Manchester United bounced back from their derby humiliation against Manchester City with a 1-0 victory over Everton on Saturday, as Arsenal stunned Chelsea 5-3 at Stamford Bridge.
A first-half goal from Javier Hernandez secured all three points for United, who had been desperate to atone for their 6-1 mauling by City at Old Trafford last weekend.
Sir Alex Ferguson made five changes to the side humiliated by City, with Rio Ferdinand, Anderson, Nani and the injured duo of Chris Smalling and Ashley Young all sidelined.
The introduction of Hernandez reaped rewards for United after just 19 minutes, with the prolific Mexican international tapping in after good approach play by Tom Cleverley, Danny Welbeck and Patrice Evra.
Everton might have equalised shortly before half-time, only for Leighton Baines' free-kick to crash back off the underside of the crossbar.
"It's an important result to come away from home and win," Ferguson told the BBC. "Everton is never an easy game and they put everything they could into the game. First half we played some fantastic football and scored a good goal.
"Hernandez is fantastic in the box. It's a good result and we worked hard for it."
The win left United two points adrift of leaders City at the top of the Premier League. Roberto Mancini's City can restore their five-point lead later on Saturday with victory in their home game against Wolves.
In the other early kick-off, Chelsea captain John Terry rounded off a miserable week with a late blunder as Robin van Persie scored a hat-trick in Arsenal's 5-3 victory over their London rivals.
Chelsea looked to have snatched a share of the points after Juan Mata's late thunderbolt levelled the game at 3-3.
But with full-time looming, a dreadful back-pass from Florent Malouda exposed Terry, who slipped over as van Persie raced clear, rounded Petr Cech with ease and coolly netted his 11th goal of the season.
Van Persie duly completed his hat-trick with a well-taken finish in injury time as Arsenal struck on the counter-attack.
It was the final act of a mesmerising contest that saw Arsenal twice come back from behind before securing their eighth win in nine games, a victory that pushed them up to sixth in the table.
A frenetic opening spell saw both sides carve out a string of opportunities before Chelsea eventually took the lead.
Arsenal squandered two glorious chances, Gervinho hooking the ball wide with the goal at his mercy after a brilliant counter-attack and van Persie clipping his shot high and wide after being found unmarked at the back post.
Arsenal were made to pay for their profligacy on 14 minutes when Mata beat Andre Santos with ease and then picked out Frank Lampard, who headed home Chelsea's 6,000th league goal for 1-0.
But Arsenal struck back with a well-worked goal from van Persie after clever work from Aaron Ramsey and Gervinho.
Arsenal's effort in hauling themselves back into the contest was undone on the stroke of half-time however when Terry -- at the centre of a racism investigation this week -- restored the Blues' lead.
Yet the see-saw momentum of the contest continued immediately after half-time, when goals from Andre Santos (49 minutes) and Theo Walcott (55) put Arsenal 3-2 up.
Mata's equaliser pegged Arsenal back but Terry's late slip handed the initiative back to the Gunners before van Persie clinched his hat-trick deep in injury time.
Source: AFP
