SOCCER - FA PREMIERSHIP/Leeds...1 Arsenal...1: This is fast becoming Manchester United's benefit month. Two of their closest rivals, Newcastle United and Liverpool, failed to win on Saturday, and two more, Leeds United and Arsenal, shared a drab draw here yesterday.

If Alex Ferguson's team beat Liverpool at Old Trafford tomorrow night they will open up a five-point gap at the top of what is supposed to be the most open Premier League for years. As it is, only Newcastle are within striking distance of the champions while Arsenal have lost the advantage of their match in hand.

Leeds and Arsenal each looked worth a modest each-way bet for the title yesterday, nothing more. Much of the game was affected by a strong, swirling wind which made first-time control tricky and judgment a lottery when the ball was booted into the air.

Yet even when the gale abated in the second half the football continued to drift aimlessly back and forth like tumbleweed in a ghost town.

The best thing that could be said about the match was that after a feud stretching back at least seven games the teams declared an uneasy armistice. Only three names were added to the 48 bookings this sequence of fixtures has produced, and for once nobody was sent off.

Both sides had the common sense of Mark Halsey to thank for this. Halsey refereed in the old-fashioned way, declining to interrupt what little flow there was with trivial stoppages and keeping his cards close to his chest. Would that some of his contemporaries were prepared to follow suit.

Arsenal's Ashley Cole and Robert Pires were each cautioned for fouling David Batty, and Seth Johnson followed for a challenge on Patrick Vieira. By the standards of both sides this was practically a love-in.

Halsey even forgave Martin Keown for chucking a corner flag into the crowd in his annoyance at a decision early in the game. It is bad enough when the fans throw things at the players.

There may, however, be repercussions when the video panel studies the elbow Mark Viduka planted in Keown's face when the pair went for a ball towards the touchline after half-an-hour.

After the Arsenal defender had recovered, Halsey spoke to both players without reaching for a card. Had he had a clearer view of the incident Viduka might not have been so lucky.

Perhaps this was long-delayed retribution for the elbow on Viduka at Highbury last season which brought Keown a three-match ban after the TV panel had studied the evidence.

If so, Leeds may be facing the loss to suspension of yet another important player. Alan Smith was beginning a five-match ban yesterday which will see him out of action until March, Danny Mills is about to miss four games and Lee Bowyer will be out for six if he is found guilty on two counts of misconduct.

Injuries are not helping them either. The loss of Olivier Dacourt and Eirik Bakke has deprived David O'Leary's midfield of much of its ability to link up with the attack.

For half the game Batty and Johnson were successful in denying Vieira and Ray Parlour opportunities to establish consistent lines of communication with Thierry Henry and Dennis Bergkamp through the middle and Pires and Fredrik Ljungberg on the wings.

But when Leeds, having taken an early lead through Robbie Fowler's seventh goal in six starts, needed to regain the initiative after Pires had brought the scores level, they could not get Fowler and Viduka going again.

That said, Fowler remains the most positive thing which has happened at Elland Road in recent months. For Liverpool he made a habit of enjoying himself at Arsenal's expense, so the way Leeds went ahead after five minutes yesterday could have been predicted.

Despite being thrown off balance, Jason Wilcox managed to produce an excellent centre which sailed beyond Sol Campbell and Cole to Fowler, who had positioned himself perfectly to head the ball past Richard Wright.

By then Arsenal, who had begun enterprisingly enough, might have been two up. In the second minute Henry's pass beat Rio Ferdinand and reached Dennis Bergkamp, who fluffed his shot. Another two minutes and another Bergkamp-bound ball from Henry was this time cut out by Ferdinand, who with Jonathan Woodgate was about the best player on view.

For a long time Arsenal offered little but half-formed ideas, the occasional surge from Henry or Pires, and evidence that Bergkamp is no happier in a high wind than he is in a high plane.

Nevertheless the Dutchman only needs a fraction of time and space to form an attacking idea, and in the 44th minute this saw Arsenal draw level. Gathering a pass from Pires, Bergkamp fed the ball into a gap. Henry let it run through his legs and Pires, who had been following the move, regained possession before beating Nigel Martyn.

Speaking of the Viduka/Keown incident after the match, O'Leary said: "I don't want to make any comment on that incident until I have seen it again.

"I know at the time I gave the referee a bit of stick because I thought we were through with a chance and I couldn't understand why he had blown up.

"But the referee did well. It was a game which was refereed rightly, especially as there were a lot of people waiting to pounce."

LEEDS: Martyn, Mills, Woodgate, Ferdinand, Matteo, Bowyer, Johnson, Batty, Wilcox, Fowler, Viduka. Subs Not Used: Robinson, Kelly, Harte, Keane, Kewell. Booked: Johnson. Goals: Fowler 6.

ARSENAL: Wright, Luzhny (Dixon 81), Campbell, Keown, Cole, Parlour, Ljungberg (van Bronckhorst 66), Vieira, Pires, Bergkamp (Wiltord 70), Henry. Subs Not Used: Stack, Upson. Booked: Cole, Pires. Goals: Pires 45.

Referee: M Halsey (Welwyn Garden City)

NEXT ON THE LIST: Tuesday - Man United v Liverpool; Wednesday - Leicester v Arsenal