The pressure was on Arsenal on Monday night after they had been shifted down to third place following wins from Manchester City and Chelsea at the weekend. Arsene Wenger’s men were able to triumph against Aston Villa, however, and returned to the top of the Premier League.Elsewhere, West Ham pulled off the kind of backs to the wall, determined and gritty win that can boost morale for a team that is severely lacking it. Don’t worry Sam, another 16 or so of those and your job should be fine.
Anyway, as we move into the next phase of action, here are three things to look out for from this weekend’s Premier League action.
1) Mourinho vs Moyes at the Bridge
In the match of the weekend we have David Moyes and his merry band of Anderson’s and Nani’s travelling down to London to take up arms against Jose Mourinho’s west London tyrants, the jewel of the King’s Road; Chelsea Football Club.
It’s always a blockbuster fixture when these two teams meet and Sunday’s clash will be no different as Chelsea aim to stay involved with the title race and not lose any ground on Manchester City and Arsenal.
But can United derail Chelsea’s title hopes and record what would be a fantastic win and make ground in the race for the top four? Moyes will be hopeful on Wayne Rooney’s return to the starting XI but even with that good news United will struggle to gain victory on Mourinho’s turf.
2) Tony Pulis receiving a visit from old friends
You may or may not like the baseball cap wearing manager of Crystal Palace, Mr Tony Pulis, but there is no denying that he is able to grind out results when they are needed. Organisation is key to Pulis and it is this approach that allows his teams to stay solid at the back thus giving them far greater chance of gaining points from games.
This Saturday Pulis’ former team, Stoke City, pay a visit to their old manager in south London now under the guidance of a Mr Mark Hughes, or Sparky as he is known in some quarters. Hughes prefers to use a pass it along the ground philosophy with his Stoke which is markedly different from Pulis’ trademark kick it long and kick ’em hard approach.
It will be a clash of styles at Selhurst Park on Saturday but neither manager will care how the points are claimed as we near the business end of this Premier League season.
3) Christian Benteke to start scoring on a regular basis again
It has been a difficult season thus far for Paul Lambert and his Aston Villa team. It started well enough, with a win at the Emirates Stadium on the opening day of the season a few more after that which propelled them to mid table.
The goals have dried up, though, and then Paul Lambert made some controversial (but fair) comments regarding the FA Cup and Villa where then duly knocked out of the competition at home to League One Sheffield Wednesday.
After being thoroughly outplayed by Arsenal for 75 minutes on Monday night a rare occurrence took place at Villa Park; yes, that’s right, Christian Benteke headed in his first goal since the 1800s and suddenly Villa, and Benteke himself, looked full of life once more.
Lambert’s men face a difficult assignment on Saturday evening as they go to Anfield to face a Liverpool team who are firing in goals for fun. In this fixture last season, however, Villa bullied their way to a brilliant 3-1 win with two goals from the mighty BENTEKE.
Perhaps the sight of the Kop End will help the Belgium striker to remember that it is his job to score goals and he will go forth and score many.
Also, Liverpool are prone to the odd mad slip up here and there when things start to look good for them and this is potentially one of those games.