Whoops! That Was The Championship That Was.

And then there were two. Admittedly it might have been three if only ‘Lil Defoe’s legs had been that incy wincey bit longer and he’s slid the ball into the net as opposed to not quite reaching it à la Gascoigne against Germany in the semi final of Euro ’96 and sliding himself into the post instead. It might still have almost been three if Man City hadn’t immediately taken advantage of Defoe’s misfortune to romp up the pitch, get a penalty and put Spurs’ title hopes to bed for another season.

So It’s The Manchesters Then?

With the difficult Christmas season behind us we enter what is referred to as the ‘business’ end of the season. Games are coming thick and fast and, you know what, they’re all important. If only because teams don’t have the safety net of another 30+ games to play and the cup competitions are all getting serious. It’s around this time you have those weeks that go, Champions League quarter final, then FA Cup semi (or big team clash), then Champions League quarter final, all in 8 days. Go into a protracted poor period and, like Arsenal last season, your four potential trophies can evaporate in less than a fortnight.

And with four of the top five playing each other and the rest of the top seven failing to win, it was always going to be a defining weekend for the Prem. And once again it was the Manchesters who came out on top. City are now three points clear of United, who are another five ahead of Spurs. Every time you looked at the table Defoe’s legs got a little bit shorter.

A Good Time To Lose If You Are The Arsenal?

Actually that should have read, A Good Time To Play Man U If You Are The Arsenal, but it amounts to much the same thing. Three losses on the trot is not a great way to start the new year, but it’s par for the course for Arsenal, whose form in 2011 was little better than relegation quality and that was before they lost Fabregas and Nasri. And if you are going to lose to Man U, then it was best to do it in a week where all the teams around you lost or drew. That fourth place is now looking a bit dicey, but they remain the best of the challengers for it.

The Fatalistic Predictions Of M. Wenger

So far this season has been Wenger’s nightmare, with his most pessimistic predictions coming back to haunt him in spectacular fashion.

• First there was the classic, “Imagine the worst situation, we lose Fabregas and Nasri. You cannot convince people you are ambitious after that.” Hardly the best thing to say when you’ve pretty much agreed to both leaving.
• “We first have to win our next game and we have a chance again when we play Manchester United on Saturday.” Hardly the best thing to say given you’re putting out a defence with four centre backs, one of whom is Djourou.
• “More than anything else, it is important to finish in the top four.” Will this come back to haunt him too?

That Robbie Keane Eh?

Last year, when joining West Ham, he was a byword for ineffectiveness, skying balls all over the place, missing the sitter of the season and never finding the net as he helped ensure the Hammers played another season of Championship football. Today, a year older and having played another year in the MLS retirement home, he comes back to Villa and promptly boffs in two fabulous outside the box strikes against Wolves. The second was a great on the turn volley into the top corner that would have pleased any striker. Whodathunkit eh?

Newcastle And Liverpool Hit Brick Wall

You could argue, that with the three teams below them all losing, Chelsea’s draw with Norwich was a good point gained away from home. But you can’t argue that both Newcastle and Liverpool were caught out this week. Newcastle have hit that point where they have somehow overachieved, but are no longer serious top four contenders. Their 5-2 beating at Fulham showing their lack of strength in depth. While Liverpool still don’t appear to have recovered from the slump in form that coincided with the end of the Benitez regime. All that money spent and they are still suffering. And while Newcastle look more likely to keep Demba Ba having just bought his fellow countryman Papiss Demba Cisse, Liverpool’s grip on their star striker seems far less assured. If they don’t get that fourth place spot, I don’t think they’ll be keeping hold of Dirty Suarez. If I were Real Madrid or even Barcelona, I’d be looking at him very seriously.

Dead Cat Bounce?

QPR beat Wigan, but is that really the start of the Mark Hughes effect or just the realisation that there is at least one team in the league less talented than they are? Wigan are so bad they have a worse negative goal difference than they have points. And that’s never a good position.

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And Then There Were… Seven?

