Watch: Arsenal 2 - 1 Everton

Watch Arsenal 2 - 1 Everton

Arsenal came from behind against Everton to keep their chase with Manchester United for the Premier League top spot going for another week. The Gunners had to rise above a blatant offside decision that went against them which put them behind in the first place, and in the last 20 minutes, they did just that - rise above the controversy with goals from Andrei Arshavin and Laurent Koscielny.

I won't go into too much detail on the goals scored, because you can see them above, but here is a quick summary:

Louis Saha scored the opener while standing in a clear offside position when the ball was played to him by Seamus Coleman in the 24th minute. Despite uproar from the Arsenal players who all raised their arms simultaneously as the ball floated over, the goal stood, and the Toffees held onto their fragile away lead until the 70th minute.
A beautifully chipped ball from Fabregas opened up the Everton defence with apparent ease, for the previously out of sorts Arshavin to poke past Tim Howard for the equaliser.
Five minutes later, and a corner was floated into the box for Koscielny to head home for the winner and run off in hysteria to celebrate with his delighted fans.

David Moyes, the Everton manager, was not happy. At all. In fact, the Scot was disgusted. But not at his teams performance, rather, he was disgusted at the Arsenal captain, Cesc Fabregas' behaviour towards the referee in the tunnel. Moyes explained:

"Fabregas should have been sent off in the tunnel for his comments about the officials. It was disgusting.

"I won't be repeating them, but maybe someone will."

When he was asked to explain what he meant by this, Moyes said:

"No I won't. I'll just say that he should have been sent off for his comments to the officials coming up the tunnel."

Nevertheless, Arsenal were victorious, and continue to put pressure Manchester United at the top of the League, despite the Red Devils comfortable 3 - 1 win over Aston Villa. The gap remains at 5 points, but will the fact that neither Arsenal or United added to their squad in the January transfer window, while their title rivals did play any part in the title race? Not too much I suspect. Both have bee strong from the off.

Ferguson has no regrets, But Moyes does.

Sir Alex Ferguson has said today that he has no regrets about leaving Wayne Rooney out of the Manchester United side that played Everton on Saturday, in which United threw away a 3-1 advantage to draw 3-3 in the final minutes.

 I have no regrets - I did the right thing. And I have no concerns about playing him tomorrow [against Rangers] at all.

Why should he have regrets? He left Rooney out, and with good reason. It would have been a big risk playing Rooney with him either rising to the occasion, or doing completely the opposite and buckling under the pressure in front of his heckling former fans and do something stupid. It wasn't a risk worth taking and Ferguson knew it. He made sure nothing controversial would happen by not naming him in the squad against bitter fans who hate Rooney whatever he does.
Ferguson also proved that Rooney can be left out of the squad, and Manchester United still score goals. Three goals against Everton is a very good total, as they have (most of the time) confident, solid defenders as well as an experienced midfield. Relatively new England defensive rock Jagielka along with Distin, in front of the former Manchester United keeper Tim Howard, who made some fantastic stops to save his team from losing are usually tough to crack, but United banged in three passed them through Fletcher, Vidic (both from crosses) and Berbatov - thanks to another marvellous pass from Paul Scholes.

Three goals without your top striker isn't half bad is it?

Now to Moyes. Fuelled with enormous amounts of adrenaline as his eyes popped out of his head (yes, even more) watching his side blast two goals in the final few minutes of the game against United, he raced onto the pitch as the referee, Martin Atkinson blew the whistle just as Everton burst into the United penalty area on the attack, looking for the winning goal. Along with his assistant Steve Round,

shouting all sorts of abuse at the referee,  they went a bit over the top, and Martin Atkinson remembered the gist of what they were saying (or bawling) at him, and recorded it in his report of the match.

FA Chiefs have since decided to punish Moyes and his sidekick with improper conduct and fine them both £8000.

The Scottish Moyes may or may not (probably not) be cheered up by the fact that Manchester United play the Scottish side Rangers on Tuesday where Rooney will play - fit and raring to go after a weeks rest and give a mind blowing performance to win his fans back after a terrible few weeks in his personal -
but quite public private life