HAVING seen all the ‘big four’ last weekend I reckon the Premier League is a two-horse race yet again.

You can place your money and take your pick, but my advice would not be to stray outside Chelsea and United.

Manchester that is, not Newcastle.

Maybe I caught them on an off night, but the limp Liverpool I witnessed against West Ham on Monday, doesn’t stand an earthly of staying at the summit.

Arsenal continue to play football to drool about but Gallasgate and bad results against the likes of Hull, Stoke and Manchester City have left them too much to do, so it looks like Fergie or Felipe will be celebrating in May. Tell me something new.

Just about half-way through the season this is how I would assess the prospects of the pretenders in alphabetical order.

ARSENAL: Great start, the kids still looked good in an earlier round in the Carling Cup but dressing room unrest can’t be swept under the carpet and they have just bowed out of the competition after losing 2-0 to Burnley this week.

Van Persie’s double at Stamford Bridge will have lifted morale but I still think they may have a better chance of winning the Champions League than the Premiership.

CHELSEA: Capable of dismembering the likes of Sunderland and Middlesbrough and far more flamboyant under Scolari than Mourinho or Grant, but showing signs of fatigue.

European excursions are often followed by leg weary performances at home – and Stamford Bridge is no longer a fortress as Liverpool and Arsenal have proved.

Will be there or thereabouts but need bigger contributions from the likes of Michael Ballack, Joe Cole, Deco and Didier Drogba.

LIVERPOOL: they may be top of the tree this morning but even Rafa Benitez and Steven Gerrard admit they’re not playing well.

Gerrard’s fresh air shot against the Hammers summed up the point.

Robbie Keane was booed and looks like a fish out of water, Torres is injured, Crouch has gone, and if Gerrard doesn’t score I’m not sure who else will.

It’s 18 years since they won the title teenage fans are beginning to wonder if it was all a myth.

MANCHESTER UNITED: Still the team to beat as they seem to have been for decades.

Fergie still has the appetite and the ammunition. Carlos Tevez, Ryan Giggs and Anderson can’t get a start and Owen

Hargreaves, Wes Brown and Paul Scholes are all working on their fitness.

Guess where I think the title is going to end up?

DID I hear right? Luis Felipe Scolari wants referee Mike Dean to ring him and apologise for getting a hairline decision wrong in the frenetic atmosphere of a local derby.

Okay, Robin Van Persie was marginally offside but if the flag doesn’t go up the referee is hardly going to give it.

There weren’t too many grumbles until folk had the benefit of replays, and human error has to be a factor in any game of rules.

Everyone makes mistakes, maybe Senor Scolari should ring the fans up for making the wrong substitutions.

WHETHER or not the England cricketers should return to India is a very delicate subject.

It would be easy for people like me to say we have to stand up to terrorists and that, of course, they should fulfil the two Test series obligation.

However, I’ve been to Mumbai quite regularly in recent years, so I can identify with the feelings of those who may be a little squeamish.

Even more so since national selector Geoff Miller told me last week how he’d stayed at the Raj Palace only two weeks ago and how he felt knowing the English team kit was still in there.

The chilling atrocity was brought home to him all the more and I would fully accept there may be some players who never want to return to that hotel.