1) Rodgers's grumblings were justified

It is unusual to hear a manager criticising the manner of a 3-1 win and even more striking when the manager in question is Brendan Rodgers, a man not averse to accentuating the positives at Liverpool. He was justified in his complaints after Saturday's defeat of Crystal Palace, however. No team reflects the openness of this Premier League season better than Liverpool, who sat top of the table on Saturday night but have yet to produce a commanding 90-minute display in this campaign. Rodgers lamented the "lack of control" behind the otherwise impressive front two of Luis Suárez and Daniel Sturridge and Palace had enough opportunities to disturb Liverpool's incisive first-half display. It was encouraging to hear the manager at the Premier League summit demanding improvement, although Anfield would happily listen to that criticism every week if the table remained the same. "We'll get better in the second half of the season," said Rodgers. "But it was critical that we made a good start. I believe that we have still got a lot of improvement to make which is good, especially if we continue with this mentality of winning games. We've won five out of seven but there is still a lot of improvement to do." Andy Hunter

2) Will Moyes stick with Januzaj?

David Moyes claimed he would have started Adnan Januzaj three or four weeks ago, but for injuries elsewhere which scuppered his plan. It will now prove a source of intrigue whether or not the United manager continually picks the 18-year-old, both at home and in Europe, or reverts back to the experienced performers who had struggled earlier in the season. Ewan Murray

3) All hail Allardici

Sam Allardyce once speculated that he might be taken more seriously as a tactician and, therefore, considered for the very top jobs, if he had a European-sounding surname. At White Hart Lane on Sunday, the West Ham United manager contented himself with aping Spain's 4-6-0 formation, which had triumphed at Euro 2012, to enjoy a memorable 3-0 win. He positively basked in the post-match acclaim. 'No, no, don't call me a managerial genius (but you can if you want)', was the subtext to a line from his press conference. André Villas-Boas hated it. The Tottenham Hotspur manager gave Allardyce and West Ham absolutely no credit. He said that their goals had come from a set-piece, a fluke and a one-man break against two of his defenders. Allardyce's tactics had emphatically not thrown him. "It's nothing to do with the strategy but you can write whatever you want," Villas-Boas huffed. Having been outwitted in the second-half by Chelsea's José Mourinho the previous weekend, this was a low point. Allardyce is riding high. David Hytner

4) Pellegrini finds the 'release pressure' valve

There was a first at the Etihad Stadium on Saturday during Manchester City's 3-1 win over Everton: the sight of a Manuel Pellegrini discarding his billing as the calm patrician of the technical area to become, well, a touch animated. This collector's item came in two parts. The opening stanza featured the Chilean exchanging some involved words with James Milner after Romelu Lukaka's opener for Everton that may or may not have been a telling-off for the midfielder. Then, in the second half, when Aleksandar Kolarov had to depart due to a facial injury, Pellegrini, to use the parlance, "lay into" both the left-back's proposed replacement, Gaël Clichy, and Brian Kidd, his assistant, after the Frenchman had sat back down after warming up. Coming soon to a Premier League dugout near you: a water-bottle kicking, fourth-official berating, opposition manager-baiting Pellegrini … Jamie Jackson

5) Mackay knows better than to take on Cardiff's owner

The Cardiff players said before Saturday's defeat to Newcastle that they were thinking of asking the manager, Malky Mackay, to ban the club's owner, Vincent Tan, from the dressing room after a row over bonuses. The dispute has been resolved but ill feeling lingers and Tan did not make his usual appearance in the changing room after the final whistle. So was he barred from doing so? Hardly. The mega-rich Malaysian owns the club, and to ban him from any part of it would be akin to barring him from his own front room. Tan did not make his millions from being compliant, he is a tough task master and Mackay, who is nobody's fool, is not about to take him on. Joe Lovejoy

