28 November, 2015

Gameweek 13: Whatever the league is on right now............can I have some?

Goals, goals, goals.......This weekend served up more thrills in the most open season in decades and three four-goal scorelines plus some huge results for the top of the table sides. Leicester ended this weekend top of the league by virtue of having not been a complete fucking shambles at any point so far (even when womped 5-2 by Arsenal they still looked pretty good). Man United continue their sloth-like "run" in the top four and City and Arsenal just did what City and Arsenal do, lose to sides they really should be beating and racking up injuries like ligaments are going out of fashion. Meanwhile Chelsea seem to have woken up somewhat and are looking to scrape as many dire victories as they can to ensure they're no-where near the relegation zone come the new year...........

Watford Vs Manchester United: Own goal claims all three for dour United...............
Winning any game after a spate of injuries is always good regardless of the nature of that win although, curiously, all bar one (Martial) of United's injuries could be judged to have actually improved their team. Given all the vitriol been thrown around about United essentially being there for the taking, as Arsenal showed, it seems very few teams are up for actually taking them. They sit second having only lost two games (only Leicester and Spurs have lost less) and in a good position to continue this form throughout the congested Christmas period. Watford boast a busy, if not necessarily potent, strike-team in Ighalo and Deeney and it was hoped that the two of them would get stuck into the United defence and wreak havoc.

The reality was something different. Watford started meekly in the first half and really only had one chance on goal, which was missed badly by Ighalo. Starting meek in attack is okay as it affords them a chance to play themselves back into the game, starting meekly in defence only costs goals. United pulled ahead in the 11th minute when Depay was left totally unmarked and his crisp volley from Herrera's cross left Gomes no chance whatsoever. United went into cruise control from then on and the half ended 1-0. Watford came out from the break a changed team and set about playing they way they should have from the start. Were it not for the brilliance of De Gea, United would've been 2-1 down long before Rojo tripped Ighalo in the box in the 87th minute. Deeney stepped up and finally put the ball past De Gea. United jolted back into life and pressed but five minutes left them almost nothing to work with. They got the winner courtesy of Deeney when Lingard's fine shot was saved by Gomes and Schweinstieger fired the ball back into the box. Deeney could do nothing as the ball cannoned off him and into the net. United's streak is impressive, even more so considering how badly they're playing, and they will seek to continue it against Leicester which is sure to be one of the most improbable 1st Vs 2nd matches in recent history. Watford will seek to finally get some rewards for their hard work against a rudder-less Villa next week.

Chelsea Vs Norwich: Off form Costa rescues three points for relieved Chelsea......
It's amusing to think that Norwich actually went into this match above the current league champions. Chelsea broke a three-game losing streak with a solitary goal and the sigh of relief at the final whistle was so strong it blew out windows for miles around London. A season Norwich would've been delighted to leave Stamford Bridge by this scoreline but they entered with the smell of a win or, least, a draw. They did themselves no favours with some horrendous marking and left with neither. Chelsea, and Costa in particular, will not look back on this performance with too much fondness, had Norwich defended better or had more teeth in attack Chelsea would have been in serious trouble. They will also view the two glaring misses in the first half by Costa as a sign that another alternative may be required for the out-of-form striker as Remy and Falcao clearly are not up to the task.

However, with silver linings being what they are, there was one high point from tonight and that's the form of Hazard seems to be rising. Today he looked like a man who's woken up from a long-term coma in which he was stuck in a vivid nightmare. Even considering the lack of any type of pressure from Norwich he can look at this match as one of his better performances this season. Yet it was Costa who conspired to squander all the good work of his team-mates. Picked out expertly by Pedro, Costa was left unmarked on the penalty spot and promptly fired over. He was then put through one-on-one and he dithered until dispossessed by Ruddy. That one sent the Chelsea bench into a maelstrom of anger and it was no surprise that his number was being prepared on the 64th minute when he scored. Fabregas took a free-kick quickly and Norwich, slow all day, were totally unable to deal with the pace and Costa found the top corner to seal all three points. It's a slow progression for Chelsea so far but they surely are in a much better position with three points and Hazard back to some semblance of his best. They take on Spurs next week and will need to produce something better to stand a hope of stealing a march on the top spots. Norwich will lick their wounds and prepare for an even more wounded Arsenal next week.

