smart technology: United, City maintain perfect starts to season

Monday, September 12, 2011

United, City maintain perfect starts to season

updated 4:48 p.m. ET Sept. 10, 2011

LONDON - The Manchester rivals kept up their domination of the Premier League on Saturday, with United and City each earning their fourth consecutive win behind hat tricks from their star strikers.

Wayne Rooney had three goals to power United to a 5-0 rout of Bolton that kept it on top by goal difference ahead of City, which got a big day from Sergio Aguero in a 3-0 victory over Wigan.

"We've concentrated on ourselves," Rooney said. "We knew it was going to be a difficult game, we focused, made sure we got the win and thankfully the win was a bit easier than we thought."

The only other unbeaten team is fourth-place Stoke, which handed Liverpool its first loss of the season with a 1-0 victory on Jon Walters' penalty kick.

The north London rivals finally celebrated their first wins: Arsenal beat Swansea 1-0 and former Gunners striker Emmanuel Adebayor scored in his Tottenham debut in a 2-0 win at Wolverhampton Wanderers.

Also Saturday, third-place Chelsea topped Sunderland 2-1, and Everton tied Aston Villa 2-2.

But it's United leading the way as Alex Ferguson's side looks to extend the English title record to 20. Javier Hernandez also had a pair of goals against Bolton.

"It was excellent, the movement and pace they play at was just fantastic," Ferguson said of the Rooney-Hernandez partnership.

Man City had another impressive show, but manager Roberto Mancini was not satisfied.

"We had 15 chances in the first half and we scored only one goal ? this is a problem because the game can change any moment," Mancini said. "We have started the season very well but the season will be long. If we want to arrive at the end of the season still at the top we need to improve."

Aguero has scored five goals in two home games for City since coming over from Atletico Madrid.

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BARCELONA, Spain (AP) ? Real Madrid seized an early advantage in the Spanish league by beating Getafe 4-2 after Barcelona squandered an early lead to draw 2-2 at Real Sociedad.

Barcelona was up 2-0 after just 12 minutes on goals by Xavi Hernandez and Cesc Fabregas. But with Lionel Messi and Andres Iniesta resting for Tuesday's Champions League game against AC Milan, Imanol Agirretxe and Antoine Griezmann scored in the second half to rally Sociedad to the tie.

Barcelona coach Pep Guardiola inserted Messi and Iniesta in search of the winner, but goalkeeper Claudio Bravo smothered Messi's best chance with 15 minutes to play.

"Two defensive lapses, two errors that cost us dearly," Xavi said. "That's football. The game was under control and we could have even sealed the win with a third goal."

Madrid took full advantage, with Karim Benzema scoring twice against Getafe.

The France striker gave Madrid the lead in the 14th, but Getafe's Nicolas "Miku" Fedor equalized in an evenly played first half at Santiago Bernabeu stadium.

Cristiano Ronaldo's penalty and Benzema's second goal put Madrid in position to pull away, but Miku scored again to keep the game in doubt until Gonzalo Higuain sealed Madrid's victory late.

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BERLIN (AP) ? Hertha Berlin won 2-1 at defending champion Borussia Dortmund in the Bundesliga, and Bayern Munich routed Freiburg 7-0.

Raffael and Peter Niemeyer scored in the 49th and 81st minutes for promoted Hertha's first win at Dortmund since 2006, and only its second ever.

Robert Lewandowski got one back in the 88th, but was unable to prevent Dortmund's first home loss in 19 games.

Mario Gomez scored four goals for Bayern Munich, including a penalty. Franck Ribery had two and substitute Nils Petersen rounded off the scoring in the 90th.

In the 175th northern derby between Werder Bremen and Hamburger SV, Claudio Pizarro struck twice for a 2-0 win for Bremen.

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PARIS (AP) ? Bafetimbi Gomis scored the winning goal in Lyon's 2-1 win over Dijon to help his team take the provisional lead in the French league.

Lyon midfielder Maxime Gonalons headed in a corner from Kim Kallstrom to open the scoring. Dijon midfielder Benjamin Corgnet equalized with a powerful long-range strike in the 43rd, but Gomis powered home a header in the 53rd to give Lyon the victory.

Also on Saturday, it was: Saint-Etienne 1, Lille 3; Caen 0, Toulouse 1; Sochaux 1, Lorient 1; Bordeaux 0, Evian 0; Ajaccio 3, Valenciennes 1.

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GLASGOW, Scotland (AP) ? Kyle Lafferty led Rangers to a 1-0 victory over Dundee United that kept it on top of the Scottish Premier League.

United was dealt a blow after 30 minutes when Johnny Russell was sent off for aiming a headbutt at Kirk Broadfoot. United still created goal-scoring chances but Lafferty headed in the only goal in the 61st minute from Gregg Wylde's cross.

Celtic is just a point behind its Glasgow rival after a 4-0 rout of Motherwell, which dropped to third.

James Forrest scored twice for Celtic ahead of its Europa League group opener against Atletico Madrid on Thursday. Fellow midfielders Joe Ledley and Ki Sung-yueng also scored.

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