6) Mourinho has bench-warming game-changers at his disposal

While Chris Hughton, perhaps rather harshly, starts fretting again over his position at Carrow Road with a trip to Arsenal to come after the international break, Chelsea can warm to their newfound squad depth. Much is justifiably made of their lack of goals up front, with the three senior strikers on the Londoners' books having yet to register in the league while Romelu Lukaku already boasts four on loan at Everton. Yet José Mourinho still benefits from game-changers on his bench. He could fling on Eden Hazard and Willian against Norwich, with the two-time European Cup winner Samuel Eto'o also making a contribution as the visitors shape-shifted boldly in a bid to conjure a winner. Last year the management might have been looking to Yossi Benayoun or Marko Marin to inspire such a victory having been pegged back. Mourinho will need more than one transfer window before he is content with the balance of his squad, but others would be envious of the options already at his disposal. The strikers may not be scoring, but the collective boasts personnel who can inspire revivals. Dominic Fifield

7) Pochettino's quick thinking swung the game

Swansea will play worse and win. After Southampton took the lead through Adam Lallana after 19 minutes, Swansea dominated for long enough for the edginess in the crowd to become very apparent and it was only the excellence of Artur Boruc and some wasteful finishing that prevented them from equalising before half-time. At the start of the second half, Swansea's control only became more pronounced and a goal felt inevitable. Mauricio Pochettino had started the game with his side set up in a 4-4-2 formation, Rickie Lambert and Daniel Osvaldo partnering each other in attack, but now Southampton were getting overwhelmed in midfield. Pochettino, however, did not sit there hoping for the best. Instead he reacted. He removed Southampton's biggest name, Osvaldo, and brought on a teenager, James Ward-Prowse, to bolster his side's midfield in the 58th minute and Swansea soon ran out of ideas. Another goal did indeed arrive - but not for Swansea. Pochettino is becoming increasingly impressive. Jacob Steinberg

8) Is Wenger wrong to doubt Wilshere's scoring credentials?

"I don't think he will ever be a goalscorer," Arsène Wenger said when a journalist in the Hawthorns pressroom pointed out that Jack Wilshere had recently described his own goals record as "embarrassing." Yet in the next sentence, Wenger also pointed out a lot of people had previously thought the same about another of the players in the Arsenal dressing room. "Let's not forget we had the same problem with [Aaron] Ramsey a while ago. Once they start to score it comes naturally." Wilshere, he added, is "a player who can provide chances for others ... in our job, it's quite simple, you need players who score and players who give the balls to those who score. He's more in the second category but of course from that category you want a few goals as well, so it's good that he knows he can do it." Wilshere's equaliser in the 1-1 draw at West Brom was his first goal in the Premier League since a 4-2 win at Aston Villa in November 2010 (though, in mitigation, a lot of that time has been spent missing through injury). In total, he has two in 82 appearances. All the same, it was strange for Wenger to say, as his first reaction, there would never be a time when Wilshere scored with regularity. Of course, Wilshere will always be a creator but he strikes the ball so accurately, and is such an elusive opponent, is it expecting too much to think if he stays injury-free that eight to ten goals a season should be beyond him? Daniel Taylor

9) Stoke may need to embrace a familiar plan B

Rightly or wrongly, Tony Pulis has taken a battering of late – last week Kenwyne Jones called Stoke's style under the Welshman "more or less kick-and-hope. I think team-mates could testify it was very hard to come by chances." And yet, under a new manager and ethos, converting these chances has been sorely lacking of late – Stoke are the Premier League's lowest scorers. In their 1-0 loss to Fulham, Stoke dominated possession for long periods and were unlucky not to be given a penalty but failed to fashion clear-cut chances and still looked most dangerous from set-pieces; Robert Huth header from a corner being his his team's only effort on target. Mark Hughes should be admired for trying to establish his own legacy, but in games where Stoke lack incision, as they did on Saturday, he might have to accept that with the attributes of his current squad, Jones et al, 'kick-and-hope' remains an ugly but effective plan B. Michael Butler

10) Where to start at Hull?

The former Real Madrid director general Jorge Valdano once compared games between Liverpool and Chelsea to "shit on a stick", but relative to Hull and Villa, both "shit" and "stick" become comparatively fascinating and metaphorically redemptive. Accordingly, not even The Guardian has the brass neck to manufacture a talking point out of a match so soul-curdlingly sordid – but for the fact that it just has. Daniel Harris