GUNNERS SEEN OFF
(Image taken from Manutd.com)
OK...the raving about Arsenal's European run stops here for a while. Arsene Wenger's crew's first trip after their conquering of Turin took them to Old Trafford for the biggest Premiership tie for both sides for ages, United were still chasing Chelsea and Arsenal qualification for the Champions League. Both sides on form. It the text battle between me and my best mate(an ex-United fan turned Gunner)it was I who had the first laugh - Wenger resting his deadliest assasin Thierry Henry for a game against United seemed like one heck of a gamble. The Ruud boy and Rooney were up front for us.
Admittedly my mate was able to respond pretty quickly, Arsenal ran the early stages of the match and Neville wound up having to move fast to shut down Cesce Fabregas at one point. Having said that United did raise their game and fired in their share of freekicks and corners at a nervous Jens Lehmann before a Rooney cross late on got handballed away by Kolo Toure just before half time and if that was anything to go by, Arsenal were going to be lucky to get out of Old Trafford with anything.
The hungry Rooney got his moment in the second half when he picked up a smooth Silvestre cross in the 54th minute. There was only going to be one outcome in that position - 1-0. From there Arsenal looked to counter but nothing ever really happened. Enter Henry but his first act was to send a freekick wide and he never really settled(Arsene, what's the French for 'oops'?). Rooney helped in the final laugh by setting up Park in front of an open goal in the 78th minute. 2-0. 'Game over, return to Highbury'. All my mate could do was plead his team's exhaustion. Whatever.
Elsewhere though, we didn't exactly pick up any favours. Chelsea hammered West Ham 4-1 at Stamford Bridge while the Scousers took care of Bolton at Anfield. Still, I mentioned Chelsea's away form last weekend and there's still that game in hand we have over the Scousers. No worries yet.
North of the border, Aberdeen continued their class form by beating Hibs 1-0 at Pittodrie in the Scottish Premiership. Scott Severin hit a first half winner with a class volley which pretty much summed up the match, the Edinburgh side lucky to limit the damage to one goal. Jimmy Calderwood's suggestion of European football next season sounds optimistic to me(the Reds would need to finish in the top three at least) but it's good to see the Dons on this sort of form anyway.
By that point though, Celtic had already wrapped up the Premiership title. A top of the table clash against Hearts at Celtic Park led to a 1-0 win thanks to an early John Hartson goal and it never looked like being the visitors's night. That's a second winners medal for Roy Keane in his first season north of the border.
Finishing off - how arrogant is Guus Hiddink? Yes he's a class manager I'm not denying that but now he's claimed that he was 'insulted' by the FA only being willing to put him on a shortlist to become the new England manager and has instead gone to Russia to gaffer their national side. I'm sorry but I'm not being bigoted by saying that England are one of international football's big names. There is no where such a set up would allow a foreigner to just stroll in to the job without competition(even if he might have beaten off the competition anyway). I hope we cane Hiddink's new side in the Euro 2008 qualifiers.
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