Diamonds Soccer

Arsenal continued to rack up the goals as they thrashed a defensively weak Blackburn Rovers at Ewood Park. Emmanuel Adebayor grabbed the headlines with a hat trick completed in the second half, with cameos by England hero Theo Walcott and emerging talent Aaron Ramsey. The latter two provided the passes that led to the first and fourth Arsenal goals, with Robin Van Persie providing the opening goal that set Arsenal on their way to their second consecutive win. It will give the younger Gunners an additional boost as they head towards their first Champions League group match this midweek.

For Blackburn Rovers, their manager Paul Ince must be severely disappointed with his players’ performance. Once again, they looked out of their depth at the back, although the front pairing of Roque Santa Cruz and Jason Roberts tried their best but just could not break down their opponents. Ince must find a solution quickly for his team, or their lack of cohesiveness at the back will send them into a desperate battle for survival this season. Their opening day win now looks a distant memory.

Liverpool finally broke their jinx under Manchester United when they beat the defending champions to go top of the table. They can remain there if Chelsea fails to beat Manchester City later today. Meanwhile, it was a win that was achieved under strange circumstances, with Liverpool talismans Steven Gerrard and Fernando Torres both missing due to injuries. Gerrard came on later during the match and played his part in securing the much needed win that would surely boost the Anfield players’ confidence this season. They are attempting to win the club its first title for decades and prevent Manchester United from picking up their 18th league title, which would pull them level with Liverpool as the clubs with the most number of league titles.

Manchester United first opened the scoring with Carlos Tevez hammering in a low cross pulled back by Dimitar Berbatov. That was the only contribution by the Red Devils’ new boy before he faded and Alex Ferguson would definitely be speaking to him about not doing his share of running and winning the ball back for the team. At that point, Manchester United looked to be cruising to another win over their hated rivals, as the Liverpool players looked frustrated and deflated.

But an equaliser eventually came, although it was a comedy of errors that led to it. A curving long ball swept in from the right by Liverpool was palmed onto Wes Brown by a flapping Van der Sar and into an open goal. The goal was a long time coming as Liverpool had failed to score against Manchester United for ages. While they did not technically score this time either, it was just reward for their persistent pressure. The match ended with Liverpool having 22 shots, an overwhelming edge over whatever the Red Devils could muster.

The winner finally came as Mascherano ran down the right flank in the second half, before losing the ball as Ryan Giggs came in to cover. The cause looked lost at that point in time, but the little Argentinian harried Giggs to the byline and managed to poke the ball through the Welsh winger’s legs to the excellent Dirk Kuyt. Kuyt then flashed a cross across goal to Ryan Babel, who stubbed the ball into the turf but it still screamed into the net for the winner. The Kop and whole of Anfield exploded in unison as the Liverpool fans celebrated a long awaited win over their greatest rivals.

England gained sweet revenge over Croatia when they dealt them their first defeat at home in a competitive match last night. Not only did England beat Croatia to lead the table with maximum points from two matches so far, they also handed them a huge beating, with Theo Walcott scoring a hat trick to hand his country a 4-1 win over the off form Croatians. Wayne Rooney chipped in with the other goal as Fabio Capello and his players stuffed Slaven Bilic’s words back into his own mouth.

After the match, the Croatian manager again iterated his determination to stay with the national team and disinterest for the West Ham managerial vacancy. After this limp display from his players, the London club might have made the right choice in choosing Gianfranco Zola instead.