The hounds smell blood (like they did with Wenger) but Moyes deserves time for having guts to follow Alexander the Great.

The hounds are snapping at the heels of David Moyes, just as they were with Arsene Wenger after Arsenal lost at home to Aston Villa a few short weeks ago.
Yet, once again, there are few if any sensible suggestions as to who might take over if the manager is sacked.
No-one had a better idea when Sir Alex Ferguson anointed Moyes as The Chosen One to succeed him at Old Trafford. Nor do they today.

Making a point: David Moyes (left) led Manchester United to a creditable draw in Donetsk on Wednesday and deserves time despite a poor start

Can't look: Moyes (right) came under fire after the defeat by Manchester City.

Not now that Fergie has made it abundantly clear that he has no intention of doing a Sir Matt Busby and returning to the throne if Manchester United don’t get back to winning ways sharpish.
Moyes has eased the pressure a few degrees by taking a point at inhospitable Shakhtar Donetsk and thereby retaining the lead of their Champions League group.
Still, it won’t be easy for him as United return to the long haul of the Premier League. His late start at Old Trafford probably set back the annual summer reconstruction of the team which Sir Alex used to engineer to such miraculous effect.
So the first task for Moyes appears to be keeping the ship steady until the new year, then building towards challenges on all fronts the following season.
It may not feel comfortable for supporters accustomed to perpetual success but any silverware which comes United’s way this season will be a bonus.
Moyes should not be hung, drawn and quartered for that.
This is a very good manager and his own variation on a potent United team will emerge over time. The continuing presence of Ferguson on the board will ensure that he is given that precious commodity.
Far from being threatened by the shadow of his predecessor Moyes will be protected, at the very least for long enough to have a decent chance of proving himself. The odds are that he will succeed in doing that.
For the moment his qualities are to be more accurately gauged by the team he left behind. The early-season success of Everton has at least as much to do with all that Moyes put into that club down the years as with his replacement Roberto Martinez.
United were always going to present a more complex puzzle. The expectations are greater. The egos he now has to deal with are bigger, making motivation on the Ferguson Richter Scale more difficult.
And the time had come for a couple of legends to be replaced.
He should take encouragement from Wenger, who although deep into his tenure at Emirates has had to fend off the furies.
So quickly has he turned a hiccup at the start of the season into a roar of acclamation that Arsenal are looking like genuine contenders for all the glittering prizes.

Legacy: Moyes showed guts in replacing Sir Alex Ferguson as United manager

For this he, too, has needed time. 
The rip-tide of brilliant football which swept away Rafa Benitez’s Napoli this week began as a wave towards the finish of last season.
Even though that improvement did not come early enough to end Wenger’s eight years without a trophy, the confidence built in those closing weeks has spilled over into the new campaign.
Mezut Ozil’s arrival has consolidated that transformation to such an impressive extent that Arsenal are now the very model of unexpected consistency. All this, while United, Manchester City and Chelsea are performing erratically.
There is reason to suppose that Wenger’s lean years are ending.
If so, it will be by virtue of Arsenal’s patience and that sends a message to Old Trafford.
As far as I can see, Moyes has made only two mistakes of any real consequence. And come on, he’s entitled to the odd slip as he steps on to this especially steep slope.

Time and money: Arsene Wenger was barracked at the start of the season but he then bought Mesut Ozil (below) and Arsenal started winning

Mesut Ozil

What a turnaround: Arsenal are now top of the Premier League, unbeaten in Europe and Wenger is a happy man

The most recent was admitting publicly what most of us suspect, that in this season of transition United have no realistic chance of actually winning the Champions League.
Fortunately for him United’s players, instead of being deflated, redeemed their manager with Wednesday night’s committed performance in Ukraine.
Perhaps the bigger error was his first decision, that of taking this job to begin with.
As many have discovered in the past, the best time to succeed a legendary manager is being the man after the first fall guy who tries to fill those shoes.
If nothing else, the critics of Moyes should give him credit for having the guts to take on the immediate legacy of Alexander The Great.

Nobody wins when likes of Wiggins and Froome disrespect sport

Imagine Manchester City simply shrugging and stumbling off the Etihad Stadium pitch at three down against Bayern Munich with half an hour to go --  just because they knew the Champions League game was up.
Suppose that England, needing 270 to win at Lord’s, reached 258 for two with four hours left for play - and Australia just padded off to the pavilion muttering: ‘No chance here, mate.’
What if Andy Murray, in next summer’s defence of his historic Wimbledon title, were to be two sets,  five-love and 15-40 down to Rafa Nadal in the semi-final – so he smashes his racket and stalks off Centre Court?

