Aston Villa beat champions Manchester City on Wednesday night to extend their remarkable winning run at home as Scott McTominay scored twice to help Manchester United record a 2-1 victory over Chelsea at Old Trafford.
Elsewhere, Liverpool closed to within two points of leaders Arsenal with a victory at Sheffield United and Fulham hammered Nottingham Forest 5-0, heaping the pressure on manager Steve Cooper.
Aston Villa, who have now won 14 league games in a row at Villa Park, scored the only goal of the game in the 74th minute when Leon Bailey’s shot took a huge deflection off Ruben Dias.
The win, which lifts Unai Emery’s men into third place, means they equal a club record for consecutive home victories in league competition, previously achieved in 1903 and 1931.
City, last year’s treble winners, missing the suspended Rodri, have now won just three league games in their past nine.
They are unbeaten in their past 43 matches in which the Spain midfielder has played but their four defeats in all competitions this season have all come when he has been serving a ban.
Manchester United secured a priceless three points, shrugging off a rare penalty miss from Bruno Fernandes in the first half.
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Chelsea’s Cole Palmer finished an impressive team move on the stroke of half-time to cancel out McTominay’s opener.
But the Scotland international headed home Alejandro Garnacho’s cross for his second with about 20 minutes left to lift United to sixth in the table, just three points behind City.
Manager Erik ten Hag, who dropped out-of-form Marcus Rashford, brushed off rumours of dressing room unrest, saying he did not care “about the noise”.
Liverpool, looking increasingly dangerous, saw off basement club Sheffield United 2-0.
Virgil van Dijk opened the scoring at Bramall Lane, turning home a Trent Alexander-Arnold corner in the 37th minute from near the penalty spot.
The visitors dominated possession but failed to break through again until midfielder Dominik Szoboszlai made the points safe in time added on.
The victory takes Jurgen Klopp’s team to 34 points – just two behind Arsenal, who beat Luton 4-3 on Tuesday.
Nottingham Forest, in their second season back in the Premier League, slumped to a fourth straight defeat at Fulham.
Alex Iwobi and Raul Jimenez scored two goals apiece and Tom Cairney completed the humiliation in the final minutes.
Brighton recorded a 2-1 home win against Brentford courtesy of goals from Pascal Gross and Jack Hinshelwood, while Bournemouth notched their third win in four games, beating Crystal Palace 2-0.
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