Arsenal are flying after winning 4-1 at Everton.
West Ham are on a high too after beating Manchester United 2-1 at Upton Park. But they have a lot of injuries.
Last season the Hammers beat Arsenal home and away but they will find a different team this time – tougher, quicker at the back, and very fit from the 70th minute to the 94th.
West Ham couldn’t believe their luck on Saturday when Cristiano Ronaldo fired that penalty wide, after he had earlier headed in a Ryan Giggs cross to clinch a typical counter-attack
Even so, United were still winning the game. They were winning the game for an hour.
Then Mark Noble took a corner on the right and big Matthew Upson, the best header of a ball when he was at Arsenal, ran in and jumped but Anton Ferdinand got up in front of him and nodded in for 1-1 in 77 minutes.
In 82, Noble sent in a very high free-kick and the giant Vidic jumped and Upson got a foot above him and sent a thunderous header into the top corner. A monster header that gave him his first goal for West Ham. Bizarrely, the champions had made the same mistake twice in five minutes. A big man with a running jump will always get up above a big man making a standing jump.
With Arsenal coming back to win 4-1 at Everton, it’s time to ask : Do Arsenal want it more than Man United ? On Boxing Day 2007, it looked that way.
Sure, a two-point lead is nothing and United will beat Birmingham at Old Trafford, perhaps with Rooney and Carrick restored. Fergie welcomes Brum boss Alex McLeish, who played for him at Aberdeen.
Basically, Sir Alex wants the Champions League.He has won nine titles in his first 20 years at Old Trafford. The first was in 1993 with Eric Cantona and the ninth came in 2007, six points above Chelsea and 21 above Liverpool in third place.
Sir Alex could win it this again year if he needed it again. But what he wants, what he really, really wants, is Moscow and history : Sir Alex Ferguson 1999 and 2008. Sounds good that. Looks good too. He wants one more European Cup than Sir Matt Busby.
On the other hand, club-builder Arsene Wenger needs the title because he has won nothing since 2005. This is the post-Highbury period, the post-Thierry period. It’s the Emirates, it’s Gallas & Fabregas, it’s time for his policy of buying kids to be vindicated.
He has surprised us so far by winning 14 out of 20 games and drawing five, by choosing a captain we didn’t expect, by freezing out Gilberto and Lehmann, by creating a more rugged style of play which still pleases the eye. This Arsenal has steel and stamina as well as the trademark slick pass-and-move.
This season the whole is greater than the sum of the parts, so Arsenal will continue to prosper through the early part of 2008, even when individuals are not doing especially well.
Just don’t mention the African Cup of Nations : Man United have no African players.