Arsenal 1-3 Manchester United

I can't pretend i saw that coming, a demolition every bit as resounding as our champions league semi final victory. I was feeling slightly more confident after we seemingly hit form in our second half against City. But then i saw the line up with no Vidic to replace the suspended Ferdinand and Park in for Giggs and no Valencia. I'd be lying if i didn't admit i would have settled for a draw.
But after the first ten minutes i had to revise my opinions. We still seemed brittle at the back but going forward the evidence was there that the form we saw in the second half against City was continuing as Rooney was looking superb and Nani was once again looking the part. The midfield trio were taking it in turns to get forward and were making a pretty good fist of controlling the middle of the park
Arshavin was seeing plenty of the ball but his use of it was poor to say the least. If he had not wasted so many of his opportunites and they had gone a goal up who knows how the game would have panned out. But he didn't and when United finally got the goal they looked like they had in them, that was that. I don't know whether the first goal was credited to Nani or classed as an own goal. But what a sublime piece of skill from our rejuvenated winger as he took three men out as if they weren't there before the cross which Almunia could only divert into the back of his own net. The second goal just minutes later just completely killed the home team off. Swap Rooney for Ronaldo and it was almost a carbon copy of the third goal in last season's semi with Rooney running almost sixty yards to get on the end of Nani's inside pass to drive the ball past Almunia to make it two nil. I t could have been even more embarrassing for the home side as Rooney set up another chance for Nani that could have made it three.
I thought Arsenal would come out determined to at least make a fight of it in the second period. But they were just as bad and United continued to completely run the game. The midfield three were superb and Arsenal couldn't get into it at all. Fabregas didn't have a sniff all afternoon, how many defeats like this will it take before he decides the Emirates is not a long term home for him. When another counter attack led to Park scoring the third you were left wondering how many we were going to get. But United eassed it down after that and Arsenal did finally have a little period of looking like they might get a goal. Even then though, they had to get a piece of luck as a Vermaelen shot that Van Der Sar had covered took a deflection to make it 3-1. United were still creating chances though and how Rooney missed in the last minute, i don't know. The fact that he could laugh about it told the story of the rest of the game.

Alan Hansen believes that Arsenal had this coming and that their title chances are as good as over.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/leagues/premierleague/arsenal/7122339/Alan-Hansen-Arsenals-ragged-defending-was-ripe-for-the-picking-by-Manchester-United.html

The Times on Wayne Rooney the man
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/football/premier_league/manchester_united/article7009572.ece

Ferguson happy with maturing Nani
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/eng_prem/8490425.stm

The Times reckons that there is nothing solid about Keith Harris's talk of a United takeover. It is just in an exploratory stage.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/football/premier_league/manchester_united/article7009568.ece

Duncan drasdo of MUST responds to David Gill's laughable defence of the Glazer's
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/teams/m/man_utd/8490005.stm

An Observer panel discuss the future of football governance and Greg Dyke gets to the crux of things in his second paragraph.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2010/jan/31/premier-league-debts-panel

David Conn on the current state of football finances and where we could and should be heading.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/blog/2010/jan/31/premier-league-clubs-debts

Paul Hayward on the Ferguson Wenger rivalry and 5 things we now know about football debt http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/blog/2010/jan/31/sir-alex-ferguson-arsene-wenger-rivalry

Patrick Barclay wants Terry stripped of the England captaincy and it handed over to Rooney. I hope not
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/columnists/patrick_barclay/article7010394.ece

David Davis takes apart Tony Balir's performance at the Chilcott inquiry
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/jan/31/david-davis-iraq-inquiry-blair

Nick Cohen on the disaster that is our privatised rail network, another piece of free market nonesense.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/jan/31/nick-cohen-network-rail

The Times reports on a crisis of confidence in the western free market version of capitalism at Davos.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/leading_article/article7010380.ece

Robert Skidelsky thinks the worries of inflation are just plain wrong.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/feb/01/inflation-recession-quantitative-easing

China is flexing it's muscle over Taiwan according to Martin Jacques
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2010/jan/31/china-taiwan-united-states-arms

There is getting pissed and getting pissed as Rip Torn is charged with trying to rob a bank.
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/news/rip-torn-actor-hollywood-hellraiser-and-bank-robber-1885175.html
He was brilliant in the Larry Sanders show. Why can't you buy that great show on DVD?

