Alex Ferguson today demanded a lengthy winning streak from his Manchester United side to stop leaders Chelsea and Liverpool from stealing their English Premier League crown.

The fiery Scot insisted his Champions League-winning team stamp their superiority over the tricky mid-table sides as Arsenal lost further points early in the title race.

While United won 2-0 at Blackburn Rovers on Saturday, Arsenal needed a last-ditch equaliser to scramble a 1-1 draw at Sunderland.

Ferguson said a run of victories like the one that carried the Red Devils to the title last season was required to keep their rivals at bay.

“We’re capable of that. We have to do that in terms of keeping up with Chelsea and Liverpool, that’s obvious,” he said.

“It’s not an easy league this. You see Arsenal dropped a couple of points because there’s a lot of grounds you can go to and lose points.

“It’s going to be an interesting season. What we’ve got to do is to make sure we’ve got consistency and make sure we try to take something from every game.”

United defender Wes Brown scored a disputed header in the 31st minute at Ewood Park and striker Wayne Rooney scored in the 64th minute to keep the champions breathing down the leaders’ necks.

The result left United three points from the top and Ferguson’s side will have a game in hand following this weekend’s round of matches.

Chelsea host Aston Villa on Sunday, and Liverpool travel to Manchester City.

Spain midfielder Cesc Fabregas rescued Arsenal with an injury-time header at the Stadium of Light. Substitute Grant Leadbitter gave the hosts a shock lead in the 86th minute, two minutes after coming on.

Arsenal lost 2-1 at home to Hull last weekend but narrowly avoided a second straight league defeat to lesser opposition.

The Gunners are on 13 points, one behind the leaders ahead of Sunday’s matches.

“We had a good attitude, a good response but we are frustrated,” said Gunners boss Arsene Wenger.

“In the last two championship games, everything went against us. We tried, we lacked a little bit of sharpness, maybe, but overall the attitude was very good.”

Sunderland boss Roy Keane said he was pleased with the Black Cats’ performance.

“I thought we were outstanding: the discipline of the team, the way we played,” the Irishman said.

“A draw was possibly a fair result.”

At the JJB Stadium, former Gunners striker Jeremie Aliadiere scored a last-ditch goal of his own, his 89th-minute effort the only goal of the game as visitors Middlesbrough beat Wigan.

The goal ended Boro’s run of four straight defeats.

“Our mentality going into the game was different and you could sense a determination about them,” said Middlesbrough boss Gareth Southgate.

“The irony is we’ve played much better football in our last two games and taken nothing.”

Latics manager Steve Bruce moaned that side had been “mugged”.

“We needed to score and unfortunately we didn’t manage to do that, and we’ve been caught with a horrible sucker punch at the end,” he said.

At the Hawthorns, Roman Bednar’s 61st-minute goal was enough for West Brom to see off visitors Fulham 1-0.

It was the Czech international striker’s third goal of the season.

“The next game (against Man United) is the important one and we’ve got to be ready to go to Old Trafford, make life difficult for them, and see if we can pick something up there,” said Baggies manager Tony Mowbray.

© AFP 2012

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