Half measures: Chris Froome (left) and Sir Bradley Wiggins pulled up midway through the elite men's race at the World Road Championships

Not difficult to think how dim a view the spectators would take of such petulant behaviour. The coaches and sponsors and everyone else involved, also.
But most importantly of all, what about their opponents? 
How would they feel about being denied their moment of victory by such miserable, self-serving failure to honour one of sport’s most basic precepts?

Dethroned: Wiggins' decision to pull out was shameful

Well, that is exactly what two of this country’s most celebrated sportsmen of the moment did the other day. Our first two British winners of the Tour de France, no less.
Bradley Wiggins, who has been knighted, and Chris Froome, who will no doubt be highly honoured shortly, pulled up midway through the cycling World Road Championships road race for no better reason than that they had no chance of winning.
So, come to that, did the rest of their team-mates. Shameful, is one word which comes to mind.
All right, it was chucking down with rain. OK, that made the roads slippery and riding downhill particularly hazardous.
But it was the same for those in front of them.
It was the same for the winner and the two other chaps who made it to the podium, only for Wiggins, Froome and Co to deprive them of the respect they deserved for their braver efforts.
Those of us who cringed at what they did will no doubt be told that we know nothing about cycling. Even if that were true, it is irrelevant.
Sport is not only about winning. It is also about losing in a gallant manner which gives due credit to he, or she, who has defeated you on the day. Did they forget they were supposed to be riding for Britain, not only themselves?
What if the rest of the Tour de France riders had packed up and gone home the night before the final stage leaving Wiggins last year, then Froome this summer, to ride into Paris alone?
Some celebration that would have been. And how would they have felt?

Champion: Froome (centre) won the Tour de France in the summer but gave up when conditions were less favourable at the world championships

Yet they have blithely disrespected the sport which brought them wealth and fame - and their peers within it.
All Sir Bradley and Mister Chris had to lose by doing the right thing and keeping going to the sodden end was a race.
Instead, they chose to lose their dignity.

If Hart doesn't recover England will be playing find us keepers

Joe Hart’s woes are becoming painful to behold and he will feel the hurt from his latest blunders, committed in Manchester City’s crushing defeat by Bayern Munich, for some time to come.

Hopefully, he will recover his equilibrium, along with his instinct for shot-stopping, sooner rather than later.
Because the once-overflowing well of England goalkeepers has dried up to the point where this country cannot afford a single one with even a hint of international potential to fall by the wayside.

Not safe keeping: Joe Hart concedes the first against Bayern and looks despondent (below) but England need him to rediscover his form

The harsh truth is that the conveyor belt which used to keep producing genius examples of this eccentric breed of footballer has ground to a halt.
Gone, sadly, are the days when two giants between the sticks were asked to take turns in wearing the England jersey.
Had Peter Shilton not been required to share the honour with Ray Clemence he would have acquired many more than his England record of 125 caps. Both men won English league titles and European Cups to boot, Shilton with Nottingham Forest and Clemence with Liverpool.

Giants: Keeping colossuses Ray Clemence and Peter Shilton competed for the England No 1 jersey in the 1970s and 1980s

Able Seaman: David Seaman was superb for England in the 1990s and early Noughties

Those two pairs of huge hands were followed by David Seaman who, apart from being voted goalkeeper of the tournament in England’s run to the semi-finals of Euro 96, achieved such distinctions as conceding only 18 goals in 38 league games for Arsenal in their 1990-91 championship-winning season.
And lest we forget, two legends from the sepia history of our national game – Manchester City’s Frank Swift and Bert Williams of Wolves – established the high bench-mark for England keepers in the 40s and 50s.
Then, above all, stands the greatest ever goalkeeper for England – and in the world.
Gordon Banks, the at-times unbeatable custodian of England’s World Cup glory of ’66, hallmarked his place at the all-time pinnacle of his craft with that Save of the Century from Pele’s header in the World Cup Finals of Mexico 1970.
Will we ever see his like again? All we can do, it seems, is pray.

The Greatest: Gordon Banks, who was at times unbeatable in England's goal, saves Pele's header in 1970

It's there in black and white: Frank Swift and Bert Williams (below) set the benchmark for England keepers in the 1940s and 50s