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It was a foggy and frustrating night in South London as Manchester United dropped points for the 13th time in 27 games this season after a 0-0 draw against Crystal Palace. It was their sixth goalless draw, most of any Premier League team this year, and registered their least number of attempts on target in over two years in a league game.
Manchester United began the first half sloppily, with the likes of Eric Bailly and skipper Harry Maguire giving the ball away cheaply in dangerous areas. As the game settled down, however, it was a fairly uneventful 45 minutes of football with both teams managing to produce just one attempt on target between themselves.
Nemanja Matic scored a stunning goal three years ago at this venue to settle a five-goal thriller, unleashed a strike which was the only effort that tested Vicente Guaita. Both sides lacked any sort of cutting edge in the final third. The returning Edinson Cavani received little to no service with the visitors evidently lacking a creative spark.
The Red Devils began the second half poorly as well as they failed to string together a set of passes to threaten the hosts' goal. They failed to produce even an attempt, let alone one on target, for nearly 30 minutes into the second half. Palace, on the other hand, squandered a couple of half-decent opportunities on the counter, with Christian Benteke in particular missing his kick after some good work from Eberechi Eze.
The introduction of Scott McTominay and Dan James late into the half injected some much needed energy into the side and the latte was guilty of missing what was their most clear-cut chance up until that point.
James ran down the byline to find Bruno Fernandes on the edge of the box who then switched to Shaw on the left. The Englishman delivered a peach of a cross into the box to find James who, unfortunately, barely managed to get any contact at all.
Eric Bailly, Mason Greenwood, and others' attempts were poor and in vain as it was a poor night in every way for Manchester United. Dean Henderson saved further embarrassment for Ole Gunnar Solskjaer's men with a big save against Patrick van Aanholt in the dying minutes of the game.
This result leaves the Red Devils a staggering 14 (!) points behind a seemingly unstoppable Manchester City, setting up a game at the Etihad at the weekend which could potentially hand the Cityzens the title as a win would see them 17 points clear.
Here are some of the best tweets from the game as Manchester United registered their fourth draw in the last five games.
