His performance at Birmingham was fantastic, and he single handedly earned Manchester City a point.  He demonstrated the full range of keeping skills that he possesses; including saving long shots, one-on-ones, crosses, and even a penalty save.

There are not many reasons to envy City as a United fan, but Given is definitely one of them.  He has to be City’s best signing, and for only £8Million…that’s a bargain.  When Van der Sar retires United could really use a player of Given’s quality as his successor…

The most noticeable absentee was the injured Steven Gerrard, and it looked like it could be a difficult game for Liverpool without their iconic skipper.  But as soon as the first ball was kicked it was clear that Liverpool were well up for the match.

As you are probably well aware Liverpool ended up winning 2-0 and I won’t go into a detailed match report here, but rather pick out a few things that bothered me.

I think it was a big mistake for Ferguson to play Scholes in the midfield.  Scholes is a Manchester United legend, and will always have a place in the heart of the fans, but it’s just the nature of live that players get older and lose their edge.  For me ever since last season Scholes has been on a down hill slope, at this point he rarely has a good game.  Against Liverpool he got caught on the ball many times and just didn’t seem able to keep up with the play.  My biggest surprise was that the normally astute Ferguson did not pick up on this and substitute him out for Anderson or Nani at half time.

Another issue which has started to bother me a lot for the last few matches is Berbatov and his increasingly poor attitude.  At this point you see him complaining and have a go at other players whenever Berbatov misplaces a pass or doesn’t get the ball he wants; and not in a constructive way, but more of a blame game.  I’m shocked Ferguson has let him get away with it, as his performances just don’t warrant any special treatment.  I he doesn’t get his head right Ferguson needs to teach him a lesson and let Machada and Wellbeck have a chance at starting matches.

On a plus side the defense looks a lot stronger with Van Der Saar in the net; with Ben Foster playing I’m sure the score could have been 4 or 5.

Liverpool played very well, and I have to take my hat off to them with the likes of Lucas and Carragher really playing brilliantly after being criticized for recent poor performances.

At the beginning of the 2008/2009 season Ronaldo missed the first few months due to an ankle injury.  After coming back and having a successful season he claimed that the injury was behind him and a one off occurrence.  Real Madrid obviously believed this when they offer United a record breaking transfer fee for his services.

However in the friendly last weekend against Hungary Ronaldo limped off the field with another injury.  After coming back to Madrid for examination the club issued this statement:

“After a clinical examination and an MRI scan, it is confirmed the player has suffered a recurrence of his injury to his right ankle, a medial collateral sprain with inflammation in the bone,”

All players pick up injuries from time to time; the real problem comes if you pick up an injury which keeps coming back.  If you are constantly worrying about a certain injury while playing it’s impossible to perform at the peak level.

Ronaldo may be able to recover from this injury and move on, but with the way he plays; relying on speed and quick turning skills this kind of injury could signal the decline of the worlds best player.

At this point it’s clear that this isn’t realistic and it does not appear that Sir Alex had such lofty ambitions for Owen.

Ferguson has only used Owen sparingly, mostly as a substitute; one of those final roll-of-the-dice players, who you can throw on in a clutch situation and they might be able to nick a goal for you.

Owen had spent most of the summer defending his fitness, saying that he wasn’t an injury prone player.  And for the start of the season he backed up that talk and avoided any kind of embarrassing first game blow out.

I think it’s time to be honest; Owen is still a good player who might be able to come on as a substitute and get a goal, but he’s never going to be his former self, he will probably not play any significant future England roll, and he will pick up injuries.

The question now is how much better is the Manchester United treatment room compared to Newcastle.  If they can get him back quickly in the next few weeks then he may be able to shrug off this incident, but if it turns into months on the sideline it could be curtains for Owen’s dream comeback.

Anyways time to get back to football!

Manchester City have revealed their £32.5million striker, Robinho, is expected to take another 3 weeks to recover from injury.

At first this seems to be very bad news, but this might not necessarily be the case.  Robinho was not playing exceptionally well prior to the injury, and Manchester City have been done very well without him.

When he does come back from injury Mark Huge will undoubtedly feel the pressure to get him back into the team.  This would likely result in Bellamy or Tevez having to ride the bench; although they have both been playing very well and would definitely be disgruntled by such a move .

