Winners and Losers of the Weekend

Winners

Micah Richards
An immense talent. On the evidence of 2007/08, England will not miss Jamie Carragher.

For all the fuss generated by Sven-Goran Eriksson's spending spree, the Swede's best move this summer was identifying Richards, previously deployed at right-back, as Sylvain Distin's replacement alongside Richard Dunne.


Manchester Citeh
Last season, it was impossible to discuss Citeh at length because there was nothing to say once their tedium had been berated. This year's difficulty is the impossibility of fathoming whether their revival is founded on Swedish genius or simple good fortune. Against ManYoo, they were pummelled yet somehow prevailed. Rope-a-dope? Only the dopey would argue as much. With the honourable exceptions of Richards and Dunne, the Citeh performance actually verged on the horrendous.


Chelski
Their resilience is remarkable, yet without Rob Styles' botched meddling then Jose Mourinho's disingenuous insistence that his side sought victory at Anfield would have been indisputably refuted: Frank Lampard's penalty was the visitors' only shot on target.


Losers

ManYoo
The champions weren't in crisis in midweek and the debit of another point to their championship rivals hardly justifies an amendment. Nonetheless, the nature of their third successive setback was concerning.

Playing both ahead of his best position and schedule, Carlos Tevez could not disguise his inadequacy as a centre-forward. The designated replacement for Wayne Rooney is not suited to spearhead an attack and, as a consequence, too much of United's play was convoluted, thereby restricting the ratio of possession to goalscoring opportunities. Both Ryan Giggs and the disappointing Nani were guilty of drifting inwards -.....


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