That glaring yellow 'winter' ball

It might be Man City’s to lose (almost), but Man U and Spurs look to be genuine challengers while Chelski, Arsenal, Liverpool and, amazingly, Newcastle are fighting it out for the remaining Big Cup place. If the last frantic few weeks of football have told us anything it’s that there really isn’t one dominant team out there. Man City have lost out to Sunderland, Man U to Blackburn, Chelski to Villa, Arsenal to Fulham, only Spurs have really maintained their form over the Christmas and New Year period.

New Year Predictions?

Man City – have the strongest squad so should win the Prem, could win the FA Cup and the League Cup and the Europa League (if they take it remotely seriously). At their best, as against Spurs, they are unstoppable, but prevent Silva and/or Yaya Toure playing and you’ve got a chance of beating them.

Man U – the conventional wisdom suggests you can’t write them off, but I don’t think they can genuinely contend without a midfield. My prediction, third.

Spurs – unless they suffer injury to Bale, Van De Vaart,  Modric and/or Brad Friedel they are real contenders. ‘Appy ‘Arry goes to court in January, which might throw a spanner in the works. Runners up.

Chelski – the great rebuilding continues, albeit at a ruinously slow pace (much like their defensive backline). Do Chelski have the desire to fight their way to fourth? I don’t think so. Could potentially go as low as seventh as the clean out continues, but fifth is more likely.

Arsenal – You don’t win anything with no defenders and only one decent striker even if you are Arsenal. Sadly the words ‘Managed Decline’ spring to mind. Can they still eek out a top four place? They certainly have the track record, but they need to recruit more than just old boy Thierry Henry in January. À la recherche du temps perdu on its own won’t cut it Arsène. Gervinio and Chamakh’s trips to the Africa Cup of Nations won’t be as much of a miss as Wilshire, Sagna, Santos and Vermaelen already have been. Could just scrape into fourth, if Wilshire’s return is as miraculous as everyone anticipates.

Liverpool – the loss of their talisman Dirty Suarez will effect them. Suarez and Adam aside, none of their new boys have really hit the ground running. Indeed, Carroll, Henderson and Downing have been ploddingly poor at best. Their best chance for the year is to win their League Cup semi against Man City.

Newcastle – having beaten Man U, you can’t write them off. However, despite a formidable defense, their real strength is striker Demba Ba, but he’s off to the Africa Cup of Nations. This might slow them down. I think the best they can achieve is fifth.

Best Of The Rest

Sunderland – have found new life with O’Neill (what was it about Useless Bruce that dragged them down for so long?).  Still massively handicapped by the presence of the ego driven goal drought that is Nicklas Bendtner. Safely top ten, with no irritating European football to worry about next season.

Swansea – despite Norwich being above them, they’re the best of the promoted clubs. They have a genuine star is keeper Vorm, who one imagines will soon be snaffled by one of the bigger clubs.

Norwich – the East Coast Stoke. Mid-table mediocrity is a notable achievement for a promoted side.

Stoke – still the least entertaining, most unpleasant defence, but it’s good to see a team taking the Europe League seriously. Should be interesting to see how they do now it’s getting serious. If Fulham can get to the final, then why can’t Stoke? Might at least keep the Manchesters honest in the competition.

Not A Good Year For

QPR - Manager Colin W is weaving his magic, turning a team that looked like a real surprise into a plumeting nosediving monster. Needs to invest pretty heavily in January.

Wolves, Bolton, Blackburn and Wigan – along with QPR, the bottom five are currently 5 points adrift and averaging less than a point a game with double digit negative goal differences. It’s hard to see the relegation candidates coming from outside this group, although there’s always the hope that Scottish reptile McLeish will do the double and take another Birmingham team down.

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Two moments of madness

Engerland never, ever make it easy for themselves. Here a match that was clearly there for the taking, and the easy taking at that, was transformed into a backs to the wall war of attrition which Engerland nearly managed to lose thanks to two moments of suicidal madness.