Huge may have dodge a team selection bullet for now, but at some point he is going to have to start making difficult decisions as to which big ego he is most willing to rub the wrong way.

There was no love lost when Adebayor left Arsenal in the summer and headed for Manchester City, and in this game he was keen to prove his previous employers had undervalued his services.

He was a valuable member of the city team in this match, and not only for scoring the 3rd goal, but also for his excellent defensive headers from Arsenal set pieces.  With Adebayor and Lescott dominating in the air inside the City box the Gunners did not look a goal threat from corners or free kicks.

However in my opinion the man of the match was Craig Bellamy, with pace to burn and the energy to run for the full 90 minutes, he looks like a big asset for Manchester City.  His tracking back and tackling may have gone unnoticed by some, but you can be sure his teammates and manager will be giving him a pat on the back in the locker room.  Plus it was his goal which put City 2-1 up, when Arsenal looked like they might go on to win.  And his pass which setup Wright-Phillips for the fourth goal.

After Arsenal leveled the game at one all it looked like they would run away with the game, but then City used the magic strategy which always seem to send Arsenal into a tail spin.  They started putting in some tough tackles and even a few late challenges and the Gunner were easily shaken.

If Arsene Wenger wants Arsenal to finish in the top four this season he is definately going to have to figure out a way to toughen up his team.

This year it was a bit of an anti climate with none of the “big four” making any last minute moves and no real superstar players being signed.  As a United fan I was a bit disappointed, I know Sir Alex had said there would be no further signing this summer, but I had thought this might just be a ploy to throw others off his trail.  I think United could have really used at last one “game changing” player to come into the squad, and I’m starting to wonder if that Ronaldo money was really available, or if the Glazers are bleeding the club dry.

It seems Spurs did the best on deadline day with the signing of Nico Kranjcar.  I had previous mentioned that Kranjcar was unhappy at Portsmouth and only had 1 year left on his contract, so when Luca Modric broke his leg it’s no surprise the Harry Redknapp swooped in for Kranjcar’s signature.  I’m starting to worry that Spurs could be a real force to contend with this season.

Another of the more notable signings was Richard Dunne from Manchester City to Aston Villa.  I would say that for a bottom-half-of-the-table club trying to break into the top half, this would be a good signing.  But I thought Villa’s goal was to break into the top 4?  Manchester City would seem to be one of Villas direct rivals this season, so I can’t understand buying a player who has been pushed onto the bench of your rivals?  Maybe Martin O’Neil thinks he can get something better out of Dunne…I’m not so sure there’s anything extra to get…

Given his role in the Spurs revolution the news that he has sustained a broken leg in the match again Birmingham will be a serious blow.  Reportedly Modric is expected to be out of action for at least six weeks.  Leaving Tottenham to try and find a spark from somewhere else.

As an England and Manchester United fan I can’t help taking some heart at the Croatian’s misfortune.  He will miss both the International World Cup quantifier between Croatia and England next week, and also the Premier League meeting with Manchester United the following weekend.  He will be sorely missed by his teams in both events.

It’s hardly surprising that another switch was on the card seeing as Tottenham now have Benoit Assou-Ekotto at left-back, who’s looking like a top class player, and also Gareth Bale as a backup.  It seems unlike that Chimbonda would get much game time at all.

All the moving around has got to take a toll on a player and it appears to have taken a toll on Chimbonda, who has seen both his first team appearances and transfer fees eroded.  In 2006 he was worth £4.5 million from Wigan to Tottenham, now his value has been cut in half.

2005–2006		Wigan Athletic
2006–2008		Tottenham Hotspur
2008–2009		Sunderland
2009–2009		Tottenham Hotspur
2009–????		Blackburn Rovers

There have also been reports that Vidic’s wife is unhappy in Manchester; but I’m not sure how true this story can be if she managed to live in Moscow before coming to the UK.

Vidic has put the gossip to bed by clearly stating that he will be staying at United for at least this season.

United need Vidic for at least this season; they have some great prospects coming through with Johnny Evans already proving last season that he is a top level center back and ready for first team football.  The red devils also have Craig Cathcart and Johnny’s brother Corry Evans who also look like quality players, but still learning their trade.

There are always a few transfer rumors about top class players, it’s what sells newspapers, but the talk about Vidic does seem to be above average, and I have a feeling he will not be with United forever.