IN THE SOUP - MATCH VIEWS FROM THE BROADSHEETS

THE OBSERVER - UNITED CRUMBLE AT FORTRESS FRATTON

With dust and cobwebs collecting in its aged wooden stand and lagging hanging off old pipes, Fratton Park remains a throwback to less sophisticated times, as readers reminded us in these pages recently. It is, though, a formidable ally to Portsmouth. I don't know what its crammed seats full of incessantly raucous support do to the enemy, but by God they frighten me.

And yesterday, it seemed, Manchester United. For the second time in six months they were sunk on the South Coast by a vibrant Portsmouth side - you wait 47 years for a win over United and two come along at once - with David Unsworth this time slamming home a penalty and Yakubu Aiyegbeni grabbing his sixth league goal of the season.

'Incredible result, especially with United coming here with near enough their strongest side,' beamed the Pompey manager Harry Redknapp. 'This place is a bit like the old Dell, isn't it? One of those tough places to go.'

Thus did toothless United waste all the hard work in beating Arsenal last Sunday, and Sir Alex Ferguson was not mincing his words. 'It's a terrible disappointment, a real kick in the teeth,' he said. 'The result of last weekend has been absolutely destroyed. This was a bad, bad performance and an awful result.' Indeed, if this performance was soup, it would have been gazpacho; if pizza, the pavement variety.

Most worrying for him must be United's inability, for all their possession, to unlock a defence, as they did regularly in their expansive dominance of the Premiership for most of a decade. Now Arsenal, despite the defeat last Sunday and the wobble yesterday, are leaving them behind, along with Chelsea. United now trail the leaders by nine points and there currently looks little prospect of overhauling them.

Last week, United had beaten Arsenal with a contain-and-counter strategy. Now they had been done unto and never, thereafter, did they look like retrieving the position. Arjan De Zeeuw and Dejan Stefanovic held firm at the centre of a Pompey defence now bombarded with predictability. Fratton Park rocked as United rolled over.

THE INDEPENDENT - FERGIE FACES THE UNPALATABLE TRUTH

After soup on suit, egg on face. Having done the hard part by ending Arsenal's unbeaten run amid the pandemonium of Old Trafford last Sunday, Manchester United slid to defeat despite dominating most of an eventful game in the South Coast sunshine. Time after time they set up shooting opportunities - 18 in all - only to fail for want a finish. In the meantime Portsmouth, spirited as ever at raucous Fratton Park, broke out in the second half to claim a disputed penalty and a route-one second goal.

Ferguson appeared in front of selected media representatives afterwards without so much as a smudge on his smart white shirt but with a serious blemish on his team's record, which he acknowledged in admirably honest fashion.

It was United's first defeat since losing at Chelsea on the opening day of the season, but they have drawn too many games and with Arsenal dropping more points, this was a glorious opportunity spurned to demonstrate serious intent to have a say in the championship chase. Nine points already looks an awful lot to make up on the two London contenders with a squad that is settling down but still lacks a certain something. Yesterday it was the killer pass from a midfield in which Roy Keane's best days are behind him and the final touch that Ruud van Nistelrooy on song might have provided.

THE SUNDAY TELEGRAPH - UNITED SUNK BY POMPEY HEROICS

Maybe that momentous victory over Arsenal was not, after all, the turning point in Manchester United's season they had hoped. Portsmouth, certainly, were not prepared to let them capitalise on it yesterday at a tumultuous Fratton Park.

Hard as United tried, they simply could not break Pompey's heroic resistance. Then, on the break, the home side dashed their hopes with a David Unsworth penalty and a dazzlingly individualistic goal by Yakubu Aiyegbeni.

As expected, Portsmouth brought back most of their big guns for a match regarded as one of their major events of the season. Only three players - Linvoy Primus, Arjan de Zeeuw and Diomansy Kamara - remained from the side that had knocked Leeds out of the Carling Cup here in midweek.

United made one change to the team that had overcome Arsenal in such controversial circumstances the previous weekend, Alan Smith coming in up front for the suspended Ruud van Nistelrooy. That meant there was no start for club captain Roy Keane after a spell out because of a flu-like virus but he came on later as a substitute.

THE SUNDAY TIMES - POMPEY TORPEDO UNITED REVIVAL

Manchester United, for whatever reason, simply cannot score enough goals. They cannot prevent lesser clubs from scoring either. For the second season in succession, Portsmouth defeated them at Fratton Park, this time by an even more convincing margin. Defeating Arsenal is of scant worth if it is followed by a result such as this.

It was not as if United did not have their chances — there were several in the first quarter of an hour. Later, a header from Cristiano Ronaldo beat Shaka Hislop, rebounded off a post and was scooped over the bar by Alan Smith. On another day, such a chance will go in. The worry for United is that very soon there will be insufficient days in the Premiership schedule for them to make up ground on Arsenal and Chelsea.

Both goals came in the second half. The first was a penalty put away by David Unsworth and the second a half-chance that fell to Yakubu, who had to beat both Rio Ferdinand and Mikael Silvestre, who were covering back. He cut inside the Englishman, beating him through a dip of the shoulder, and left the Frenchman flailing on the grass. The ensuing shot just evaded the United goalkeeper.

Then there was the intemperate, if not wild, reaction of Wayne Rooney, who was booked for a clumsy, rear-end challenge on Nigel Quashie. Luckily for him, his opponent did not feign injury.

Rooney charged around for the remainder of the match, furious with his — and his team’s — inability to defeat the kind of opposition that has to be accounted for if the Premiership title is to be won.