Ronaldo sweats on hip injury as United keeps pace

Cristiano Ronaldo is facing an anxious wait to discover the extent of the hip injury that led to him walking off the pitch during Manchester United's dramatic 1-0 victory against Sunderland here at Old Trafford.
Nemanja Vidic's close range goal one minute into stoppage time, when he converted from six yards after Michael Carrick's shot had been pushed onto the post, won the game for United after they had created 23 chances as opposed to none from the managerless visitors.
Ronaldo walked off, without waiting for a substitute, and headed straight down the tunnel clutching his hip after a heavy challenge by Sunderland midfielder Andy Reid. Yet despite Ronaldo's unusual move, United manager Sir Alex Ferguson insisted the Portugal winger was right to make a sharp exit. "Cristiano had a kick on the hip. Wayne Rooney had something similar last season and it can be very painful," said Ferguson. "We'll see how he is on Monday morning, but we have Aalborg at home in the Champions League on Wednesday and Spurs at the weekend, so we will freshen it up. "There was no need for Cristiano to come to the bench, though," the Scot said of the recently-crowned European Footballer of the Year. "The best thing is to get treatment straightaway. It was the sensible thing to do."Sunderland, without a manager following former United captain Roy Keane's resignation on Thursday, defended en masse. It seemed as if a combination of resolute defending and impressive saves from goalkeeper Marton Fulop had secured a draw until Vidic's strike gave English and European champions United a deserved victory. Ferguson added Saturday's win, which kept third-placed United six points behind leaders Liverpool, could prove valuable in the defence of their title.
"We have had a tough fixture in the list in the opening half of the season and, when we have played at Spurs next week, we will have played all of last season's top ten away from home. "It's been tough for us with away games after all of our European games, but we have done okay and, if we can be within two or three points of the leaders at Christmas, then we will be in good shape.
"We deserved to win this game. We had a lot of possession and a lot of pressure, but Sunderland came here to defend. Better teams than Sunderland have played with just one man up-front here, though, so you can't blame them for doing so, especially in their current situation." Sunderland caretaker boss Ricky Sbragia, a former United coach, was frustrated after his team came within a whisker of snatching a point.
"We are very disappointed. We had a game-plan, but how many times have you seen United score in the last minute?
"They are the best team in Europe, though, so that's what they can do," added Sbragia after a loss that left Sunderland in the bottom three. Sam Allardyce, Gordon Strachan and Alan Curbishley have all been linked with the Sunderland job following Keane's exit, but chairman Niall Quinn said there was no rush to find a permanent replacement.
"There have been over 30 sensible applications so far, which is great," Quinn revealed.
"Roy was a dream to work with and will be very hard to replace. We will not get another like him, that's for sure, but we will look at all the available options, trawl around and come to a conclusion over the next couple of weeks. "We have not sat down to discuss anything yet. We just intend to take it easy and make the right decision."[justify]