United 1 - 0 Arsenal

DDG

Smalling Evans Vidic(Cleverley) Evra

Valencia Carrick Jones Kagawa(Giggs)

Rooney RVP(Fellaini)

What a performance by United! That's exactly what our season needed; a win against the team every newspaper has been blabbering about how good they are. Yes, Arsenal are having a good run at the top but today's game, I believe, was their first real test. During the first half their players were inexistent and, although they improved during the second period, they failed to display the tiki-taka football everybody has been raving about. They had more attempts at goal than us but in reality none were really threatening. Most of their shots came from outside the box and there were a few which ended in row Z. With the exception of Sagna, I wasn't too impressed with the way the Gunners' players played. On the other hand we could have sealed the win twice. Roo missed a good chance and so did Smalling.

I cannot really single out a player who didn't do his absolute best today. Smalling, Jones and Rooney were our best players. f I had to choose a man of the match, it would be Jones. He chased every ball in the middle of the park and managed to break down a lot of Arsenal attacks. During the second half, when our injured captain had to be taken off, Jones was a beast at the heart of our defence. Excellent. Smalling missed a chance to put the game to bed (and maybe spare my heart a couple of beat-skipping moments) but I was really impressed with his performance at right back. That was probably one of his finest displays in the red of United. At the front, Rooney ran his socks off. At one point, probably sometime near the 80th minute, he was defending our goal in our box and in 5 seconds he conceded a free-kick in Arsenal's half near their box. If that's not commitment then I don't know what is. 

RVP scored a good header (with the help of his shoulder) to haunt his ex-employers. I think that was van Persie's 3rd goal vs Arsenal since he joined us. I'm not completely sure though. I enjoyed seeing him celebrate as much as I enjoyed his goal. That celebration had 'passion' written all over it. So much for Arsene's claims that RVP is still an Arsenal boy. We've got two world class strikers and two very good understudies who should help us keep progressing. Strikers can carry a whole team, just look at what Sturridge and Suarez are doing to Liverpool. They're second and they've got a pretty ordinary team, if you ask me. That showed when they were played off the park by Arsenal last week. 

So, it's been a really good weekend. Scrap that, it has been an EXCELLENT weekend. City lost, Tottenham lost, Chelsea drew(should have lost), Everton drew and we won our game vs the Gunners. I'm not saying we'll win the league because of today's game but at least Moyes has shown his doubters that he's a good manager. And for all those people creaming their pants whenever they see Mourinho and his team, it's good to know that our manager is only one point away from the guy with the biggest ego on the face of earth. The media leads you to believe that we're 20 points adrift. 

This was a must win game and thankfully our players delivered. Two massive games await us though. We'll be facing Cardiff and Tottenham away from home. Difficult fixtures but we've gathered some momentum so we should be up for those games. Come on United! 

Well done Ozil. If it wasn't for your constant misplaced passes, I wouldn't have realised you were playing today.