Everton Vs Aston Villa: Toffees chew Villa up and spit them out..............
Everton are a team reborn as of late. Something in their team DNA has clicked and it's producing a series of performances that are just downright scary at times. Here they completely obliterated Villa by half-time and looked very sharp and collected whilst doing so. Granted they were playing against Aston Villa; a team so disjointed and lost it wouldn't be surprising of it turned out they were being out-scored by their training dummies. Villa have the lowest goals for account in the league now (10) and it's easy to see why. There's absolutely zero fight left his this squad and Garde is going to need a miracle to restore some faith to this sorry bunch. Maybe it's down to a solid starting XI. Everton's (for the first time in a long while) picks itself. Deulofeu, when he stays on his feet, and Barkley have been turning in some excellent performances and they're really starting to play with some flair and style. Villa replaced three lost players (Delph, Benteke and Vlaar) with thirteen other ones and it's hard to see what any of them are supposed to be doing, let alone how they fit together.

Villa were 3-0 down at half time and all the goals came from Everton simply being allowed to pass and run their way down the pitch almost to the goal itself. The first was a Deulofeu shot that Guzan parried for Barkley to slot home unopposed. The second was a Coleman cross that Lukaku met, under no pressure again, with a glanced header into the far corner. The third was another spilled ball by Guzan, this time from a challenge with Kone, and Barkley, yet again, slotted home with no resistance. The fourth came after a period of Villa playing somewhat better in the second half when Barkley and Deulofeu simply passed their way through the middle and opened up the goal for Lukaku to net his second and the games fourth. It's funny to compare two clubs that have such similarities in size, finances and supporter base and see such glaring differences in the teams. And it's purely down to management. Here's how Everton have kept it together while Villa have shit it all out:
  • Big and talented young Belgian centre-forward: Villa sold Benteke, Everton broke the bank to keep Lukaku.
  • Talented and hyped young English player: Barkley ran the show today while Grealish looked out of his depth.
  • Young winger from Barca: Traore barely makes the bench, Deulofeu is in brilliant form and has even stopped the diving!
  • Ageing veterans: Barry, Osman, Jagielka still look fired up. Lescott, Richardson, Cole look wrecked. Let's face it, when you're looking to Richardson to help you out, you're fucked.
  • Celtic full-back: Coleman is excellent both in attack and defence.....Villa have Alan Hutton.

Newcastle Vs Leicester City: The Foxes go top with an inspired destruction of Newcastle.....
Look who's laughing now? If Ranieri was to conduct the rest of this season like that scene in Father Ted where Ted wins an award and uses his acceptance speech to bitterly settle scores with everyone who annoyed him, could anyone blame him? It's probably the only thing that could make me like him more. This game was very much a show between two managers on the opposite sides of the spectrum, McClaren cannot do anything right, Ranieri cannot do anything wrong. Leicester delivered their most complete victory of the season and Newcastle delivered their worst one. Newcastle failed to register one single shot on target and were amazingly fortunate to get to almost half-time before conceding.

The goal was well signposted. Vardy had had numerous opportunities to score but somehow contrived to scuff most of them before Ulloa burned past Mbemba (this was to be a recurring theme) and his cut-back pass left Vardy with little more to do then find the target, which he did. He almost racked up a second, after the break, when he ghosted past Mbemba and smashed the ball off the bar. The second was not too far off when, in the 62nd minute, whipped in a superb cross for Ulloa to head home. While the goal (and the cross) were excellent, rarely does marking get so lax. It was almost as if the Newcastle players were at home watching the highlights themselves. With Newcastle waving white flags Leicester went into a kind of auto-pilot and even took off Vardy for Okazaki. He then scored the third when he bundled in (seemingly against his will) Simpson's parried shot in the 83rd. Boos rang around the ground at full-time, as they'd done at half-time and McClaren must surely be feeling the heat, any more performances like this and he'll certainly not see 2016 as Newcastle manager. A difficult away match to Palace awaits next week. A win there would surely ease a shit-load of the weight. Leicester will seek to cement their top spot against Manchester united next week and Vardy will seek to continue the form that's seen him compared to the likes of Batistuta.

Southampton Vs Stoke City: The walking dead claim a major scalp................
Stoke are a peculiar team. When Hughes took over from Pulis he'd inherited a team that had a rod of steel through the middle but little else to make them shine other than some pacey wingers. They played a direct, physical form of football (some might call it “fighting”) and were often easily found out at times. Hughes' main task was to add flair to the team whilst retaining that iron will to not concede goals. It appears, from today's match anyway, that he's some way towards the promised land. There are few teams that can shut up shop at 1-0 and make it work. Stoke are absolutely one of those teams. It also helped that Soton were curiously off the boil today and played like they had lead weights in their socks.

