With all the doom and gloom about Liverpool after their worst loss at City for 50 plus years are they, or were they really that bad? Probably not actually. It was City's best display in years for sure but Liverpool really weren't the fodder that you'd think from the scoreline or what has been written about it either.

First of all they were missing Joe Cole (suspended for the red card) and perhaps the biggest being Javier Mascherano who had essentially gone on strike in a last ditch effort to secure his transfer to Barca. Torres, while in the starting 11, was a mere shadow of himself and a wayward pass from the normally reliable Gerrard actually led to City's opener. When they finally did get started after going down 2-0 the goal credited to Tevez was against the run of play and stellar saves from Joe Hart and the keeper's best friend (the post) stopped the Reds from getting back in the contest.

No, Liverpool will not threaten for the title this season but expect them to be in the tussle for a Champions League place before it's over. They may not make it if they play as 'soft' as they did at Eastlands but expect them to be in the reckoning.

Speaking of Champions League, Tottenham's 4-0 win carried them through to the group stages (6-3agg) over Young Boys at White Hart Lane overturning the first leg deficit. Crouch scored early (5) off a Bale cross then DeFoe put them in control of the tie with a handball assisted goal of his own (32) before Crouch added another headed goal and a penalty for the 6-3 aggregate win. Tottenham advances to the group stage of the Champions League for the first time with the victory. Spurs draw a difficult group with champions Inter Milan, Werder Bremen and FC Twente in Group A. Group stage action begins with round 1 on September 14 & 15.

Group C is headed by Man United and Valencia along with Rangers and Buraspor. Chelsea gets Marseille, Spartak Moscow and Zilina. Arsenal heads Group H with Shaktar Donestk, Braga and Partian Belgrade. The so-called Group of Death (Group G) has AC Milan, Real, Ajax and Auxere. Group D has Barca, Panathinaikos, Copenhagen and Rubin Kazan their opponents in what looks to be an “easy” run to the knockout round.

In Europa Leage 2nd leg action it was Rapid Vienna who dumped Aston Villa out with two late goals, in a quick turnaround just after Heskey had put Villa in front repeating last season's exit at the hands of the same club. City waltzed past Timisoara 2-0 on goals from Shaun Wright-Phillips and Boyata while resting most of the first choice 11. And Liverpool got two in the final five minutes on an OG and Kuyt's strike (88) for a 2-1 victory at Trabzonspor (1-3agg) on the day when Mascherano finally gets his wish on his move to Barca.

Liverpool is in Group K with Napoli, Steaua Bucharest and Utrecht while City gets Juventus, Salzburg and Lech Poznan in Group A. The Europa League group play begins September 16.

Rafa's Inter Milan lost the UEFA Super Cup match to Atletico Madrid 2-0. The club that knocked his Liverpool out last year now beats him again in the Super Cup.

In EPL Round 3 none of the front line clubs faced one another. A chance for them to take a breather? Not in this league.

Blackburn welcome Arsenal to Ewood Park with Wenger agitating for foul calls ahead of the match blasting Rovers for their “Rugby tactics” before the ball was even kicked. Chelsea's goal scoring machine hosts Stoke and Tottenham entertain slumping Wigan at the Lane. Man United looked to take advantage of West Ham at Old Trafford and Liverpool hoped to do the same versus West Brom at Anfield.

Ahead of the weekend neutrals savored the promise of a more competitive match as Aston Villa faced Everton. The Villains would be in a bad mood after getting bounced out of the Europa League for the second season in a row by Rapid Vienna in the mid-week and the Toffees have missed far too many opportunities in the opening two games.

Aston Villa hung in at the end for a 1-0 victory over Everton with a late fingertip save by Friedel for the win in an entertaining match. Villa's goal came early (9) from an unlikely source, Luke Young (his first in nearly two years) but they made it count. The Toffees can't seem to finish anything right now and this game was another example of it.

The Gunners had just enough to get past Rovers 1-2 on the opener from Walcott and Arshavin's match winner after Mame Diouf had leveled for Blackburn. It might have been a bigger margin of victory but Paul Robinson had a good day in goal for Rovers.

All the rest aside the result of the weekend had to be Wigan's 0-1 victory over Spurs at White Hart Lane on a nice finish from Rodallega (81). Just ahead of this strike Wigan had two other wonderful chances in the space of two minutes but made the third of them count. The Latics, having lost twice at home surrendering 10 goals in the process were superb on the road. It might have been expected that Spurs would suffer a bit of a letdown after the heady result in the mid-week but they didn't have enough in the tank to ovecome Wigan's midfield and when they did they missed their chances. Along the way Spurs produced 15 corners but couldn't make a single one count. It must be said this is the kind of result that separates Man United and Chelsea from the rest of the challengers.

And both of those recent title winners showed Redknapp's guys how it's done: United, with a thorough 3-0 victory over West Ham on goals from Rooney (his first since March), Nani and Berbatov while Chelsea cruised past Stoke City 2-0 with strikes from Malouda and Drogba (penalty). Stoke proved to be a far more challenging opponent for the Blues but in the end didn't have enough.

In a match that featured 4 disallowed goals Blackpool won a point at home in a 2-2 draw with Fulham in the first ever EPL contest at Bloomfield Road. Zamora opened the scoring (35) with a strong header and after having several apparent goals disallowed the Seasiders managed to level in the 71st on a Pantsil OG. Five minutes later they had the lead via Luke Varney only to see Dickson Etuhu pull Fulham level just three minutes from full time.

Newcastle's Andy Carroll notched his 4th goal of the young season to lift the Magpies to a 1-1 draw at Wolves in a very physical contest. Wolves saw 7 players booked and Newcastle 5 attesting to the nature of the game.

Bolton rallied from two goals down and only ten men for a 2-2 draw with visiting Birmingham after losing their keeper (Jaaskalinen) to a red card for a hand to the face of a rival player.

Meanwhile Liverpool got a goal from Torres (65) and that was all in a 1-0 victory over West Brom. Another less than convincing performance for the Reds but the first win for Hodgson as manager.

Sunderland stunned Man City 1-0 at the Stadium of Light on an injury time penalty by Darren Bent. While dominating proceedings in the opening half Tevez missed a gaping open net which came back to haunt City at the very end.