Wayne Rooney and Cristiano Ronaldo scored late to keep Manchester United at the top of the Premier League with a 2-0 win over Reading on Saturday.
Title rival Arsenal kept pace with the Red Devils with a 3-0 win at London rival Fulham behind two goals from Emmanuel Adebayor, putting both teams on 54 points with United ahead on goal difference.
"You start to worry when a game goes on and on whether you're going to get the goal," Manchester United manager Alex Ferguson said. "It's taken a lovely flick from Wayne Rooney to open it up for us."
Chelsea remained four points from the leaders with a 1-0 win at Birmingham, while most of the focus was on Saturday's late game, when Kevin Keegan began his second stint as Newcastle manager with a drab 0-0 draw against Bolton.
"You hoped it wouldn't be a 0-0 type of game," Keegan said. "The stadium was rocking but Bolton came here and were very well disciplined and very well organized by [Bolton manager] Gary [Megson] and we weren't good enough to break them down."
Also on Saturday, it was: Blackburn 1, Middlesbrough 1; Portsmouth 3, Derby 1; and Tottenham 2, Sunderland 0.
Rooney took a cross from Carlos Tevez in the 77th minute to poke the ball past Reading goalkeeper Marcus Hanhemann, who had kept out numerous United attempts.
Ronaldo made it 2-0 on a counter attack in the 90th, for his 17th Premier League goal this season.
Arsenal have not lost a game this season when Adebayor has scored and the Togo striker put the Gunners ahead at Fulham.
He headed in his first goal after taking a cross from Gael Clichy in the 19th minute and took a cross from Aleksandr Hleb to head in his second goal -- and 15th in the Premier League this season -- in the 38th.
Tomas Rosicky volleyed in Arsenal's third in the 81st. The Gunners lost the league lead last week when they drew 1-1 with Birmingham.
"We are very, very ambitious and the way we came on the pitch today after the disappointing result of last week gives you a strong message about how much this team wants it," Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger said.
Delighted Newcastle fans hailed the return of the man they dubbed the "Messiah" this week, but Keegan's patched-up side struggled against Bolton, taking more than an hour get a shot on target.
And it was Bolton that nearly scored the winner through Jlloyd Samuel in the 90th minute -- but Newcastle goalkeeper Shay Given produced a reflex save to block the best chance of the match.
Chelsea started new signing Nicolas Anelka for the first time, but couldn't break through the Birmingham defense until the 80th minute, when a corner from Juliano Belletti was headed in by Claudio Pizzaro.
Benjani Mwaruwari scored a hat trick for Portsmouth, finding the net in the 38th, 42nd and 55th minutes after Derby had scored an early goal through Lewin Nytanga.
Mwaruwari equalized by hitting the roof of the net and then gave Portsmouth the lead with a header after Derby failed to clear a corner. He scored his third after playing a one-two with Pedro Mendes.
Pompey started new midfielder Lassana Diarra but played without defender and captain Sol Campbell, who dropped out before the match with a back injury.
Aaron Lennon scored for Spurs in the second minute against Sunderland. Robbie Keane made it 2-0 in injury time with his 100th goal for Tottenham.
Defender David Wheater put Middlesbrough in front in the 13th with a header after a free kick from Stewart Downing. Blackburn leveled in the 75th, with Matt Derbyshire scoring from a pass from Jason Roberts.
A sumo star was born in Japan on Sunday when 24-year-old Takerufuji became the first wrestler in 110 years to win a top-division tournament on his debut, triumphing at the 15-day Spring Grand Sumo Tournament in Osaka despite injuring his ankle on the penultimate day. Takerufuji, whose injury had left him in a wheelchair outside the ring, shoved out the higher-ranked Gonoyama at the Edion Arena Osaka to the delight of the crowd, giving him an unassailable record of 13 wins and two losses to claim the Emperor’s Cup. “I did it just through willpower. I didn’t really know what was going
The US’ Ilia Malinin on Saturday produced six scintillating quadruple jumps, including a quadruple Axel, in the men’s free skate to capture his first figure skating world title. The 19-year-old nicknamed the “Quad god,” who is the only skater to land a quadruple Axel in competition, dazzled with an array of breathtakingly executed jumps starting with his quad Axel and including a quadruple Lutz in combination with a triple flip and a quadruple toe loop in combination with a triple toe. He added an unexpected triple-triple combination at the end to earn a world-record 227.79 in the free program for a championship
Shohei Ohtani’s interpreter is being criminally investigated by the IRS, and the attorney for his alleged bookmaker said Thursday that the ex-Los Angeles Dodgers employee placed bets on international soccer — but not baseball. The IRS confirmed Thursday that interpreter Ippei Mizuhara and Mathew Bowyer, the alleged illegal bookmaker, are under criminal investigation through the agency’s Los Angeles Field Office. IRS Criminal Investigation spokesperson Scott Villiard said he could not provide additional details. Mizuhara, 39, was fired by the Dodgers on Wednesday following reports from the Los Angeles Times and ESPN about his alleged ties to an illegal bookmaker and debts well
MLB on Friday announced a formal investigation into the scandal swirling around Shohei Ohtani and his former interpreter amid charges that the Los Angeles Dodgers superstar was the victim of “massive theft.” The Dodgers on Wednesday fired Ippei Mizuhara, Ohtani’s long-time interpreter and close friend, after Ohtani’s representatives alleged that the Japanese two-way star had been the victim of theft, which was reported to involve millions of dollars and link Mizuhara to a suspected illegal bookmaker in California. “Major League Baseball has been gathering information since we learned about the allegations involving Shohei Ohtani and Ippei Mizuhara from the news media,” MLB