The first half hour of this match were virtually all Stoke and their goal was a real team effort. Shaquiri, who is really starting to show the class that made him such a darling at Inter, pelted down the right flank and passed in Arnautovic. He then then played the ball across again to Pieters who helped the ball into the path of Krkic, unmarked, who flicked the ball home at the near post. The half hour of domination ended with Afalley having as hot cleared off the line, yet it should have been more as both Arnautovic and Shaquiri had opportunities to score but wasted them. Stoke shut up shop in the second half and hit Soton on the counter. That steel is now augmented with the skill do be able to do this effectively. Soton pretty much owned the ball for the second half and managed to do nothing with it. They notched up only one shot on target the entire game. Koeman was rightly pissed at his team afterwards claiming that he “didn't recognise any of them”. He'll need them showing from now on because Soton have a tough run of fixtures coming up to the new year starting with Manchester City next week. Stoke will travel to Sunderland and this result will surely buoy them to three points there as well.

Swansea Vs Bournemouth: Two goal lead squandered as the Swans claw themselves back in...
Things aren't going so well for Bournemouth right now. They came into this match on the back of a five match losing streak and the urge for them to take the fight to a Swansea team that seems almost devoid of fight recently was palpable. And they did just that. Rifling home two goals in side the first 26 minutes. Trouble is, it took only half that time for them to piss away the two goal lead. It's difficult to draw parallels between Bournemouth's play and the result that come of it. They play with a confidence and verve and yet haven't a bean to show for it. The only positive for them today is that Swansea, in clawing back a two goal deficit, also showed up their own deficiencies. They are woefully short on confidence and have an array of first-team players who have all lost their form completely and have just been phoning it in. The play hasn't been this bad since before Laudrup was sacked.

The match started off quite badly too. Bournemouth's first came after ten minutes courtesy of some truly awful defending. Stanislas had overrun a nice pass to him and it left a simple clearance for Bartley. Unfortunately he cleared the ball straight into Sung-Yeung. The ball re-bounded to Stanislas who crossed low across the box for King to slot home. Swansea woke up and forced two good saves from Federici but left themselves wide open for the second; Arter receiving the ball from deep and picking out Richie in the box. Richie had enough time to literally stand on the fucking ball and wait for someone to run in through the centre. It was Gosling whose first-time shot was dead top corner and the boos that rang around the home stadium were defending in the aftermath of the second goal. It must've filtered through to the players as they pulled one back less than 90 seconds later. Ayew with some deft footwork in box after Shelvey found him with a through ball. He controlled the ball with his right foot and back-heeled it in with his left and, suddenly, Swansea were back in it. They poured on the pressure but it was a contentious penalty that helped level things when Francis was judged to have tripped Ayew in the box. Replays showed that he actually tripped over his own feet. Shelvey stepped up and put away the equaliser to save some face for Monk, but not much. Swansea will need to step up their performances and next weeks meeting with an in-form Liverpool is not an ideal match to start. Bournemouth will not be happy with their next match either as they host Everton.

West Brom Vs Arsenal: Loss highlights the familiar injury crisis at Arsenal......
Here we go again. A mad rash of injuries followed by a huge dip in form and some stuttering losses to teams they really shouldn't be losing to if they consider themselves title contenders, same old Arsenal. For a team who's the very embodiment of exciting football, Arsenal can be quite a boring team to write about. It's a very Arsenal thing to lose by two goals when the opposition only had one shot. But it truly was an evening where literally everything that could go wrong, did. Arsenal took 72% possession, restricted West Brom to only one shot on target (which led to a goal), hit the post, scored an own goal, missed a penalty and suffered two more long-term injuries, one of them to a crucial player. So not a good night then. For West Brom all the guff about the blunt style of football served up by Pulis were stemmed by the result and some fine attacking displays, particularly by McClean and Rondon.

Not that Arsenal did themselves any fucking favours tonight. Despite having nine first-team injuries going into this game, they still boast a legion of talent that Pulis could only dream of. The trouble is the talent didn't perform. They lost Coquelin after half an hour to a knee injury sustained in a tackle with Yacob and Arteta came on in his place. How Wenger must be wishing he turned to Flamini instead...Alexis had come close with a fierce 20 yard strike that was well saved but it was yet another perfectly delivered cross from Ozil that unlocked the massed Bromich defence. Giroud was left unmarked and his header was as simple as could be. Seven minutes later Bromich equalised through their own set-piece and Arsenal defended it every single bit as badly as Bromich did theirs and the result was the same. Morrison deftly pinging the ball across and into the net. Five minutes later McClean beasted Bellerin, not for the first or last time, and slung in a cross. Arteta was there to bungle the ball into his own net. He would then sum up his evening by getting injured twenty minutes after coming on. Arsenal poured forward and Campbell had a great chance to score from six yards but took it like a 95 year-old MS sufferer. Then Alexis was bundled over in the box and up stepped Cazorla to rescue at least a point and make the game not a complete shambles. He slipped in his run up and ballooned the ball over the bar. Arsenal will now limp onwards to Norwich after a mid-week CL game and West Brom will happily accept the early Christmas gift and hope for another at West Ham next week.

