WOW!
The contrast was gobsmacking and mind-boggling between the two Manchester sides. City were top-class sweeping aside Aston Villa, whilst United flopped to a shock defeat at Norwich, with two hat-trick candidates in Sergio Aguero and Carlos Tevez for the prior whilst the latter were held back at Carrow Road and obviously missed Wayne Rooney. It was a surpirse to see Roberto Mancini's side use alternate penalty takers, especially with a hat-trick on the line. It is maybe a good tactic to keep the goalkeeper guessing, on his toes and/or confused. But I would have thought a striker on a hat-trick would have his objections against not being the penalty taker. It was good team play in the end though.
And Anthony Pilkington's brilliant header was a smacker for Norwich and a deserved winner against Sir Alex Ferguson's men. The former United trainee pulled ahead of Chris Smalling before looping a header over Anders Lindegaard on
the hour mark. Comeback kings United are used to going behind and still bag the three points later on, but this time it was not to be and the Red Devils fell to their third defeat of the season and into second place, one point behind league leaders City. OMG!
The weekend was packed full of surprises and sides chuffed to finally be back on the winners list with Arsenal, Reading and Southampton, plus Norwich, Swansea and West Brom! I would love to see what the odds were for these results! Reading got their first win of the season with a great comeback from being a goal down and deserving the three points for their stubbornness and commitment.
Steve Clarke has done a great job at West Brom and they should have now shut up all their doubters with their convincing win against Chelsea. Their formation worked a treat with striker Peter Odemwingie nodding in the winner to continue his side's impressive run and shoot them up into the fourth Champions League qualification spot.
TOP!
Southampton's performance was impressive and mouthwatering. Nigel Adkins knew his men would do a good job and not sit back and so they did. After the Saints went ahead, a lot of sides would have sat back kept the back line strong to keep the lead. But that did not happen in this fixture. The visitors kept themselves forward, on attack and pressure up on the home side. It was a delight to see and watch and a fully deserved win and three points for the promoted side. If they keep up this work ethic, I don't think they will struggle to stay up.And I have to give Fulham a mention after they kept fighting on, even after going down to ten, then nine men! Defender Brede Hangeland's sending off was harsh and substitute's Mladen Petric late injury after he had scored the equaliser did not help. But in the end Sunderland's stubbornness prevailed and the visitors ended up two goals to the good. It will be a hard lesson and feel harsh for Martin Jol's men, but the spirit is there.
FLOP!
QPR and Mark Hughes have to be really worried! Hughes' men lacked confidence, desire and a plan in their defeat against Southampton and were left still looking for their first win of the season stuck at the bottom of the table with just four points from 12 games and five points from safety. Much in contrast to Fulham mentioned above, there is a difference between a hard fought defeat and being outplayed and not showing or giving much for it. HERO!
Liverpool finally found the winning way thanks to a certain Mister Suarez once again! The Uruguayan starred with two goals against Wigan and provided one for man-of-the-match Jose Enrique, his first for the club. This took Suarez's tally for the season to 13 goals for Liverpool and bagged his side only their second home win of the season in the Premier League to lift them up to 11th spot in the table. ZERO!
Emmanuel Adebayor went from hero to zero within minutes at the Emirates. The Togolese striker scored against his former employers, giving Tottenham a well deserved lead as they had started the game well on top. But minutes later, he threw the game out of the window for Spurs letting emotions get the better of him when he saw red for his lunge on Santi Cazorla. They still played and fought on, the scoreline was harsh on them. But hopefully the lesson was learned by Adebayor! His stupidity let the Gunners back into the game and they made the most of it, netting five goals and bagging three points on their local rivals. My Predictions => Actual Results
Arsenal 2-1 Tottenham => 5-2
Liverpool 2-1 Wigan => 3-0
Man City 2-1 Aston Villa => 5-0
Newcastle 2-1 Swansea => 1-2
QPR 2-1 Southampton => 1-3
Reading 2-1 Everton => 2-1
West Brom 2-1 Chelsea => 2-1
Norwich 2-1 Man United => 1-0
Fulham 2-1 Sunderland => 1-3
West Ham 2-1 Stoke => 1-1
In case you noticed and wondered, I once again forgot to put through my predictions, hence, all games were set to 2-1 automatically...
*All images taken from the BBC website's match reports
No comments:
Post a Comment