'To claim that United have recovered from early-season uncertainty may be premature. While on the one hand Paul Scholes has excitingly recovered his goal touch - now adding two to his first for seven months last week - this was not a performance to have Jose Mourinho and his men looking, as yet, anxiously over their shoulders. It may have been enough to have Sir Alex Ferguson standing smilingly benign on the touchline, but the occasional inadequacy of Mikael Silvestre at centre-back, the decline in authority of Roy Keane and the protracted acclimatisation of Wayne Rooney, mean that United for the moment are more neck-end casserole than filet mignon.
Neither team face a particularly awesome December-New Year sequence. Following Arsenal at home on Wednesday, United face Southampton at home, Fulham away and Portsmouth at home, then the more formidable trio of Bolton home and Villa and Middlesbrough away. On form, a string of three consecutive victories looks unlikely to be sustained through another seven matches. We shall see.'