Liverpool stun Leicester, blues for United, Arsenal

The Curacao worldwide struck from 30 yards to open the scoring before Long and Fonte added second half goals to down the Gunners, who remain two points behind leaders Leicester City.

It’s a psychological advantage that now sees us as firm favourites to lift to the Premier League trophy for the first time since 2004.

“We started too late to play our football”, said Leicester manager Claudio Ranieri. “Liverpool pushed from the beginning and for this season they deserved to win”.

“Riyad was a more complete player when he left Le Havre than when we first had him – he had made huge strides in his defensive play and was physically far more ready for the English league”.

Losing 2-0 at Stoke on Boxing Day condemned United to a fourth consecutive defeat in all competitions for the first time since 1961, and pushed the team down to sixth place.

“It is very hard as I’m also part of four losses and I have to cope with that”. There were four different City scorers: Raheem Sterling, Yaya Toure, Wilfried Bony, and Kevin de Bruyne.

Interim manager Guus Hiddink begun his second spell in charge of Chelsea with an entertaining 2-2 draw with Watford.

Although this year players will get New Year’s Day off, most teams will be in action again on Saturday January 2.

Spain striker Diego Costa scored twice but Watford had led 2-1 through Troy Deeney’s first-half penalty and Odion Ighalo’s deflected shot in the 56th minute. They have won their last three Boxing Day games but prior to that failed to win one since 2005, on the way enduring disappointing results against the likes of Birmingham, Fulham and Aston Villa. I said after the Arsenal game it is hard when you lose to discuss positive things but we had more than 60% of possession for the ball so that gave me some sign we were returning to our style.

Elsewhere, managerless Swansea climbed out of the relegation zone with a battling 1-0 home win over West Brom, as an early goal from Ki Sung-yueng (nine) proved enough for a first win under caretaker boss Alan Curtis, while Bournemouth played out a goalless draw against Crystal Palace.