Manchester City Vs Liverpool: The Akloppalypce is back...and it's hungry!!!
In the words of Pellegrini afterwards, “it was a complete disaster”. Never before have City played with such a sense of apathy and lack of conviction. Expect maybe for a few weeks ago at Spurs where they were also beaten 4-1. The last time Demichelis had also started in defence........ Anyway, to lay the blame solely at the feet of one defender after such an awful team outing would be unfair. Of all the players involved only Hart and Aguero could hold their heads up by the end. No team can defend like this and expect to win. Mangala and Demichelis played like men who had never seen a football before; let alone each other. Sagna was porous on the right hand side and was bypassed many times far too easily. The defensive frailties weren't helped by Fernandihno being left on the bench. An excellent midfield screen he was sorely missed and his replacement, Fernando, was a virtual bystander. Further up there were more problems as Toure, who barely broke into a jog the entire game, and Navas, useless even at the best of times, both put in shifts so bad that they were both hooked at half-time.

There were two teams playing, however, and while much of the focus will be on how bad City played, Liverpool deserved this win. They were excellent from front to back. They pressed and harried the shit out of City and would've won through sheer force of will were the skilful moments not there. But they were there and then some. Liverpool looked like scoring every time they went forward. Eight minutes in, Firmino dashed to the byline and punted a cross in that Mangala, after forgetting how his legs worked, could only put into his net. Not a fitting start for one of the most expensive defenders in the world. The second came fifteen minutes later when Firmino latched onto a misplaced header form Demichelis and sent in a ball for Coutinho to tap in form eight yards out. The third came nine minutes later when Countihno had a shot roughly blocked by Hart and Can put in a backheel that cut out the entire City defence and left Coutihno one-on-one, he choose to dink the ball across to Firmino to tap into an empty net. The Liverpool press was proving too much for City and they looked destined to end the half scoreless when, one minute from the break, the press eased enough for Aguero to cut inside Leiva and curl a super shot in from 25 yards out. The second waned from the breathless pace of the first one but there were still moments of magic in it when Skrtel got the ball, let it bounce, turned and smashed a volley home to secure the points. Although the points were secure from 30 minutes in, such was the display from Liverpool. They will hope to replicate this time and time again and have a dispirited Swansea to try out next, whereas City will have to cope with Southampton next.

Spurs Vs West Ham: Spurs purring midfield puts the Hammers to the sword......
While no-one is touting Spurs to be able to challenge for one of the top spots this season, any more of this and it'll be hard to look past them. West Ham have made a name for themselves when playing away and the expectation was that both teams would attempt to out-gun one another to see who is left standing. They racked up twelve shots on target today, eight of which were repelled by Adrian, the only West Ham player to actually show up tonight. Even then, he was totally at fault for Spurs' third goal. The Spurs high press worked a treat and Wet Ham had to answer to it. They certainly couldn't look towards their striker Carroll to bail them out. To a man, West Ham were the inferior team and turned over possession an alarming amount of times under pressure from Spurs.

While West Ham started somewhat brightly, this “feel-good” period lasted a scant twenty minutes until Kane put home Spurs first in after he rolled away from Jenkinson and thumped the ball home. The second was a textbook near-post run from Alderweireld to leap above Carroll and head home. Sours could be aggrieved that they didn't score more in the first half, and they could be pleased that Kayoute's overhead kick crashed off the crossbar rather than into the net. The second half was a continuation of the first. Spurs pressed high and peppered the West Ham goal. The third goal was a calamity when Tomkins forgot who he was a tried to play out form the back. His pass went straight to Erikson who fed Kane who thumped his shot off Reid and under Adrian who really should've done better. Then Walker showcased himself in quite good and bad lights inside of a three minutes spell. He surged forward in the 84th minute and scored using the outside of his foot when set up by Heung-min. Then he made not one, but two glaring errors when Alderweireld hit the ball back to him inside his own half. His pass was awful and intercepted by Jelavic and he was completely sold by Lanzini to allow space for the consolation goal. Spurs take on Chelsea next and it'll be another scalp for Spurs to collect this season having missed out on Arsenal last week. West Ham will need to get their shit together for West Brom, fresh off a rousing defeat of Arsenal.

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