Villa Up to Fourth After Drawing Blank With United

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Premier League champions Manchester United were made to rue missed chances, as they drew 0-0 with Aston Villa at Villa Park.

The result now means that Villa go a point ahead of Arsenal in fourth place, while United remain eight points off Premier League leaders Chelsea and Liverpool, with a game in hand.

Throughout the game United were by far the more dominant side, but failed convert to any of their chances. Wayne Rooney had the best of United's opportunities, but the England striker lashed wildly over the bar from close range, after being played in by an astute pass from Michael Carrick.

Villa also had their chances however, and Ashley Young almost had Villa in front at the start of the second half, the midfielder almost catching Edwin Van der Sar out with a curling effort from 20 yards.

The home side might feel hard done by, after seeing a blatant penalty waved away by the referee on 58 minutes. Nemanja Vidic appeared to be tugging on the shirt of Gabriel Agbonlahor, as the Serbian made sure Agbonlahor wasn't going to get to the ball.

For the remainder of the second half, United had the better chances, but failed to convert any of them, and therefore fail to claw back the eight point gap between them and the league leaders, Chelsea and Liverpool.

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After seeing his side win 2-0 at the Emirates last week, Aston Villa manager Martin O'Neill revealed it was harder to do the same against the current EPL champions.

Talking to BBC Sport, O'Neill said: "We tried to perform in the same way as at Arsenal. It is very difficult against United—they are great players who can turn games but we stuck at it and deserved something.

"These have been two big games for us after losing to Newcastle and Middlesbrough and will help to give the players great self-belief."

And after seeing Villa go ahead of Arsenal into fourth place in the table, O'Neill recognised the difficulty of maintaining such a position.

"It is exceptionally hard to break into the top four but we are aiming for that sort of thing. The players are improving and have a good confidence about themselves."

Despite his side failing to claw back the points on the league leaders, United manager, Sir Alex Ferguson was pleased with the way his side performed against a tricky Aston Villa team.

The United manager said: "I thought we were the better team apart from a 15-minute spell after half-time when Villa got the ball into our box from free-kicks and corners and caused a lot of problems.

"Apart from that, we weren't in danger. I was pleased with the effort we put in against an aggressive and determined team who defended for their lives.

"With the amount of possession we had at the end I thought another chance must come along but they held on."