United go from extreme to extreme

To be fair, you can forgive Alex Ferguson a tepid United performance in light of recent results. Before this win over Aston Villa, United hadn’t won in three but had arguably put in two of their most rousing performances in recent years. The siege against Newcastle, following on from a similar onslaught against Benfica, produced some thrilling football but ultimately no winning goal.

Yet, having reined in the team’s attacking instincts at Villa Park, United returned to the form of October and most of November by producing yet another 1-0 win. Perhaps appropriately, a defender got the goal in Phil Jones, who opened his senior account.

As it stands – and as we’ve said here before – United seemingly must find the balance. And, of course, that balance usually comes in midfield. Yes, we’ve beaten this drum but it is the key issue with United: without Cleverly or a central midfielder of similar guile or invention, this is going to be an issue: open but unreliable or reliable but austere.

Bottoms up… again

Last week, Wigan beat Sunderland with a last-minute winner to jump off the bottom of the table and reinvigorate their confidence. And, for the first 28 minutes against Arsenal, that seemed to be the case. The problem with Wigan, however, is that as Roberto Martinez attempts to instil an aesthetically-pleasing style of football on a young, evolving team, it’s quite a fragile construct. With momentum, they can be magnificent. As soon as they stutter, they stumble altogether.

And so it proved against Arsenal. Despite initially putting it up to Arsene Wenger’s team amdirably, Wigan folded as soon as the first goal went in.

Given that it was one of the Premier League’s premium teams, that wouldn’t be too much of a problem. Except for the fact that Blackburn overturned form with a gritty, creditable 4-2 win over Swansea – inspired, of course, by Aiyegbeni Yakubu. It takes them off the bottom and, potentially, takes the pressure off Steve Kean.

The result also brings Bolton deeper into the mire after a miserable 3-0 loss to Tottenham. As has been repeated a few times over the past few weeks, Owen Coyle now has a worse win percentage than Gary Megson while the team has regressed. Part of that, naturally, has to do with the fact they had such a difficult start (which takes time to recover from) as well as the loss of their first-choice centre midfield.

But, in what is looking like a potentially tense, topsy-turvy relegation battle, Coyle is going to have get things back on course soon.

Spot the difference

How many penalties does Frank Lampard have to miss to be stripped of the duty at Chelsea. As well as high-profile games like a World Cup quarter-final and the FA Cup this was his fourth in recent years for Chelsea. That may not be too bad a record but then managers should not be looking for “not bad”. The problem here is the very perception of penalties. Because, if a player hits the ball at a top corner then – provided the goalkeeper is near the centre of his line – then it is physically impossible to save. There is absolutely no reason why professionals should not be able to train themselves to regularly hit that spot. All it takes is simple repetition and refinement of technique. And that’s the problem with Lampard’s penalties: the lack of technique. He approaches them very awkwardly with the result being that they’re either blasted down the middle or knocked relatively meekly to the side – as happened against Tim Krul. In essence, he reduces penalties to a dangerous game of bluff. Which, as the Germans have proved over the years, should not be the case.

Quick hits

- Aiyegbeni Yakubu has now scored more goals this season than Fernando Torres, Didier Drogba and Nicolas Anelka combined. He could have a big say at the bottom, while Chelsea need a striker scoring to have a bigger say at the top.

- You could have had a certain sympathy for Alec McLeish given how reluctant Villa fans were to even give him a chance on taking over. But the fact is that he’s not living up to his end of the bargain. Not only are they atrociously dull to watch (like his Birmignham, as Alex Hleb and now Charles N’Zogbia have complained) but they’re relatively porous at the back.