Manchester’s grip on the title

SPORTS Betting:

MANCHESTER 13, North London 3. So said the headlines in many of our newspapers on Monday morning after United and City had demolished Arsenal and Spurs.

The efficiency and ruthlessness of those displays must have sent shock waves down the rest of their Premier League rivals and the bookies have wasted no time in taking evasive action.

United, 8-2 winners, are down to a best-priced 13-10 to retain their title.

But City’s collapse in odds continues apace and they are now a meagre 9-4 to come out on top in the Premier League title race.

To my eyes, City were arguably the more impressive of the two teams on Sunday simply because their rivals did not roll over at the first sign of trouble. Spurs were not great, but they were made to look poor.

Conversely, Arsenal were shocking and while United were terrific, they were gift-wrapped the easiest of victories.

With Edin Dzeko scoring four times for City and Wayne Rooney a hat-trick for United, both strikers have had their odds slashed for the top-scorer’s Golden Boot.

The pair share favouritism at 4-1, with Dzeko’s City team-mate Sergio Aguero on 11-2 and Liverpool’s Luis Suarez 10-1.

Then it’s 12-1 bar, which includes Arsenal’s Robin van Persie, who looked totally disinterested at Old Trafford.

As for the Manchester clubs’ main rivals for the title, Chelsea are next best at 5-1 with Liverpool next at 16s and Arsenal a huge 50-1.

Gunners boss Arsene Wenger has been one of the Premier League’s best-ever managers, but the odds-layers reckon he is a contender to lose his job.

Almost unthinkably, Wenger is 8-1 second favourite to be the next Premier League manager to go, behind Blackburn’s Steve Kean, who holds the dubious distinction of being the 8-11 favourite to first lose his job this season.




WORLD champions India will have plenty to prove when they begin a series of five one-day internationals against England on Saturday.



Having been whitewashed 4-0 in the recent Test series, India will be short on confidence, but they at least have the comfort of that recent World Cup triumph and contain many matchwinners throughout their side.

That said, I have to marginally fancy rampant England at 10-11 to win the series, even though the evens about India would have seemed a gift a couple of months ago.