Saturday, 26th September 2009 – KO: 15:00

A rare Saturday 3pm kick-off for United here as we travel to Stoke in the Premier League.

Having come up into the Premier League last season, Stoke were perhaps one of the favourites to be relegated but they surprised everyone by having a fantastic season and they even put several of the more “established” Premier League sides to shame.

The real foundation for their success was their home form as they won more than half of their home games and lost just four times (Chelsea and Manchester United being two of the defeats).

This season they have started in similar fashion and were only beaten by Chelsea at home after a late, late goal by Florent Malouda.

The signs are all there again that any team going to Stoke had better go expecting a battle if they’re to walk away with the three points.

Manchester United have gone from strength to strength so far this season. A lacklustre start to the season saw us make hard work of beating Birmingham and our next game saw us lose to Burnley. Since then, however, we have put together a string of six straight wins in all competitions scoring sixteen goals in the process.

The only game we have drawn so far this season was the very first – The Community Shield game against Chelsea – almost two months ago.

It could well be that we are due another draw and, given Stoke’s home record, it wouldn’t come as a complete surprise.

I certainly think the price about us winning the game is ridiculously low (around 1.40) and whilst a United win is obviously what I am hoping for, I cannot see it being as easy as those odds would suggest although we should be capable of beating Stoke, even at their place.

The good news is that apart from the existing injuries to the likes of Rafael and Van Der Sar, Fergie has a full strength squad to choose from here.

He has already said that Ben Foster will start in goal but it is going to be interesting to see what it does in most other positions, especially in midfield and up-front.

Fletcher should be a given but who plays alongside him? Scholes? Anderson? Carrick?

Up front, Michael Owen has done everything that could possibly have been asked of him during his limited time on the pitch so far this season, the same probably cannot be said for Berby who has had far more time to impress and only seems to be succeeding in giving his doubters more and more ammunition.

After his stunning start of the season continued with a stunning start to the Manchester Derby, Rooney faded quite dramatically against City last week and it will be interesting to see if this is the week Fergie decides to let him recharge his batteries ready for the big Champions League game we have next Wednesday.

I can see a United win here but the draw would not come as a massive shock either. A Stoke win WOULD be a shock.

If we do win, I can only see it being by the odd goal and I wouldn’t be at all surprised if Stoke score at least one of their own.

The bet is going to be 3 points Stoke +1, +1.5 Asian Handicap @ 1.95 with VC Bet.

Not an awful lot to report on this one.

The bet looked good for a long, long time in this one but when Fergie brought on Giggs for the continuously frustrating Nani, it suddenly didn’t look so good anymore as two swings of his magic left foot led to two goals within 22 minutes of his introduction.

Stoke didn’t really threaten too much – mostly down to a great defensive display from Vidic who seemed to win almost everything in the air (Stoke’s strong point).

The win was an excellent result but even better news came from Wigan who beat Chelsea which mean that we went top of the League on goal difference.