Hargreaves was playing holding midfield, thus you dont want him making forward runs all the time, taking him out of position. Considering thats what Stevie G, Lamps and Carick do all the time with little regard of holding the midfield, i think hargreaves so called static attacking was the right way to play.
Anyway from what i remember, a times Owen was doing more work than all the midfield put together, thats including making fine attacking dribbles.