When Fabio da Silva was booked for his twin brother Rafael’s foul in the League Cup

Identical Brazilian twins playing on either side of the Manchester United defence, Rafael and Fabio da Silva became successful cult heroes at Manchester United from a young age.

The gifted twins arrived from Fluminense without having played a senior match. That didn’t stop them from making a positive contribution to silverware, though Rafael da Silva played over three times as many matches for United as his twin.

However, Fabio started the Champions League final against Barcelona in 2011. United went on to lose against one of the greatest teams Sir Alex Ferguson faced, two years after suffering defeat to the same Barcelona team in 2009.

Fabio left United in 2014 to play under Ole Gunnar Solskjaer at Cardiff City, whereas Rafael stayed for a year before being sold by Louis van Gaal to Lyon. There is no shortage of stories from the time the Da Silva twins spent at Old Trafford.

Fabio da Silva’s mistaken identity in 2-0 win over Barnsley

League Cup champions United beat Barnsley 2-0 to book a place in the quarter-finals. Ferguson made 11 changes to the team that had lost against Liverpool.

Danny Welbeck opened the scoring after six minutes, converting Anderson’s corner with a headed finish. Barnsley had a chance to equalise through Daniel Bogdanovic when he hit the post, but Michael Owen was never in doubt as he doubled the lead on the hour mark.

South Yorkshire Police reported 10 arrests following crowd trouble, but referee Chris Foy had plenty of decisions to make to control the flow of the match. Gary Neville was sent off for a tackle on Adam Hammil, and the referee was at fault for booking the wrong player for a separate foul on a Barnsley player.

• Man Utd 2-0 Barnsley – League Cup (2009) stats
• Possession: Barnsley 48%-52% MUFC
• Attempts on target: Barnsley 5-7 MUFC
• Attempts off target: Barnsley 12-3 MUFC
• Corners: Barnsley 9-6 MUFC
• Fouls: Barnsley 15-9 MUFC

A challenge on Jamal Campbell-Ryce in the 83rd minute, involving Fabio and Rafael, led to the wrong twin being shown a yellow card. Television highlights showed that Rafael committed the foul, but it was Fabio whose name was written into the referee’s book.

Ferguson had previously joked that he could only tell the difference between the twins by the wedding ring Fabio wore. Anyhow, the yellow card was later appealed by United, leading to the FA reversing the yellow card.

Former United forward Mark Robins was in charge of Barnsley on the night. Speaking to the press after the game, he said (via BBC Sport): “I’m disappointed. We must have had between 15 and 17 efforts on goal, but when you don’t take one of them you don’t deserve to win the game.

“I think we paid them too much respect at the start of the game; we were lacking a bit of belief at times. But not many teams will create that many chances against Man United.”