Premiership Weekend Roundup: October 28-29

Bolton 0 - 4 Manchester United
Chelsea can win games but they can't play attractive football. Arsenal look beautiful but they can't score goals. Manchester United, at the moment, can do both, and it's great to watch. The first 20 minutes of this game, in particular, were fantastic, as they systematically decimated a Bolton team that's looked pretty solid up until now. And Wayne Rooney has now taken any suggestion that he might have been in a slump and stomped all over it like Ricardo Carvalho's balls.

It's funny how I have so much less to say when United are playing well. Just one thing: They were guilty of some terrible marking on set pieces -- they kept leaving players open at the back post, and they were very lucky that Bolton didn't make them pay for it. Although the way United played, they probably would've gone out and scored another three or four goals to retaliate.


Liverpool 3 - 1 Aston Villa
If Liverpool can dominate a game as well as they did in the first half here against a previously unbeaton Aston Villa, why have they sucked so much in other games this season? They didn't dramatically rejig the lineup or anything like that. They just played really good, simple football. IT'S NOT THAT HARD. Or at least it shouldn't be.

Other random questions that are plaguing me today:

• Why was Carragher playing on the left of centre defence and Hyypia on the right for the first half-hour? They switched back to their usual positions after that, but I assume that there must have been some reason for the change.
  
• What's with the new strategy for corners? Instead of Steven Gerrard pinging them all wildly into the box, Luis Garcia was taking a lot of them yesterday, with a second player coming short to give them another option. They didn't always use it, but it was there almost every time.
  
• Liverpool are starting to play better. Stevie G seems to have fixed his hair. Are these two things unrelated?
  
• And finally: Now that they've won a whopping two games in a row, how many changes will Rafa make for the Champions League match against Bordeaux on Tuesday?

Sheffield United 0 - 2 Chelsea
Hilario saved a weak-ass Sheffield United, Frank Lampard scored from a (non-deflected) free kick, and Chelsea won. Business as usual. The one incident that stood out for me was in the second half, when a bunch of the Chelsea players surrounded the ref and tried to pressure him into giving a handball against the Blades. Despite the face that (a) it wasn't intentional, (b) Chelsea came away with the ball anyway, and (c) they were leading 2-0 at the time, so (d) it just made them look like petty douchewads.


Arsenal 1 - 1 Everton
The Gunners only managed a draw despite having more than 70% of the football and Everton having a grand total of one shot on target. Their fans, understandably, are a little disgruntled by the team's approach to the game. Thierry Henry's response:

"I would die like that, playing that type of football, rather than compromise our principles. There are no questions about that, no questions. The fans have the right to speak. I keep on hearing them shout 'shoot'. I don't know what they're trying to say or do. But I think they're getting sucked in by what some people are saying."

This is just a wild guess, but I suspect what they're trying to say is "PUT THE FUCKING BALL IN THE FUCKING NET, TITI."


Other results
Newcastle 0 - 0 Charlton
Fulham 0 - 1 Wigan
Portsmouth 3 - 1 Reading
Watford 0 - 0 Tottenham
West Ham 2 - 1 Blackburn