game, though, did not come until after half-time, as Wayne Rooney, who had not scored at Old Trafford since October, bagged a brace. Ronaldo supplied the first, back-heeling the ball to the England striker, who rounded Carson before passing the ball into the net. Ronaldo then provided the assist for Rooney's second, nutmegging an Aston Villa defender to play Rooney in. Heartened by his first goal in six games, Rooney finished the move with a cool shot, beating Carson on his near post. Rooney almost made it a hat-trick a few minutes later, but he was deemed to be marginally offside at the time of Owen Hargreaves' cross. April–May United were chosen to play on the Sunday of the following weekend, allowing the two chasing teams, Arsenal and Chelsea, to close the gap at the top. Arsenal played first, but could only draw with Liverpool, while Chelsea managed a 2–0 victory over Manchester City in the 3 o'clock kickoff. That closed the gap at the top to two points, putting pressure on United to pick up points against Middlesbrough, who are often regarded as one of their "bogey teams" in recent years. The Red Devils started well, and were 1–0 up within 10 minutes after Ronaldo stabbed home Michael Carrick's square ball across the six-yard box. United continued to make chances, and looked to be coasting to a comfortable victory until Afonso Alves netted his first goal in English football after 35 minutes. The Brazilian bagged his second ten minutes into the second half, and things looked desperate for United. Worse still, after 70 minutes, with United already missing Nemanja Vidić through injury, Rio Ferdinand looked to have picked up an injury himself and was replaced by Gerard Piqué. It was Piqué's fellow substitute, Park Ji-sung, who fashioned the equaliser, though, as he checked back inside Andrew Taylor before squaring the ball to Wayne Rooney, whose deflected shot found its way past Mark Schwarzer in the Middlesbrough goal. United continued to press forward in search of the winner to take the gap at the top of the table back to five points, but almost gave away a goal in the process. Van der Sar capped a solid display by blocking Tuncay's late effort. The Red Devils' next game was against Arsenal the following Sunday, in a six-pointer that would either rule Arsenal out of the title race or bring them