MONTHS of behind the scenes wheeler-dealing came to a head in just 15 hours when United announced the capture of Anderson, Nani and Owen Hargreaves.

M.E.N. Sport has taken a look at what United can expect for their £50m outlay and the prospects for United fans look mouthwatering.

NANI

THE shirt letterers at Old Trafford next season will be able to retire if two of United's new signings become instant hits.

Following Anderson Luis de Abreu Oliveira to the 'Theatre of Dreams' is Luis Carlos Almeida da Cunha, otherwise known as Nani. Almost 18 months older than the Brazilian, Nani has spent his entire, albeit brief career, in Portugal.

Born on November 17, 1986 in Amadora, he first kicked a ball with Real de Massama, a minor league club in Sintra on the outskirts of Lisbon.

The next step was either Benfica or Sporting Lisbon and he chose to wear the green and white of the 2005 UEFA Cup runners-up. An attacking left side midfielder, he is seen as potentially a successor to Ryan Giggs.

And if Nani is half as successful as two other former Sporting wingers - Cristiano Ronaldo and Luis Figo - then he should be some player. Indeed, there have been comparisons with Ronaldo. Adept on either wing, his assets are said to be his speed, trickery and the scoring of spectacular goals.

Given his first team debut at the age of 18, he is a fully fledged Portuguese international. Indeed, Nani was voted man of the match on his debut against Denmark.

He now has five caps and one goal. However Fergie may order him to cut-out his trademark backflip goal celebrations to protect his new asset.

Serie A champions Inter Milan were believed to be rival suitors for the youngster. This prompted Sporting president Soares Franco to insist Nani was not for sale.

He installed a reported buy out clause of 25 million euro into a new three-year contract.

He wore 18 for Sporting but is unlikely to take Paul Scholes' number just yet.

ANDERSON Brazilian wonderkid with thefull name of Anderson Luis de Abreu Oliveira.

And while Sir Alex Ferguson failed to prevent Ronaldinho joining Barcelona from Paris St Germain, he may just have bought the heir apparent to Brazil's number one superstar.

There are certainly plenty of similarities between the two South Americans.

Both were born in the city of Porto Alegre and both first made an impression with the Gremio club.

Ronaldinho eventually left for France and Anderson followed him to Europe to join Portuguese greats, FC Porto.

And while Ronaldinho twice went on to become FIFA World Player of the Year, his 19-year-old compatriot was voted Player of the Tournament at the FIFA Under-17 World Cup in 2005.

After a semi-final man-of-the- match display against Holland, he lasted only 15 minutes of the Under 17 final before being carried off on a stretcher.

Mexico, who clearly knew Brazil's dangerman, won the game 3-0.

Just for good measure Anderson and Ronaldinho are both left side attacking midfielders-cum-strikers.

It may be early to make these comparisons but Anderson is poised to follow Ronaldinho into the Brazilian national side.

He has already been called up for the forthcoming Copa America game in Venezuela though won't feature for the former World Cup winners against England at Wembley.

Anderson signed for Porto in December 2005 after helping Gremio back into the top tier of Brazilian football.

His goal beat Nautico 1-0 to gain promotion, a match that saw FOUR Gremio players sent-off.

In September 2006 he made his Champions League debut against CSKA Moscow and also played against Arsenal.

Anderson leaves Porto on a high after helping Jose Mourinho's former club to a Portuguese Superliga and Cup double.

HARGREAVES

Owen Hargreaves is coming home, albeit to a home where he never lived! Much has been made of Hargreaves' Bolton roots when, in fact, he's the only member of the family not born in the UK.

His mother Margaret was born in Wales. So too was his eldest brother Darren.

Dad Colin and other sibling Neil are of Lancashire stock while Owen was born in Calgary, Canada on January 20, 1981.

Colin played for Bolton's youth team before his work took him to North America, initially to Toronto and then to Calgary.

Wanderers wanted to sign Darren, a promising teenage striker who represented Canada at youth level, only for injury to wreck his pro career.

So, it was that basketball playing Owen became the footballing star of the family.

He was recommended to Bayern Munich and at the age of 15 flew to Germany for trials. Cologne and Bayer Leverkusen were also interested but never got a look in. Bayern liked what they saw and signed him in the summer of 1997.

With his multi-national up-bringing and German residency, Hargreaves had the pick of countries to represent internationally.

He chose England and Howard Wilkinson gave him a first England Under-21 cap in August 2000.

Almost 12 months later he made his full debut against Holland and in doing so he became the first England international neither to have lived in England nor to have played club football there.

