English Premier League, Week 11: Manchester City, United, Chelsea Flatter To Deceive
Arsenal brushed aside West Bromwich Albion 3-0 at the Emirates Stadium thanks to goals from Robin van Persie, Thomas Vermaelen and Mikel Arteta, with the visitors offering virtually nothing to stop the Gunners dominating possession. However, the hosts still found it difficult to penetrate the defence for much of the game, and it took a wonderful through pass from Aaron Ramsey to Theo Walcott to finally make the breakthrough - Walcott's shot was saved but van Persie was on hand to tap in the rebound. After the opener, there were no problems for Arsene Wenger's side, with Vermaelen hammering his first goal of the season after a nice flick by van Persie and Arteta making it three from outside the box in the second half.
Norwich City scored in each half but that ultimately wasn't enough to unseat Aston Villa, with the Canaries' goals sandwiching three from the hosts. Gabriel Agbonlahor was in spectacular form, setting up two and scoring a third, but before he could show his best work Anthony Pilkington had put the Villans behind with a neat free kick following an Alan Hutton foul. Villa were only behind for five minutes, though - Darren Bent was on hand to tap in after Agbonlahor had skinned Kyle Naughton on the right, and they went ahead early in the second half after a poor backpass by Naughton allowed Agbonlahor to turn scorer. Bent's second made things secure, and although a Steve Morrison header made things very interesting indeed the hosts eventually came away with three points and a 3-2 win.
Blackburn Rovers vs. Chelsea
Chelsea ended their two-game losing streak but hardly impressed against Blackburn, who had as many chances as the Blues but somehow failed to convert them. The first half was notable only for a collision between Petr Cech and Ashley Cole that may well have broken the goalkeeper's nose, but Cech played on and came up with two key stops in the second half to preserve Chelsea's Frank-Lampard-given lead, the midfielder diving to put a header beyond Paul Robinson in the Blackburn goal. The visitors then came close to scoring at both ends, Branislav Ivanovic hitting his own crossbar with a wild attempted clearance before Fernando Torres came up with a spectacular miss in injury time to keep the score at 1-0.
Andy Carroll contrived to miss an open goal from six yards as Liverpool laboured to a goalless draw at home to Swansea City, failing to score despite 25 shots. The hosts dominated the first half but nearly paid for their wastefulness in the second as Swansea created several excellent chances but couldn't beat Pepe Reina, and although Michel Vorm was forced into a pair of good saves very late, the Swans were probably good value for their draw.
On a day when Manchester United celebrated 25 years under Sir Alex Ferguson by renaming the north stand at Old Trafford in his honour, his players failed to pay their manager adequate tribute by producing a relatively insipid display that required a Wes Brown own goal and some refereeing luck to get the 1-0 win and three points against lowly Sunderland. Brown flicked into his own net during first half injury time following a Nani cross, and United generated a few more chanced before a strange incident saw Sunderland awarded a penalty which was immediately taken away after a handball call that first went against Phil Jones but was eventually given to Ji Dong-Won. Both teams would generate good chances after that, but Lee Mason's decision not to award the spot kick ended any real hopes of Sunderland taking something out of the match.
Queens Park Rangers vs. Manchester City
League leaders Manchester City were lucky to escape from Loftus Road with a win after being comprehensively outplayed for large portions of their match against newly-promoted QPR and at one point going behind 1-0 thanks to a Jay Bothroyd header. They recovered though, with Edin Dzeko creating and scoring a vital goal at the end of the first half, and David Silva scored shortly after the restart to give the visitors a 2-1 lead. QPR brought them back to level pegging when a ball bounced of Heidar Helguson and in in the 69th minute, but Yaya Toure scored the game's fifth and final goal with a header five minutes later. QPR, who had already hit the post in the first half, came within inches of equalising very late on only to see Helguson crash an effort off the woodwork. Despite the 3-2 loss, the hosts can be proud of a very good performance.
