After its fifth draw in the season, Manchester City had to give away the 1st position of the table to their nemesis, Manchester United, which defeated the unfortunate QPR.

Two weekends ago, after the blasting 5-0 result Manchester City let fall on Aston Villa, the reigning king climbed to the first position of the standings after five weeks alternating between the 2nd and 3rd place. City was back on the throne for the first time in the season. However after their meeting on Sunday with the European Champion, Chelsea, the Citizens couldn’t keep the leading seat, for Manchester United, which was stalking them a point behind, beat the Queens Park Rangers the day before.

On Saturday the Rangers travelled north to face the Red Devils at the Old Trafford, where as expected the hosts win, and not so much that they had to bear a goal from the visitors. At 51 minutes of the match, QPR opened the scoreboard with a close range shot from Jamie Mackie, not too elaborated, still as exciting for the Londoners as if it would’ve, for it raised hopes of a first triumph for the club. Because until now the Rangers have only reach 4 ties and suffered 9 fatal defeats, which have put them on the bottom of the table, in urgent need of a miracle to leave the relegation zone.

Unfortunately for Harry Redknapp’s side, the Red Devils didn’t stay too long in disadvantage and really soon riddled Julio Cesar’s goal, exactly three scores within 4-minutes-intervals. The first one arrived at 64′ through a corner from Rooney that got headed by Danny Welbeck into Jonny Evans way, who scored his third goal in the season. Darren Fletcher goals’ drought finished at 68′, when again resulting from a corner from Rooney Fletcher caught the ball from afar and with a left kick sent the ball into the Hoop’s goal. The final bullet came through a shot from the Mexican Javier Hernandez at 72′. Subsequent to the 3-1, both clubs had some nice shots to score, but none could convert them.

With the 3 points earned on Saturday by United, Barclays had a new leader and the Sky Blues knew they had to win their 13th round fixture on the next day in order to recover the first spot; nonetheless the rival awaiting was a tougher one than United’s.

Inverse to his Manchester neighbour, City went south to London to face the Pensioners at Stamford Bridge, and as expected was quite challenging for both clubs. For Rafael Benitez, Chelsea’s brand new coach, it was an influential encounter, for it was his very first game since he got signed as interim manager of the Blues, in replacement of Roberto di Matteo. Because of the dislikes from many local supporters it was especially important for the Spaniard to make a good job on this first match at home.

Things started up relatively balanced and through all the game both sides kept it that way: in constant search for a goal and good defence. City had some good chances to score during the first-half; with opportunities from Pablo Zabaleta, Aleksandar Kolarov and James Milner. But with help mostly from Ashley Cole and Cesar Azpilicueta, Petr Cech was able to protect the Blues goal. The most obvious chance to untied was lost by Sergio Aguero, a few minutes before half time, when from close range and totally alone in the area, the Argentinean sent the ball straight to Cech.

In second half the hosts got more active and started to create more opportunities to score, among the players attacking Joe Hart’ goal were Juan Mata, Emboaba Oscar and Matija Nastasic. But the Citizens’ defence was alert and didn’t allow itself a single mistake. In the end it was more of a sober match, because even though both teams did great in defence, the highlights didn’t really count with surprising moves or plays honestly the match deserved the 0-0 final score.

Now the Citizens, which continue undefeated, are in second place with 29 points, following the Red Devils just one point behind. City’s next chance to climb back to the top might arrive the coming Wednesday 28th, when the two clubs from Manchester will have the 14th fixture. While United will held its 7th home game, this time against West Ham (8th), City will go west to visit Wigan (15th).