On a night when the title contention would go down the wire and a possibility of the title champion being equal points with the second in the  league, both Manchester United and Chelsea must win their respective games in order to be crowned champions of England. Anyone who dropped points would lose the title. Where both teams would play a concurrently, there would be no two ways about it. Winning in mandatory.

Both teams needing favours from their opponents, Man Utd from Wigan and Chelsea through Bolton Wonderers, they needed these lower teams to up their performance in order to win the title. Both teams were tied goal less when Man Utd got the better of their tie. Wayne Rooney was brought down in the box and a penalty was awarded. When Cristiano Ronaldo scored from the spot, it was as if the title would be retained in the Old Trafford cabinet. Then in the second half, Andrei Schevchenko scored a goal for the Blues. News travel fast and the Devil fans who turned up at the JJB had looks on their face that could tell you that things are not looking good. That’s because Wigan had been playing better than their normal self, and a goal seemed likely for the home side.

Man Utd held on frantically to their lead, if Wigan scores, then its all over for them. Chelsea would be the champion. Sir Alex Ferguson then put in Ryan Giggs, much to the delight of Sir Bobby Charlton whose record of 758 appearances was equaled by the Welsh. And what a change it was! He then scored after a throughball, and as he so often did for the club, he made it 2-0. Unless Wigan can come back with 2 goals, the result at Stamford Bridge would now be irrelevant. And then just when time was up, news again travelled that Bolton had equalized!! The title is now safe in Manchester. For the 17^th time, it is 1 title short of Liverpool, who in total has won it 18 times.

As round two beckons at Moscow 10 days from now, Chelsea might just be playing without their captain John Terry who had to be stretchered off after a collision with fellow team mate Petr Cech.

To the other end, the teams fighting against relegation found some of their efforts futile when even with a huge margin, Reading could not keep their place in the Premiership. They beat Derby 4-0 and hoped that Fulham would lose but the Cottagers made it 1-0 courtesy of a Danny Murphy goal against FA Cup Finalist Portsmouth. Birmingham too found their victory came a little too late, beating Blackburn at home with a  4-1 goal line.

Other results saw that Everton cemented the 5^th spot to get to UEFA Cup after a convincing 3-1 win over Newcastle while Man City lost their biggest game this season against Middlesbrough with a 8-1 score line after losing Richard Dunne who is linked with a summer transfer to Arsenal.

Such a fitting finish to the league this season, after a lot of ups and downs and twists and turns. That ends round one and the next round would be to Moscow where the two top English side will be pitted against one another to be crowned European Champions. Mark your calendars Manchester United vs Chelsea. Champions League Final.

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