Champions League: United scoreless at the break

Man Utd 0, Olympiakos 0 (half-time)

Laurent Blanc went some way to silencing his critics with a wonderful tackle to stop Olympiakos taking the lead against Manchester United at Old Trafford.

Alexios Alexandris had only Fabien Barthez to beat, but Blanc got back to make a great challenge and even won a goal kick.

That was just about the only real threat on Barthez's goal and United went close several times at the other end through Ruud van Nistelrooy, Juan Veron and David Beckham.

Roy Keane was ruled out of the Champions League clash with a knee injury.

Nicky Butt replaced Keane to make his first European start of the campaign, and manager Sir Alex Ferguson made six changes to the side beaten by Bolton on Saturday.

Ferguson brought back all his big hitters and reverted to his controversial 4-4-1-1 formation against Olympiakos, who have never won an away Champions League match in 15 attempts.

Perhaps buoyed by the successes of the last two visiting teams to Old Trafford, Olympiakos started confidently and were passing the ball about well.

United, though, were in no mood to lose a third successive home match for the first time since season 1962-63.

They went close to opening the scoring on seven minutes when stand-in skipper Ryan Giggs crossed from the left for Ruud van Nistelrooy to connect with a header.

Greek national goalkeeper Dimitrios Eleftheropoulos parried van Nistelrooy's effort,and the covering Christos Kontis thwarted Paul Scholes as he attempted to score from the rebound.

United were looking more like their old selves and David Beckham whizzed a right-foot shot across goal.

Beckham then picked out Juan Veron with a right-foot cross and the Argentinian international deftly lifted the ball over the covering defender before unleashing a volley which was saved by Eleftheropoulos.

Olympiakos' defence was groaning and Beckham fired into the side netting after opening up the visitors by playing a one-two with Scholes.

For all United's pressure their defence was caught napping on 24 minutes to present Olympiakos with the best chance of the half.

The United backline stopped when Stylianos Giannakopoulos played a ball over the top and appealed for offside, but skipper Alexios Alexandris had timed his run perfectly and raced clean through.

However, Blanc came to the rescue for United.

Referee Vitor Pereira seemed to point to the spot and for one horrible split second the United fans thought he had awarded Olympiakos a penalty, but he was actually pointing at the six-yard box for a goal kick.

United regained control after this scare and Veron cracked a right-foot shot wide of Eleftheropoulos' right-hand post from 25 yards.

Beckham was coming in for some rough treatment and he finally won a free-kick at the third time of asking when he was fouled by Giannakopoulos.

The England skipper was none the worse for the knocks and he fired a long-range effort just wide.