F365 Opinion

Another bad weekend for the idea that Arsene Knows and the worst position in the 'best league in the world'...

Winners

Aston Villa
Only their second win over a Big Four team in 35 attempts (the other being against Chelsea in the final days of Jose Mourinho's reign last September).


Gabriel Agbonlahor
A note of encouragement ahead of his probable international debut in Berlin is the persuasive evidence that Agbonlahor thrives on the big occasion. Having scored at Villa Park against both Chelsea and Manchester United last season, his goal this weekend completed a feat that no other player in the league can boast: the 22-year-old has now scored at each of the home grounds of the Big Four as well as at both Goodison Park and White Hart Lane.


A Manchester Boy
For a local lad, it does not get any better. "I wouldn't say I've dreamt about this but I've thought about it every minute of my life since I started playing football, really, and there's nothing better than it, to tell you the truth," beamed 17-year-old Danny Welbeck after marking his Premier League debut with a goal within 21 minutes of his introduction against Stoke.

That his rasping strike crashed into the net in front of the Stretford End carried extra resonance because Welbeck is that rarest of things: a Manchester lad in the Manchester United first-team squad. Unless either Paul Scholes or Gary Neville can defy expectation and carry on for another year, Welbeck and Wes Brown are likely to be the only local lads in the United squad next season. While the prospect of Neville making way for a precociously-talented Brazilian is a sign of times, the emergence of Welbeck was a reminder of a bygone past: when Brown, the last local lad to make himself a regular at Old Trafford, made his debut 11 years ago he was one of 11 players in the champions' squad born in the area of Greater Manchester.


Manchester United And Chelsea
It has become a tried-and-familiar ritual that whenever a club is promoted to the top tier their employers immediately speak giddily of a trip to Old Trafford as being the date on the calendar they cannot wait for. Goodness only knows why the impatience.

United are not the behemoths of the league because they are friendly hosts. Having beaten each of last season's promoted teams both home and away, they had already scored four against both Hull City and West Brom this term before this weekend's infliction of a five-goal thrashing of Stoke. The sights may be fantastic but the Theatre of Dreams only offers nightmares for the unwary.

If United's win was an exercise in routine then Chelsea's demolition of the Baggies was a matter of the inevitable.

Since Roman Abramovich's arrived in the summer of 2003 to spend his billions in an attempt to topple United, the draw with Reading on Boxing Day 2006 remains unique as the only match in which Chelsea have dropped points against a promoted team. It has been an astonishingly successful and efficient application of overwhelmingly superior resources.

Those who belittle Chelsea as bullies, and dismiss such victories as 'only against West Brom', should consider the weight of the points collected by that 'bullying' as well as the identity of two of the four teams to have already beaten Arsenal this season. Three points is three points no matter the calibre of opposition - it's not what fights you win, but how many - and Chelsea's ruthless and apparently unstoppable exploitation of that great truism of league football is why they remain favourites to lift the Premier League title in May.


Cristiano Ronaldo
The stats say it all: 101 goals in 253 games, joint-second in the top scorers chart despite not starting a league game until September 27.


Liverpool
In the most part, Bolton matched Liverpool at the Reebok this Saturday. But what separated the two sides was a world apart.

What Liverpool had in their side was a touch of quality, manifesting itself in Fernando Torres' pass for Steven Gerrard's goal and Dirk Kuyt's header from an equally-outstanding cross, while all Bolton had on their side was the weight of pressure. It took them so far, but only so far. Liverpool's was a good win, an important win and a comfortable win because what they did to Bolton in those two moments to win the game their hosts were simply incapable of reciprocating.


Daniel Agger
As a defender, Agger is an inferior option compared to Martin Skrtel but the Dane does possess the ability to pass and play the ball out of defence. It is a particularly valuable asset to bring to a defence as unrefined as Liverpool's and especially in matches, like at Bolton, when that defence will see so much of the ball because the opposition are playing with just a single forward in front of a packed midfield.


Sunderland
A reasonable conclusion to reach from Saturday's win is that Sunderland will not be in the relegation mix in May if Djibril Cisse and Kenwyne Jones remain fit.


Ryan Taylor
Three of the Wigan full-back's five league goals have been scored against Newcastle.


Nicolas Anelka
The useful thing when discussing strikers is that there is a simple measurement available whenever one is acclaimed to be in "the best form of his career". In Nicolas Anelka's case, the goalscoring stats do John Terry's claim full vindication: 13 for the season, 12 in 12 starts, eight in his last four. Quite a turnaround for a player who caused a stir in the summer by declaring: "Goals are not my thing."

Anelka's reasoning was a wish to prove himself as a footballer: "It is for this reason that I want to play behind a main striker. It is where I feel I'm most useful." Whether or not he still believes as much is unknown, but his current spell should have brought the self-realisation that he is most useful as a footballer when he plays with goalscoring as his priority.

