RIP-ROARING, rumbustious and irreverent — this was Manchester United Football Club at its very best.

If the others score two, we’ll score three. If they manage three, we’ll get five.

Roy Keane has warned that the Reds might have to bore a bit if they are to succeed in Europe this season. Fergie is obsessed with having bodies in midfield and has experimented with Ruud van Nistelrooy as a lone striker.

On a knife-edge

Forget boring. Ditch defensive. Stuff the 4-4-1-1.

Football is played on a knife-edge, and you can play correctly, with possession and methodical correctness, and still lose 1-0.

But the United way is the glory way, in victory or defeat. At Newcastle it went the wrong way and the Reds lost 4-3, but they had lost the United way.

Only Andy Cole, who was sharp and dangerous throughout, escaped censure in the first half.

Fergie had already stepped back from his controversial split-striker idea, pairing Cole and van Nistelrooy, but only when Nicky Butt’s rib injury forced another change, at 2-0 down, did he go for broke.

He could have put Phil Neville on and kept the same shape, but there was little point — instead he went 4-3-3 by shoving on Ole Gunnar Solskjaer.

It did not work initially as the Reds were still on the back-foot and went 3-0 down in injury time.

Quick response

But in the second half, after Cole had struck just 47 seconds in, the three front men, backed up by the brilliance of Juan Sebastian Veron, Paul Scholes and David Beckham — captaining the team from the start for the first time — turned United into an irrepressible attacking force.

A Red tornado suddenly swept through a bedraggled Spurs defence, a force of nature.

They had attacked half-heartedly from the off, but were set back after 15 minutes when debut-making £8m man Dean Richards thumped home a near-post header from Christian Ziege’s corner.

One became two 10 minutes later when Gus Poyet slipped a neat ball through and as Laurent Blanc stepped up to play offside, Les Ferdinand beat the trap and had time and composure to rifle his shot low past Fabien Barthez.

Straight after the goal the storm clouds gathered above White Hart Lane, and you could swear there was a little one hanging just above Fergie’s head.

The problems worsened on 40 minutes when Butt’s rib injury forced him off — but it proved a blessing in disguise.

Poyet gifted space

There was still time for Spurs, playing with great commitment and proving deadly in front of goal, to net a third. Poyet was given too much space on the United left by Denis Irwin and measured his cross for Ziege, racing in unmarked, to plant a six-yard header home.

It needed a bright start to the second half, and boy, did we get it. With Mikael Silvestre on for Irwin, Gary Neville pushing up more and Solskjaer adding another dimension, United started to find space down the flanks.

With 47 seconds on the clock, Neville ran on to Beckham’s ball and whipped the ball low to the near post. Cole dived in to guide a great header past Neil Sullivan.

The revival was underway, but no-one could have guessed at what was to come.

Solskjaer darted in to glance another header inches wide from Beckham’s cross, and the stand-in skipper dipped a 35-yard free kick just over the bar as United took full control.

First goal for Blanc

On 58 minutes the intolerable pressure paid off as Beckham’s corner found Blanc towering above everyone to flash a header into the bottom corner.

Now the electricity was crackling around White Hart Lane. Glenn Hoddle and John Gorman were leaping around, Poyet was arguing with his boss, referee Jeff Winter, anyone who cared to argue.

Winter was telling Fergie to shush, and there was revolution in the air.

Ronny Johnsen rose unmarked to somehow head Beckham’s corner wide and then Beckham looped a left-foot shot inches wide as Veron began to open huge gaps in the Spurs defence, aided by the incessant movement of Solskjaer, Cole and van Nistelrooy.

On 72 minutes it was all square. Solskjaer battled hard to win the ball in midfield — not a phrase you hear too often — and slipped the ball forward to Cole. He fed Silvestre, striding down the left and his cross was perfection for van Nistelrooy to head in.

Vision

Six minutes later the Red rapier was thrusting again — and this goal bordered on perfection. Beckham, trapped on the right, switched the ball to Silvestre on the left with a 50-yard pass. He moved it back infield for Scholes and Solskjaer, and the Norwegian’s cute pass sent Veron loping through a gap.

The Argentinian maestro composed himself and struck a sweet left-footer into the far corner for 4-3.

The scoreboard flashed up a message: ‘Keep Tottenham Tidy’ — it was too late for that. They had been reduced to wreckage by the runaway Reds.

But United were not yet done and three minutes from time the excellent Solskjaer’s trickery saw him in behind the defence again and as attackers and defenders queued up, he cleverly pulled the ball back for Beckham. The England captain had time and space and took full advantage to gleefully drive past a despairing Neil Sullivan.

United might be entertaining, but do they have any chance in Europe when they leak goals at such an alarming rate? Let us know your views.