He made a Bundesliga debut for Bayern in August 2000 and the same season achieved a Champions League triumph over Real Madrid. He and Steve McManaman remain the only two Englishmen to have won a Champions League medal with a non-English side.

Domestic honours followed with Munich but so did some unfortunate injuries, including a broken leg last year.

Hargreaves' selection by England for the 2006 World Cup in Germany wasn't greeted with universal approval.

But he won over the notorious fans to become England's player of the tournament. He was also voted England's player of 2006.

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Fergie's tactics finally flounder

IT may have counted for nothing in the end, but for 116 minutes of this tense and often turgid final Sir Alex Ferguson (pictured)must have been congratulating himself on his tactics.
Ferguson'steam selection had effectively dulled Chelsea's attacking edge and played on the weaknesses in Jose Mourinho's line-up.
As a result, Manchester United enjoyed overall control and the bulk of the opportunities, even if these failed to translate to goals.
Chelsea counted on keeping it tight and relying on Didier Drogba to snatch victory and the history books will show that, as so often, such an approach paid off.
Defeat would have been doubly painful for United as they had the chances to end this contest way before extra-time.
With Wayne Rooney as a single striker, United were able to by-pass John Terry, who often found himself without a player to mark, and put pressure on makeshift defender Michael Essien.
Furthermore, Ferguson's decision to play Gabriel Heinze instead of Patrice Evra at left-back thwarted Chelsea's favoured tactic of trying to push Drogba to the far post to be up against a full-back.
With Wes Brown at right-back, it meant United had four defenders all of whom are good enough in the air to play in central defence.
Indeed, the final was less than two minutes old when Wayne Bridge delivered a far-post cross for Drogba and Heinze to fight over.
Drogba won the contest this time but Heinze did enough to ensure the Ivory Coast striker did not make firm contact and the ball lofted over the crossbar.
Both teams had begun cautiously, playing the ball across the back and it was slightly bizarre that United began to unsettle Chelsea using Mourinho-like tactics.

Essien
Long-balls aimed at the areas patrolled by Essien and Paulo Ferreira twice broke kindly for United.
Firstly, Darren Fletcher took advantage of panic in the Chelsea ranks to head into Rooney's path, who fired wide but was just offside in any case.
Then Essien's feeble header dropped to Rooney who did the right thing by attempting an early first-time effort to catch out Petr Cech but the execution did not match the intention.
Chelsea's lack of adventure was perhaps predictable, and they relied mainly on Drogba - who had the sort of physical battle with Nemanja Vidic that would not have looked out of place in 1957 - Joe Cole and set-pieces to provide attacking threat.
Another long-ball led to another United opening and had the offside Rooney left the ball to Ronaldo, the Portuguese winger would have had a clear run on goal.
Chelsea continued the upside-down theme - Cole not Ronaldo doing the step-overs, Drogba not Rooney doing the fancy footwork, and created a couple of half-chances for Frank Lampard (saved) and Shaun Wright-Phillips (skied).
United's new long-ball merchants kept at it: Paul Scholes from the halfway line to Ronaldo who won possession of the ball as Ferreira flapped, only to drive it into the side-netting.
Arjen Robben's appearance at half-time for Cole brought a comparative urgency to the match but still United looked the more likely to break through.
Rooney's direct running threatened on several occasions without leading to anything clear-cut, while Scholes brought a variety to the midfield that was lacking in his successor in the England side, Lampard.
It was from a diagonal, lofted ball by Scholes that left Essien scrambling to cover that proved United's best chance in normal time. It fell just where Giggs would have wanted it but his left-foot volley was a yard too high.
There was one final long Scholes ball in injury, one more nervous fluff and Rooney was in like a flash. So too was Cech though and penalties beckoned.
Then came Drogba, a brilliant one-two with Lampard followed by his 33rd goal of the season and 116 minutes of tactical victory suddenly counted for nothing.

Giggs bemoans goal that wasn't

MANCHESTER United captain Ryan Giggs claimed the Red Devils were denied a perfectly good goal in today's FA Cup final defeat to Chelsea.
The sides were still locked together when Giggs slid into Wayne Rooney's low cross in the first half of extra-time.
TV replays indicated that while Chelsea keeper Petr Cech made the initial save, he took the ball over the line as Giggs' momentum saw the pair collide.
Giggs appealed in vain to referee Steve Bennett but with the linesman ruling the ball had not crossed the line the official waved play on.
Cech got hold of the ball but then slid over the line with it.
"We both knew it was over the line," said Giggs.

