United’s youngsters set to shine — Evans

JONNY EVANS feels Manchester United’s young guns can adjust to life at the highest level — as long as they remember to keep things simple.

Providing he gets the green light to have a couple more pain–killing jabs in his ankle, Evans will be part of the United side that tackles Tottenham Hotspur in Sunday’s Carling Cup final at Wembley.

Although there will be plenty of experience in the Red Devils ranks, Evans will be joined by Darron Gibson, Danny Welbeck, Ben Foster and possibly even Fabio Da Silva to form a quintet with just 47 appearances between them this season, almost half of which have been contributed by the Northern Ireland star.

But the 21–year–old sees no reason to be nervous about appearing on the Wembley stage.

“Most of the lads don’t get nervous,” he said.

“People talk about inexperience but, as long as your concentration is good and you do the basics right it should be fine.”

Not that Evans is quite so inexperienced.

Though he hasn’t played many games for United, the Belfast–born star had a couple of spells on loan at Sunderland which have given him a detailed knowledge of life in the top flight.

In the immediate aftermath of Tuesday’s goalless draw with Inter Milan, Ferguson stated his intention to make seven changes to his starting line–up for the weekend engagement.

Yet it is more likely to be nine, with only Evans and John O’Shea set to be included if the United boss sticks to his plan to use the players he has relied on so far in the Carling Cup.
Apart from Evans and O’Shea, Gibson, Nani and Carlos Tevez are certainties. Foster seems set to win a personal battle with Tomasz Kuszczak for the goalkeeping spot, while Paul Scholes and Wayne Rooney are likely to play after sitting out almost all of the scintillating performance at the San Siro.

If Gary Neville is fit, he will be involved. The same is also true of Anderson, with Welbeck set to profit if the Brazilian fails to recover from an ankle injury.