Struggling Championship outfit Derby County shocked Manchester United with a deserved 1-0 win at Pride Park in the first leg of the Carling Cup semi-final. Kris Commons got the all important goal on the half hour after Derby had spurned earlier chances to embarrass the Champions of Europe.

This was a lethargic performance from United who could have fallen further behind had Derby taken all their chances.

The introduction of Ronaldo and Wayne Rooney in the second half gave the visitors hope as the Portuguese international flashed a free kick narrowly wide, but overall Derby, and former Reds keeper, Roy Carroll was rarely tested.

In particular, Carlos Tevez, making a return to the starting line-up was surprisingly subdued.

United will still be favourites to progress to the Final after the second leg at Old Trafford, but boss Sir Alex Ferguson would not have been impressed with this performance.

The Reds boss acknowledged the scoreline could have been worse for United.

"The positive is we've only lost 1-0," he told the club's official web site.

"It's a fantastic result for us considering the performance. We could have lost four goals so 1-0 is a fantastic result for us and going to Old Trafford now, it'll be different."

"I think we'll persevere with our younger players," Ferguson confirmed.

"They deserve to be in there, I felt they were our better players tonight in actual fact. Gibson certainly was one of the better players.

"I have sympathy for Welbeck - he never really had any service in the game so it would be unfair to judge him."