Linesman
"I spoke to the referee and said 'You saw it go over and the linesman saw it go over'."
As there never looked like being more than one goal to seperate the sides, it proved to be a pivotal moment and one which, thanks to Didier Drogba’s late strike, ensured Giggs missed out on becoming only the fourth player in history to win five FA Cups.
“Games like this are usually decided by one goal and that was the case today,” the Welshman added.
“If we had got that goal we might well have gone on to win the game.
“But the consolation is that we won the Premiership, we are improving team and we can look forward to next season with confidence.”

Manchester United V/s AC Milan

Largely higher in Manchester (3-0), Milan AC was qualified for the final of C1. Guided by magic Seedorf and imperceptible Kakà, Rossoneri extinguished the European dreams of the men of Sir Alex Ferguson. May 23, Lombards will find Liverpool, their torturer of 2005.

MILAN AC - MANCHESTER UNITED: 3-0 (To go: 2-3)
Goals: Kakà (11th), Seedorf (30e) and Gilardino (78e)Gennaro Gattuso is a man of word. At the hour to face Manchester United in League of the Champions, the Milanese barker had promised in all Italy to avenge the ACE Roma, severely punished in Old Trafford (7-1) at the time of the preceding turn. Finally, and thanks to a rather profitable initial ground visit mancunienne (demolished 3-2), the international transalpine one will have held its promise. Wounded with the outward journey, the nasty piece of work Milanese defensive medium will have been one of the principal craftsmen of the victory as of his in San Siro (3-0). One of the craftsmen... only. Because the former player of Salernitana is not kind to level the gallery with technical epic. Faithful to its grinta legendary, small number 8 rossoneri is rather there to exhort crowd and to put the hands in dirty oil. History to leave with others the care to make the spectacle. With such a player in his rows, Milan AC, revanchist this season in particular with a Series A 2006/2007 below its standing, filled the contract. And how...Haloed of a statute of potential favourite these last weeks, Manchester, however equipped well better than its Milanese counterpart attacks some, was tiny room with silence. Cristiano Ronaldo Balloon of Gold 2007 in power? International Portuguese multiplied the bad choice. Worse, incompetent to overflow a Milanese defense certainly private of Maldini but equipped with Nesta again intractable, the wonder mancunien stigmatized with him only the impotence as of his to raise their level of play. To say that DRIVEN disappointed would not be that to summarize the tendency of the meeting partly. Actually, Milan AC of Carlo Ancelotti was more extremely, the most extremely this evening on the lawn of San Siro.The nightmare of VidicA tactical superiority and technique which Rossoneri quickly posted. Too much quickly probably for English who, during nearly one hour of play, could claim to play... the house. The torentielle rain which fell down on the Milanese city could have obstructed the local managers of balloon. But it was without counting on the feet of extraterrestrial of Seedorf and Kakà. The two best players of Milan this year once again were with go. It is the second, on a subtle air handing-over of the first, which makes put a knee at ground in Manchester (1-0, 11th). Or In Nemanja Vidic. The Serb defender of DRIVEN, of return of wound, saw a true psychodrama on the Milanese green rectangle. A guilty slip in its own surface is sanctioned in the tread by a surgical striking of Seedorf (2-0, 20th).The international Serb one is at the edge of the rupture. Its club too. Each unfavourable acceleration rhyme with frank occasion for Rossoneri and it is necessary little of them so that Vidic, ridiculed once again by Kakà, is not "at the origin" of the third Milanese goal (53e). Finally, the international Brazilian one, victim of cramps, will leave in Gilardino the care to manage this extreme humiliation. Of a dish of the authoritative foot right, the old Parmesan, which cursed in front of the goal in League of the Champions, registers its second pawn in C1 this season (3-0, 78e) and plunges a little more DRIVEN in the black. May 23, it is in Athens that the troop of Ancelotti will play its tenth final of League of the Champions. With opposite it, Liverpool, the formation which had deprived it of a triumph in 2005. But this time, the chance could smile to the Milaneses. After wasn't all, in the capital hellene which Rossoneri had conquered their fifth title in 1994, étrillant with the passage Barça (4-0)? Memories, memories...THE DECLA: Kaka (Milan AC)"I continue to say that I am not yet with the signal. I must still improve. A perfect match was made. Finally against Liverpool, that still will be a beautiful meeting, a single match. I hope simply that the exit will be different (that at the time of the finale 2005). Attacker or leader of play, it does not matter, I want to be most complete possible ".