United end century with another late show

Manchester United's ambition of ending the year at the top of the Premiership collapsed at Sunderland tonight with a 2-2 draw.

A deflected shot from Nicky Butt after a disputed free kick with only three minutes to go salvaged a point for the champions but Leeds United stay top by a point.

This was the last game of the century for United and they arrived in bullish mood at the Stadium of Light for the treble winners first game ever at Sunderland's new venue.

A packed 42,000 saw the full version of the champions with Giggs, Yorke, Cole, Beckham and Irwin all coming back into the starting line up and United travel later in the week to Brazil for the inaugural World Club championship.

They are in the best form of any of the contenders for that new competition but Sunderland took an early lead when Gavin McCann scored from a Niall Quinn knock down in only the 75th second of the game.

Quinn put Sunderland into dreamland in the 12th minute when he slid in to convert a cross from Stefan Schwarz.

United captain Roy Keane brought his side back into the game with a low drive in the 28th minute as they tried to capitalise on Leeds' defeat earlier in the day at Arsenal. David Beckham's response to a first half beating was to unleash several petulant challenges as the midfielder roamed through the outfield positions in a free role that did little to help his side. Sir Alex Ferguson ended the game with four strikers at the front of his team after Beckham was brought off with five minutes to go and replaced with Ole Gunnar Solskjaer. Butt scored to level the game and Cole was taken off and replaced with Phil Neville as United settled for a point but Sunderland produced a nervous finish.

Sunderland were missing their 19-goal striker Kevin Phillips for the holiday season fixtures. They were sunk 5-0 at Everton two days ago after Phillips strained a hamstring in the last five minutes of light training on Christmas Day but this point keeps them in contention for at least a European place as the club are third in the Premiership at the moment.

United's next match in England will be on January 24th when they host Arsenal at Old Trafford.

Before that they play their first World Club Cup game at the Maracana ground in Rio next week when they face Necaxa of Mexico as Group B gets under way.

United's first game of the 1990s was a 0-0 draw at home to Queen's Park Rangers.