ONE day earlier, in the same city, the Reds had thrashed the Blues despite being behind for the entire season and enduring a torrent of criticism.

Back in Manchester, Ed Miliband was clearly confident that politics can repeat the Premiership derby and reward his team for running into form at the right moment.

Remember the Labour leader’s disastrous conference speech – also in Manchester – when he forgot to mention the deficit once and prompted chatter that he could be sacked?

Well, it was a different story yesterday, as a relaxed Mr Miliband took on his critics, spoke fluently, cracked jokes and won praise from almost all watching commentators.

The FT’s verdict was that he had “never sounded more prime ministerial”, while the BBC’s Nick Robinson said: “It was one of the most powerful speeches I've seen him make.”

Yet it should have been a tricky task, because Mr Miliband chose to fight on Labour’s weakest ground – the question of which party is trusted to run the economy and balance the books.

Riskily, he made it his central promise that “everything in this manifesto is funded, the deficit will be cut every year, the books will be balanced and the national debt will be falling”.

Months earlier – maybe one week earlier – there would have been laughter, but, in recent days, astonishingly, the Conservatives have created a vacancy for the party of economic responsibility.

Suddenly, it is David Cameron’s team on a spending binge, on the health service, on inheritance tax, on the railways – giving Mr Miliband an open goal.

On every election programme, Conservative ministers face sarcastic taunts of ‘where's the Magic Money Tree, then’?

That is why Mr Miliband hit home when he called the Tories “the irresponsible party”, adding: “No offence to the Green party but they’re making the Green party look fiscally credible.”

Of course, it is another thing to convince the voters and Labour’s own spending plans are still a muddle and a mystery, according to the Institute of Fiscal Studies.

Furthermore, although Mr Miliband’s personal ratings are improving with exposure, that only means they’ve gone up from catastrophic to merely bad.

And Labour’s new fiscal rectitude puts them in the uncomfortable position of being the only big party not to have pledged the extra £8bn NHS has called for.

Sure enough, within hours, one poll dented Labour optimism by putting the Conservatives a daunting six points ahead.

Nevertheless, the successful manifesto launch set the bar high for Mr Cameron…...who will give us the rival prospectus tomorrow.