Chelsea Back on Top as United Stumble

October 6, 2009

Another great week of Premier League football has come to an end with some superb matches, superb goals, drama, action and controversy. All in all, a pretty average week in England’s top flight!

It’s Chelsea who lead the way ahead of the two-week international break. They put the disappointment of defeat by Wigan well and truly behind them as they beat fellow title challengers Liverpool 2-0 at Stamford Bridge. Without scoring, Didier Drogba was mana of the match with a superb performance in creating the Blues’ two goals showing great pace, strength before pin point accuracy in his crosses for Anelka and Malouda to finish.

They leapfrog Manchester United who slipped up at Old Trafford. A fired-up Sunderland side held the champions to a 2-2 draw with Darren Bent once more on the scoresheet for the Black Cats. United substantially under-performed and had Sunderland defender Anton Ferdinand to thank (helping his brother’s team) as he deflected a Patrice Evra shot past his own goalkeeper to give the Red Devils a share of the spoils.

There was a fiercely contested fixture at the Reebok Stadium with Bolton and Tottenham sharing four goals for a 2-2 draw. Spurs seemed to lack the spark up front which is normally provided by Jermain Defoe who sat on the bench as he suffers with a hand injury (although he did make a late appearance). A draw in the end was a fair result.

Two teams who are pushing to break into the top four played each other at Villa Park in the Monday night game. Aston Villa and Manchester City also shared the points in an entertaining 1-1 draw. Both sides showed their huge potential but lacked enough potency to win the game for themselves.

If you wanted to see goals, drama, controversy and no lack of scintillating football, then you had to be at the Emirates Stadium this weekend. Arsenal at their best are brilliant to watch, and going forward they were at their brilliant best against Blackburn as they triumphed 6-2. The Lancashire club will feel a little hard done by as they were denied a ‘stone wall’ penalty when David Dunn was brought down in the box with the score at 3-2. Had they scored it would have been 3-3 and maybe a different result. But Arsenal were awesome in attack and were good value for their six goals.

Nobody would have thought it before the campaign, but the home banker on the coupon in the Premier League is newly-promoted Burnley. Tipped to go down by many, Turf Moor is providing them a home sweet home as they maintained their 100% record there. Good home form is vital to the promoted sides, and this could help Burnley immensely in their bid to stay in the division come May. They defeated fellow promoted club Birmingham by two goals to one.

Everton are getting back to the form which led them to the FA Cup final last season. After the disastrous start losing 6-1 at home to Arsenal on the opening day, the Toffees have gone six games unbeaten and kept that run going with a home draw with Stoke. They had to come from behind as Robert Huth nodded his first goal for his new club, but a superb Leon Osman strike saved a point for David Moyes’ men.

Wigann came thundering back down to earth with a bump. After the euphoria of a 3-1 victory over league leaders Chelsea, they were beaten at the KC Stadium by Hull City. Phil Brown’s team registered an all-important victory with the opening goal coming from new signing Jan Vennegoor of Hesselink. How much does that cost to put on the back of your shirt by the way?! A late strike by Scott Sincalir, his first for the Latics, wasn’t enough as they lost 2-1.

There was a London derby at Upton Park as West Ham took on Fulham with both teams struggling towards the nether regions of the table. Fulham will count themselves a tad unfortunate not to bag all three points as they went into a 2-1 lead in the second half. But Junior Stanislas’ injury time shot deflected into the net for an equaliser to deny Roy Hodgson’s side the win. As a side note, I think there’s been more draws this week than the rest of the season put together!

Lastly, but not leastly, Portsmouth got their first points on the board at the eighth attempt! Rejoice Pompey fans! They managed a victory at Molineux against Wolves with new signing Hassan Yebda grabbing the glory with the only goal of the game. Pompey still sit bottom of the league but at last they are off the mark. Onwards and upwards!

Paul Harper

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