LONDON (Sporting Alert) — Chelsea and Manchester City played to a 1-1 draw in their top of the table English Premier League clash at Stamford Bridge on Saturday.
English Premier League Results
Liverpool 2-0 West Ham
Crystal Palace 0-1 Everton
West Brom 0-3 Tottenham
Stoke 3-1 QPR
Manchester United 3-1 Leicester City
Sunderland 2-0 Burnley
Chelsea 1-1 Manchester City
Hull City 0-3 Newcastle
Both goals in the matchup came late in the first half, as the gap between the two front-runners stayed at five points.
Loic Remy, who started for the suspended Diego Costa, gave leaders Chelsea the advantage in the 41st minute when he finished from close range.
However, that lead last for only four minutes, after David Silva turned poacher to score the equalizer on the stroke of halftime.
Despite dominating for much of the second half, Manchester City failed to breakdown a solid Chelsea side that was missing leading scorer Costa and the club and league’s leading provider Cesc Fabregas.
Manuel Pellegrini Manchester City side was without midfielder Yaya Toure and new recruit Wilfried Bony, who are both with the Ivory Coast in the Africa Cup of Nations.
At Old Trafford, meanwhile, Manchester United moved into second place with a 3-1 win over Leicester City to go ahead of Southampton for the time being.
Robin van Persie, Radamel Falcao and a Wes Morgan own goal gave the Red Devils a first half lift-off, while defender Marcin Wasilewski headed home a lone goal for Leicester late in the second half.
“I’m very happy because of the positive result. We lost the last home match so we had to show to our fans that we are coming back again,” Manchester United manager Louis van Gaal said after the game.
“I liked my team in the first half. In the second half we tried to kill the game because we know what happened at Leicester when we were also 1-3 ahead and we lost the game.
“But in the second half we played the ball too much backwards, and I do not like that as you always need to keep your eyes open for the pass forward.
“But we also have to learn to kill the game, we may have done that more than we wanted, but it is a learning process.”
At Anfield, Daniel Sturridge returned to the Liverpool setup with a goal in the Reds’ 2-0 home win over West Ham United.
Raheem Sterling had opened the scoring for Liverpool six-minutes into the second half before Sturridge came off the bench to seal the three points.
“It’s an amazing feeling to be back playing and to help the team get three points,” the England forward said about his positive return to competitive action.
“That’s what matters the most, the team. Philippe Coutinho made my job easy. That’s what he is best at, amazing assists and runs.
“In football players get injuries sometimes, but that’s what the game is about. I’m grateful to God to be able to come back and help the team get three points. I’m looking forward to helping the team push on.”
Jonathan Walters piled on more pressure on Harry Redknapp after he netted a hat-trick to guide Stoke City to a commanding 3-1 win over QPR at the Britannia Stadium.
Walters opened the scoring in the 21st minute and then netted his second 10-minutes before the interval.
The forward completed his hat-trick in the 90th minute of play, as Stoke moved up to ninth in the English Premier League points standings.
Niko Kranjcar was the goal scorer tonight for the defeated QPR.
In other results, Tottenham’s push for Champions League football continued with a 3-0 win at West Bromwich — Harry Kane scoring a brace and Christian Eriksen finding the back of the net for the other, while Newcastle United collected a similar win at Hull City.
“I’m very pleased and very proud, it was a great performance, we played one of our best games since the beginning of the season,” Spurs’ manager Mauricio Pochettino said.
“This was a challenge, it’s always difficult when you’ve gone to a final in difficult conditions and then be ready to play a tough side like West Brom. The key was to be focused, keep our concentration and our character was excellent.”
Crystal Palace fell 1-0 at home to Everton and Sunderland beat Burnley 2-0.