At The Hawthorns, Anelka resembled the Anelka of ten years ago who took the league by storm by playing on the last defender, using his pace and thriving on the space behind. His emergence turned Arsenal from a decent side into a double-winning side that year so Terry's description this weekend of the Frenchman as "our saviour" rang out as a warning as well as a tribute.


Losers

Heurelho Gomes And His Premier League Peers
By common consent, English goalkeeping is at a 30-year low. The problem that clubs in England are now discovering is that there are no easy answers abroad either.

Because the Premier League's rise has been built on foreign talent it is understandable why so many clubs have turned overseas for a solution to the dearth of homegrown shot-stopping talent. Yet what they have encountered is a worldwide downturn. So it is that Tottenham lurched from one problem in the shape of England's mediocre World Cup goalkeeper into a calamity with a goalkeeper hopelessly ill-equipped for the demands of the English game. A drama has become a crisis.

In a different league, in a different style of the game, Gomes is an excellent goalkeeper. He still holds the record, for instance, of the most number of clean sheets in the Dutch first division and for a period in 2004 did not concede a goal for almost 1000 minutes. Contrary to appearances, he is not a flapping fool and not an inept goalkeeper. What he is, however, is ill-prepared for the Premier League.

His aberration at Fulham was borne of a wrecked confidence and there may be no comeback for the Brazilian or the theory that goalkeeping salvation is available on the continent.

Gomes' error was the worst of a bad bunch on a weekend of calamites from Scott Carson and Manuel Almunia failing to protect their near post to Thomas Sorensen failing to locate the ball even when it was struck straight at him.

Whatever the genuine ranking of this league, it is at its worse between the sticks.


Cesc Fabregas
So much for the theory that Fabregas required a rest and would revert to last season's type thereafter. Despite a week of inactivity, the Spaniard provided a horror show against Aston Villa. In reply to Alan Hansen's question of "Have you ever seen him misplace a pass like that?", the correct answer is 'yes, plenty of times this season, but not as many times in a single game before'.

Why has his form collapsed? Fabregas' brilliance in 2007/08 coincided with Mathieu Flamini's introduction and the onset of his dramatic regression began with Flamini's departure. Perhaps the Frenchman is to Fabregas what Jean Tigana was to Michel Platini.


Arsenal
A frequently overlooked cause of Arsenal's decline in 2008 is their overhaul in personnel - a surprising oversight given that Arsene Wenger has frequently justified his refusal to spend substantial funds because he is in the process of team building. The argument does not stand up to history or scrutiny.

Never mind that the three defensive midfielders who began the year in Arsenal's squad have all been sold and not replaced, consider the altered identity of the Gunners' first team over the course of the past 12 months: Of the 11 players who started the victory at Villa Park last December to extend Arsenal's lead at the top of the table, just four - Almunia, Bacary Sagna, Gael Clichy and William Gallas - started this weekend.

Hansen is on repeat to state he could not believe Arsenal would play this season as well as they did last season. He was aiming too low. Arsenal cannot play as well as last season because this season's team is inferior. Consider the difference in experience and production between the midfield quartet of last year - Hleb, Rosicky, Flamini and Fabregas - and that of now - Walcott, Nasri, Denilson and Fabregas. The transformation reeks of decline. They are no better up front either, and arguably worse given that Abou Diaby is the back-up equivalent of Eduardo.

The youth team's exploits in the Carling Cup have offered a glimpse of a promising future but in the here and now Arsenal have gone backwards.


The Other One Up Front For City
There's chalk and cheese and then there's Darius Vassell playing in the same team as Robinho.


West Ham
Two points from their last seven league outings.


Gianfranco Zola
The West Ham manager should be relieved in January if he is told by the club's hierachy that there is no money to spend because a shortage of funds was the reason why the Hammers appointed the unqualified Italian as their manager two months ago and that absence of funds is likely to save him from the sack - at least until a time when their plight becomes appreciably more precarious than it is now.


Rob Styles
There is no point adding any more fuel to the debate about the legitimacy of Bolton's 'goal' just before half-time because the fact that the debate is raging confirms the difficulty of the decision. It was marginal, it could have been a penalty, a foul or a goal, and there is something to be said for each option. Castigating Styles and proclaiming his decision to be wrong is thus utterly unreasonable (although it would be a refreshing change if Liverpool supporters could acknowledge that Nolan's infringment was far from as blatant and conclusive as they are intent on depicting).

The only point to add is the puzzlement that Styles was in charge of the game at all given it was Bolton's highest-profile match since their trip to Old Trafford last month when he broke the deadlock for United with a blunder unsurpassed this season. It is hardly as if he is a local to the north-west - Styles is based in Hampshire - and hardly as if memories of that unfathomable error are faded - he has refereed just four games since. Given that recent history, he should have been nowhere near the Reebok this weekend.

Pete Gill