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Early days but City are top
Manchester City top the English premiership table after an excellent start to the season but the same cannot be said of their neighbours Manchester United who are still winless but have a chance to remedy this against Spurs over the weekend.
Man Utd are doing everything right but in the final third they are failing to convert their chances and hence the one goal scored so far. I think they really need a central striker as cover for Louis Saha who can help convert chances they create especially when Wayne Rooney and Cristiano Ronaldo are not in the team.
On the other hand its very hard to tell about Spurs. I thought they played reasonably well against Sunderland without causing any damage and then lost but they had a very poor display against Everton and then turned on the style against Derby.
I think this is the kind of inconsistency that had Spurs allegedly looking at Sevilla's coach Juande Ramos. They should be at their best at Old Trafford because Sir Alex will be going for his first victory of the season.
Elsewhere Jens Lehmann blunders in the first two matches seem to overshadow Arsenal's good performances. Its only two matches so far for the Gunners and therefore too early to judge their performance but at least they have four points which is maybe fair because I think Fulham deserved a draw in their first match.
Liverpool should have beaten Chelsea at Anfield to get a head start against their rivals but a draw suited Chelsea especially with so many players injured at the moment. I think the next time the two teams will meet at Stamford Bridge will see a Blues victory.
On the other end of the table there seems to trouble galore for Bolton. The Trotters are the only team who are still pointless in the premiership and with the way they are playing, its hard to see where they will get their points from.
Things could get worse at Reebok Stadium if they lose El-Hadji Diouf or Nicolas Anelka or both. You cannot afford to lose your best players and still achieve good results especially if you don't replace them with equally good players.
The good news though for all clubs is that the transfer window is still open. I am wondering whether Man Utd will replace Gabriel Heinze who is set to join Real Madrid after he was denied the chance to join Liverpool. With Arjen Robben also set to join Real, I am also wondering whether Chelsea will now go ahead and get Seville's Daniel Alves.
Meanwhile, tipping on TipsChallenge is still tight at this stage of the season but lets see how things will look after another two rounds.
Hey- Great coverage! Would you be interested in posting this on Sportingo?
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Thanks Michelle.Yeah, its been some time since I posted an article on Sportingo and maybe I should modify this one a little bit and post it there.
Cheers.
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My relegation candidates at the moment are Bolton, Derby and Boro. I can see that Derby are going down after losing to Spurs by such a big margin. I fancied them to get a draw against the out of sorts Spurs but for them to lose 4 nil is shocking. Boro were lucky that the ref ruled out a legitimate Fulham goal.
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Hi Nicky, I am wondering where the goals will come from for Boro after losing Viduka and now it seems Yakubu will be leaving for Everton as well. I think they need more than Mido. I think the last few days of the transfer window could be decisive with teams strengthening problem areas.
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...amazing what a good coach can do to a team's confidence and belief within a short period of time. Man City are going to be brought down to earth with a thud this weekend.
Man U will bounce back, they have got the team and quality to do that.
I think what Real are doing is an abuse of players. They bought a whole team of players last season and most of them will be dumped now that another whole team has been bought this season. It must be frustrating if you are a reserve player or in their junior ranks....no chance for a promotion to play in the senior team.
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Mbareboy, I think that the play turnover at Real Madrid can be directly attributed to the coach turnover at the club. New coaches bring in the players they think will help them at the club and when they go some of those players will also go because the new coach may not like them and hence we now see Emerson and Cicinho leave the club and a flurry of new players come in including Robben and Heinze. I think they could have kept Reyes but they didn't make the loan move permanent.
Compare this with Man U and you can see the stability there because Sir Alex has been there for years and therefore there isn't such a player turnover as happens at the Bernabeau.
I think the Arsenal/Man city tie is going to be a very interesting match - maybe it will end up in a draw and I know you don't agree with that.
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