The international break could not have come at a better time for Manchester United. The match against Sunderland was the last match that Cristiano Ronaldo was suspended for, and, with the matches in mid-week, and another on the weekend it should give him that tiny bit of match fitness he is lacking. That will be the same with Super Saha (a month ago it was injury-prone Saha) who, providing he does actually play for France, will get some extra match fitness. And now, Chelsea’s 5 point lead which was near to being a large enough lead for them to win the Premiership has already been cut down to a not-so-large 2 points, thanks to Martin O’Neill’s Villa. They will have to think about that defeat for a whole 2 weeks, whereas we have finally got some momentum going.
The break will also give Wayne Rooney two more weeks to recover from his foot injury and I wont be surprised to see him make a very unexpected appearance against his former employees, Everton. If not, he should be back in time for the match against Chelsea. If Saha is in hot form Sir Alex will have a very tough decision on his hands, who to play upfront? How about all three? So by the time the match against Everton comes around we could have Rooney, Ronaldo, Saha, Anderson, Tevez, Nani, Scholes and Giggs (he could even benefit from the break and be back to top form) – finally all of our attacking options ready to fire, something we have been waiting for all summer! But knowing our bad luck someone is going to go and get injured. With United players coming back to full fitness the opposite is happening in Chelsea (or should I say Fulham!) with Fat Frank and Drogba injured.
After the game against Everton, we have a tough match against Chelsea (Ed’s note: We play Sporting Lisbon after Everton, something Ollie must have noted. Anyhow, we take it that he means our next Premiership game after Everton is Chelsea.) which, if we could win, would leave us in front of them. This is assuming we also beat Everton.
Following that things get much easier, with fixtures against Birmingham, Wigan, Villa and then Boro. This should provide an opportunity for United to gather some much needed points just before the match against Arsenal, a team which did the double over us last season. So providing we take maximum points from all of the fixtures just before the Arsenal match, we should be in a commanding position, hopefully at the top of the table, before our visit to the Emirates.
Manchester United and Chelsea have been tipped as the two teams that will be battling it out for the Premiership all summer, however it is neither of these two who are on the top of the table at the moment. Liverpool have had their best start to a Premiership campaign for a long time and are a force to be reckoned with. Their new signings, Torres especially, have settled in very quickly and now they are in a position many expected to be occupied by either United or Chelsea. I personally think that Liverpool will struggle in the middle part of the season and will struggle for consistency throughout the season. However, they could become a major title threat if they manage to keep up their good form.
So, at this very moment in time, things are looking up for Manchester United, with Chelsea not hitting their best quite yet. Though there is a long way to go I don’t think it will be too long until we are back where we belong, at the top of the Premiership 🙂
What do you guys think? When would we realistically be top of the table?
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