Around the English Premier League - Round 2

Manchester City confirmed their good start with another victory, and keep a perfect record like the defending champions Manchester United that also won their second game of the season.

With the English Premier League leadership in game Manchester City travelled to the Reebook Stadium to face Bolton Wanderers for round 2 action. Both teams had started the 2011-12 season with the right foot, winning their respective season opener games by 4-0 to place themselves on top of the standings, giving their showdown a special appeal.

The Citizens were going to confirm their condition as one of the favorites to clinch title with a 3-2 on the road victory against the Trotters, guided by an outstanding David Silva, who was not only responsible for opening the score at minute 26, but also of elaborating the best plays of the game.

Prior to halftime, at minute 37 specifically, Gareth Barry got one more in for Manchester City, but two minutes later Ivan Klasnic scored the discount with which they went to the break.

At minute 47 Edin Dzeko scored the winning goal for the Citizens, who could have won the game 3-1 if Kevin Davies wouldn’t have scored the second goal for the hosts 16 minutes later for the final 3-2.

In one of the biggest rivalries in England, Liverpool upset Arsenal on the road by 2-0, thanks to two late goals from Aaron Ramsey at minute 78 (through a misfortunate own goal) and Luis Suarez on injury time. While Suarez has made the Reds forget about their former top scorer Fernando Torres (transferred to Chelsea on January), the Gunners haven’t found a substitute for their former captain and playmaker Cesc Fabregas (signed by Barcelona), which is evident in their game.

Speaking about Torres’ new team Chelsea, they won their first match of the season thanks to Florent Malouda’s goal with 7 minutes to go against West Bromwich, who had put themselves ahead in the score early in the first half through Shane Long.

8 minutes after the break the Blues got the equalizer with a lucky shot from Nicolas Anelka that was deflected by Jonas Olsson. And later on Malouda made the come-from-behind victory happen by connecting a cross ball from Jose Bosingwa.

Defending champions had a tough rival in Tottenham Hotspur, but were able to outplay them in the second half thanks to the treble scored by Danny Welbeck (61), Anderson (76) and Wayne Rooney (87).

Local young talent Welbeck stole the show by netting the first one and serving the second goal in a game that was starting to become frustrating for the Red Devils, who now share the top of the standings with their city rivals Manchester City.

Wolverhampton also has a perfect record this season thanks to their 2-0 victory over Fulham at home. Two late first half goals from Kevin Doyle and Matthew Jarvis gave the Wolves three more points, and now they occupy the third place in the standings with 6 points, same as the Citizens (+5) and Red Devils (+4), but with a goal difference of +3.

The rest of round 2 results were: Sunderland 0 Newcastle 1, Aston Villa 3 Blackbu
Rovers 1, Everton 0 Queens Park Rangers 1, Swansea 0 Wigan Atheltic 0, and Norwich 1 Stroke City 1.