 people.  I look forward to seeing who they bring out next year.  Some more high profile exhibition games against Brisbane Roar wouldn’t go amiss.