A real turn up for the books as a Saints side that was far from being described as first choice, put in a great display to earn a point at Old Trafford and deserve all three more than the home side itself.
If you look at the 11 Saints players that started this game the first thought would be that this was a reserve side, I would suggest that a few months ago 8 possibly 9 of this side were not first choice in any shape or form, only Wesley Hoedt and Oriol Romeu and possibly Dusan Tadic would have been seen as starters and at times even they weren't picked by Mauricio Pellegrino and here lies the problem.
But now the manager was as one of his predecessors liked to say, down to the bare bones and therefore he did not have a lot of choice but to put out the side he did, I said in the preview that we would either see a complete lack of spirit or a revival and we saw the latter.
The real surprise in the starting line up was Alex McCarthy in goal, this was needed in the fact that Forster needs to be removed from the front line, McCartyh put in a decent performance but it should be noted that he was well protected by those in front of him, United managed only three shots on target all straight at the keeper, McCarthy had a decent game and did all that was expected, but the difference in this game was the resolute defending that made sure that United never got clear chances unlike Spurs a few days earlier who puleld the defence to shreds.
This was all about spirit, the back four had three players in it who over the past couple of seasons have been mainly reserves when everyone is fit, the midfield full of players who have not been consistent or ignored and Shane Long up front who could not even get on the bench a few weeks ago.
But they put in a great performance and earned a much needed point, the real question though is did they put in this display for the manager or for themselves !
It is hard to pick a man of the match, Pierre Emile Hojbjerg was a big contender he and Oriol Romeu worked hard in the midfield, another who impressed me was Sofiane Boufal for his willingness to take the game to United to run at them and try and create chances, although this was a difficult task it meant that we did push them back and we kept the ball for longer periods rather than just give it them back and invite pressure on us.
But there was not a player out there who came off the field not having put in a shift, if we had done that at Spurs, I'm not saying the result would have been different but at least we could have held our heads up, we can say that after this game.
This shows that Saints do have strength in depth and in the New Year with everyone fit and at least two good signings we should be more than capable of clmbing the table, the question though is whether the board feel that Mauricio Pellegrino is the man to take us forward or whether they feel that the fact that we are in this mess is completely down to the manager, this will emerge in the next few days.
But in the meantime Saints fans can all be proud of this display and take hope that we can come through a tricky period stronger than before.