UK Football

photo: Nigel Wilson

After an amazing 4-0 victory over Real Madrid, Rafa Benitez and Liverpool are poised to once again challenge for the top spot in the Premiership, or at least that’s what Benitez himself thinks.  “This is the best way to approach the Manchester United game,” Benitez said in an after match interview. “When you have an important game coming up and the players are playing this well and scoring four goals against a team like Real Madrid, you have to be pleased.

“We play a very good team on Saturday and we have to win. If we can reduce the gap we will be in the title race but we have to wait and see what happens at Old Trafford.

“Hopefully we have given Manchester United something to think about but they have a very good team. At least we will approach the game with a lot of confidence.”

And Benitez does have a point, but Old Trafford is a very hard place, if not the hardest venue in the Premiership, to beat the home team, and Manchester United have well and truly hit their stride.  Really everything hinges on United’s performance tonight, if Inter Milan and Jose Mourinho come off the victors, then Saturday we’re bound to see a dishevelled and perhaps even disjointed Manchester United team.  But if United win, the champions will look unstoppable in their weekend return to Old Trafford, and Liverpool will be hard pressed to calm the red devil attack, let alone best them on the score line.

Yet another injury to plague a West Ham team that has endured their fair share of hardship this season, as Valon Behrami has suffered an anterior cruciate ligament injury, which will sideline the Switzerland international for at least six months.  Behrami has been fantastic for West Ham, and no doubt Gianfranco Zola will be hard pressed to adjust his squad to make up for Behrami’s ability and work rate.  But Zola has done amazing things with the squad he’s had so far, leaving me to believe West Ham will be just fine.

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