English Premier League Saturday: Two From Javier Hernandez Sees Manchester United To Comfortable Win Over Wigan

This goal only served to rile up the Villa, and Ashley Young scored just a minute later. Again, it was Downing breaking up the right that made the goal possible. When he cut inside, two Blackburn defenders came out to meet him, leaving Young in a pocket of space. Downing sent the ball in, Young pounced and put the ball in the back of the net for his second of the match.

Newcastle, for their part, patiently waited for Bolton to make their move, refusing to give the Trotters any opportunities. And without those opportunities, Stephen Harper was asked fewer chances in the second half than he heard in the first.

And for that reason alone, Coyle should be disappointed. Given an opportunity to take all three from a club who will be competing with them for the last Europa League spot, Bolton seemed to lack the drive to get a win. At the beginning of the day, the Trotters may have been content with a one out of St. James’. Given the circumstances of the match, the result has to disappoint.

The only negative for Everton in the match was an injury to Maouane Fellaini. The Belgian hit the pitch after picking up an ankle injury and after trying to play through the injury for several minutes he had to come off because of the knock.

Meanwhile, the win moved Everton up four spots in the table to 10th on 33 points, although their next match is out of league as they take on Reading in a fifth round FA Cup tie.

That’s four goals against Blackburn for Young this season, but then again, Villa have played Blackburn four times. The Villa faithful will be relieved that their Blackburn bogie curse has been lifted, having not beaten them in the Premier League over the past three fixtures, but easily sending them off in cup matches. The 4-1 scoreline will surely be sufficient for all three points.

West Brom will play on Monday and have a chance to pass their rivals, but for two days, Wolves will be able to look down on the Baggies, set to finally see themselves out of the drop.

Aston Villa defender Richard Dunne helped give Blackburn Rovers their 81st minute goal, but the own-goal anti-hero won’t see another added to his tally. Rovers striker Nikola Kalinić gave a superb effort, cutting through the Villa defense to send in a long range effort. The ball took a deflection off Dunne, giving it a crazy looping curl that Brad Friedel had no chance of reaching. But with less than ten minutes left, do the visitors really have any chance of catching up with Villa?

Blackburn look fairly defeated by this point, even against a weakened Villa defense. Their away record speaks volumes, and they almost seem to have no idea what they might do to create chances. Instead, Villa are dominating, snatching back possession and taking every opportunity to take shots at Paul Robinson’s goal. Should Villa take all three points, they’ll move ahead of Rovers in the table, giving Villa a bit more breathing space.

It’s difficult to blame Blackpool too much, playing down a man thanks to DJ Campbell’s late first half indiscretion. But if you’re looking for points of criticism, you could start with nobody being able to get out and contest Doyle’s cross. It was too easy for the Irishman to hit a curling ball to the far post, having been given the time to place the pass perfectly. And with Blackpool’s line playing too high, no defenders had a chance to turn and get into a position to contest the ball. Ebanks-Blake, running onto the play, was able to blow past the defense for an easy goal.

Now into the 85th minute, Wolves look set to temporarily jump all the way to 17th place, out of the jump. They will be even on points with currently 17th West Brom, and with a three goal margin set to improve their difference, they’ll momentarily own the tiebreaker over their rivals.

The goal game as O’Hara claimed a ball just inside Blackpool’s half, his head of stream carrying up to within two strides of the Tangerines’ area, uncontested. There, the former Spur pulled-up and let go of a low shot toward the right corner. Kingson was poorly positioned to play the ball, the shot skidding past him before nestling inside the post, giving Wolverhampton their insurance.

The confrontation came when Taylor was tracking back to his right flank, ready to challenge for a 50-50 ball. Elmander, coming in from wide, was set to beat Taylor and play the ball, causing a moment of desperation from Taylor. Taylor left both his feet go, showed the bottom of his boots as he jumped straight into Elmander’s ankles.

Thankfully, the Swede as able to react quick enough to avoid injury. Still, Newcastle will play the last half of this match, tied 1-1, with only 10 men.

But can Villa keep the lead and all three points? Villa are notorious this season for giving away the lead when scoring the first goal, and with the visitors now forced out of a pure defensive position, Villa fans will be on the edge of their seats, convinced that Blackburn’s equalizer will be coming at any moment.

That advantage has led to two changes from Ian Holloway. Toward the end of the first half, Ludovic Sylvestre was seen playing wider than Eardley, an attempt to contain Jarvis. Holloway also brought in Luke Varney for an ineffective Sergey Kornilenko.

The second half will see Sunderland desperately chasing some goals in hopes of avoiding their fourth straight loss, but it is a long road back for the team. They’ve been outclassed thus far and will need a massive turnaround to find two goals, let alone keep the Toffees from adding a third.

The incident started rather innocuously, with a long ball played out of Blackpool’s end leading to an aerial challenge to be contested by Campbell and Stearman. Campbell, trying to position himself under the ball, ended-up backing into Stearman, who took exception to an elbow unintentionally put into his chest. Stearman responded by shoving Campbell in the back, leading to the attacker throwing his hands into the face of Steerman.

As the players were separated by their teammates, referee Neil Swarbrick ran over and showed Campbell the red card. The Blackpool striker is now set to miss the next three matches.