'Manchester United missed the chance to make Chelsea sweat even a little when they were held to a goalless draw by 10-man Crystal Palace, who defended doughtily and fully deserved a point that might prove vital in their fight for Premiership survival.
Even if the point does not come in handy, the confidence boost certainly will. Iain Dowie could hardly have prepared his side better and at no point were Palace prepared to accept that they were in any way inferior to United. The visitors may have underestimated the difficulty of the fixture, leaving Wayne Rooney, Cristiano Ronaldo and Paul Scholes on the bench, yet when the trio came on it made little difference. Even when Vassilis Lakis's dismissal meant Palace had to play a man short for almost half an hour, the standard of their defending somehow went up.
'We matched them up, I could not ask any more of my players,' Dowie said. 'Resolution and bravery won us a bonus point. We weren't expected to get anything from this game, in fact you could get nine-to-one on us losing by three goals. Now we can have a bit of a breather before our next easy game, at Chelsea.'
Chelsea can have a bit of a breather, too, not to mention AC Milan. If Sir Alex Ferguson had the Champions League in mind when attempting to rotate his players, it was a gamble that backfired. At least the tenth anniversary of Eric Cantona's famous lapse passed without any kung-fu kicks, though Michael Hughes was booked midway through the first half for what looked suspiciously like a Cumberland wrestling throw on Gabriel Heinze.'