A very early clip of the classic Byrds

United in takeover calls

Is this the beginning of the end for the gimps. It's hard to know yet, i suppose they are going to have to make leaving worth their while. That would be hard to stomach but if we get our football club run along the right lines, it would be a price worth paying as far as i am concerned.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/teams/m/man_utd/8488910.stm

The green and gold campaign is really taking off and winning over the doubters, United and neutral.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-1247217/DES-KELLY-Manchester-United-fans-win-flying-colours.html

Fletcher is not anti football, Wenger's description, after the home victory earlier in the season as Ferguson defends the Scottish player. It was all total sour grapes after getting beat again.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2010/jan/29/sir-alex-ferguson-arsene-wenger-disagreement

James Lawton thinks Terry will have lost the trust of Capello over the captaincy. I'd like to think he lost the trust of his team mates.
http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/football/news-and-comment/james-lawton-terry-can-no-longer-exploit-in-public-the-image-he-has-betrayed-in-private-1883591.html

The appearance of Tony Blur was the highlight or lowlight of the week in poilitics, here is Matthew Parris's take on preceedings. That's the first time i have read anybody inferring the neocons are trying to scapegoat him as well as the anti war movement. The easy ride he got was nauseating but totally expected.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/matthew_parris/article7008890.ece

Simon Jenkins finds the questioning appalling but thinks Blair's confident performance was undone by the lack of remorse for the loss of life at the end.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2010/jan/29/tony-blair-iraq-inquiry-chilcot

Robert Fisk analyses the show from the middle east.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/tony-blair-and-his-ohsoclean-conscience-1883656.html

A guardian podcast on the proceedings
http://www.guardian.co.uk/global/audio/2010/jan/29/tonyblair-iraq-war-inquiry

Jeremy Warner thinks the financial world has forgotten what capitalism is for.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/comment/jeremy-warner/7105004/Capitalism-has-forgotten-to-share-the-wealth.html

I think we can safely say Michael disagrees, he thinks they know what it's for alright.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/theguardian/2010/jan/30/michael-moore-capitalism-a-love-story
I don't know about evil but id like to think that junk bonds, hedge funds, leveraged buyouts and the like will be dirty words before i turn to dust. And long term i would agree some one must come up with something miles more efficient ( no recessions, depressions, mass unemployment and sink estates ) and something fairer. The Keynesian econmics of the post war years would be the starting point for looking for a new model.

Is Cameron saying one thing to the British electorate and another to the world's finacial establishment at Davos. He really is going to be Tony Blair the second if they get that majority.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/jan/30/david-cameron-davos

It looks like Chris Morris's new film will be one to watch, as it goes down well at the sundance festival.
http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/film/article7006852.ece

A classic piece of Krautrock from Neu

Rooney : we are not a one man team

Not to the extent that the scousers are a two man team, but i dread to think what we would be like without him.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/leagues/premierleague/manutd/7099525/Manchester-United-are-not-a-one-man-team-says-Wayne-Rooney.html

Henry Winter salutes the versatility of Rooney and thinks England should think about utilising it in their next friendly. I'd rather he didn't even play in that myself.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/leagues/premierleague/manutd/7095311/Wayne-Rooneys-versatility-for-Manchester-United-and-England-is-good-for-the-system.html

James Lawton thinks that though our opponents are catching up on us, we still set the benchmark.
http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/football/

I was surprised United's youth team got beat so comprehensively last night.
http://www.manutd.com/default.sps?pagegid={B4CEE8FA-9A47-47BC-B069-3F7A2F35DB70}&newsid=6645838

City's democracy loving owners worried about Cook's gaffe's
http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2010/jan/29/manchester-city-garry-cook-sheikh-mansour

Or according to the Indy, they are happy with him and his strategy to win the war against United.
http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/football/news-and-comment/ian-herbert-city-lost-this-skirmish-but-cook-has-strategy-for-victory-in-the-war-1882427.html
You have just got to hope the indy version of City's owners is true. Comedy value.

Anthony Seldon wants Blair to tell the truth about Iraq at today's inquiry. Fat chance, he doesn't know the meaning of the word.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/guest_contributors/article7007055.ece
I'm a pretty stright kind of guy, yeh.

Matthew Parris got him spot on
"I believe Tony Blair is an out-and-out rascal, terminally untrustworthy and close to being unhinged. I said from the start that there was something wrong in his head, and each passing year convinces me more strongly that this man is a pathological confidence-trickster. To the extent that he even believes what he says, he is delusional. To the extent that he does not, he is an actor whose first invention — himself — has been his only interesting role."

^{Richard Adams calls for Obama to ditch Geitner}
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/richard-adams-blog/2010/jan/28/fire-timothy-geithner

Guitarist for hire Barrie Cadogan's main project Little Barrie