Concentration, Concentration, Concentration

The three testicalled scrotum that is the Euro 2012 logo. Two countries separated by football.

Arsène Wenger used to go on about concentration all the time. Aside from not seeing things it was his go-to excuse for slip ups and incompetence whenever Arsenal lost (or drew) in Europe. But it was never more clearly illustrated than in Engerland’s total switch off for Montenegro’s first goal on the stroke of halftime. This set the tone for the rest of the game. Before that Engerland were comfortably in control, indeed they were actually playing within themselves and never looked like being threatened by the Montenegrans. Afterwards it seemed as if none of them had ever seen a round ball, much less played with one. And once they found themselves on the back foot they never looked as if there was any chance of them seizing the initiative from their opponents and while the Montenegrans rarely appeared truly threatening, they totally dominated the entire second half. Thankfully Engerland had already built their two goal cushion, because without it they would have been crushed.

You Can Take The Boy Out Of Chav…

But you can’t, apparently, take the Chav out of the boy. Rooney’s petulant kick at defender Dzudovic, which saw him sent off, will set the tone for his entire Euro 2012. So reminiscent of Gascoigne’s madness in the FA Cup final (the injury he caused himself blighted the rest of his career) or more pertinently Beckham’s kick out at Argentinian defender Diego Simeone in France 1998? If Capello has any sense he will be including Rooney in his squads, but will only play him from the bench if at all. That way the team will have to learn how to live without him, while he will still feel part of the side. And in a pleasing development, this is exactly what Capello has said he wants to do.

All About The Attack

We also saw Wales beat the Swiss, something Engerland couldn’t do at Wembley. They have continued their admirable progress up the FIFA rankings, albeit from somewhere close to the bottom. And it struck me, does Engerland actually have an attack as good as the Welsh? You have Bale and Bellamy racing down the wings actually threatening teams, something that Wallcott, Young, Downing, Lennon seem to do only infrequently. And they’re backed by a midfield, led by Ramsey, which actually likes to pass the ball. And I wondered, Is anyone actually afraid of Engerland? Because I wouldn’t be. They are a good Championship qualifying side, one of the teams you wouldn’t want to be in a qualifying group with, but nothing special.

Who Are Ya? (Repeat Until Senseless)

If Engerland were a Prem team, who would they be? Let’s think, supposedly one of the big beasts, yet they haven’t won anything for ages; capable of scoring goals yet always vulnerable with dodgy defending and a very soft centre;  just lost their talismanic forward/midfield dynamo; potentially a great attacking side yet always looking to throw away a lead… Any ideas? Could they possibly be today’s Arsenal (albeit with considerably less technique) in disguise?

Still A Few Good Points Lurking (Even If We Don’t Always Pick Them Up)

1. Engerland have qualified and are in the second pot. And now that we don’t have to jet about trying to win approval from some FIFA despot we can play some proper friendlies and try to build a side that could do well in Euro 2012. Time for Capello to really earn his money, playing players with potential, rather than the same old failures.
2. New broom? Engerland went to South Africa with the oldest squad in the tournament. And with players like Terry, Lampard, Gerrard, Rio and Ashley Cole beginning to look tired (or perpetually injured) it’s time for change. Capello has a moment, in between the demands of qualification and the tournament itself to test out the new blood. We want to see what a midfield of Wilshire, Cleverly and McEachran can do. What an attack with Welbeck, Young and Wallcott can accomplish if they’re allowed to float around and go for their opponents. We want to see players who can hold and play with the ball rather than just hoof it. We want to see an attitude to friendlies that says, it’s more important how we play the game than the result, because right now we have an opportunity to try things out without recrimination.
3. Changing expectations. We’re probably not going to win it. One of Engerland’s apparent problems has been the weight of expectation on their heads. Now, surely, that isn’t the case. I don’t think anyone expects Engerland to win Euro 2012. And with Spain, Holland and Germany all apparent certainties for the semis (an unkind draw aside), it would show admirable progress for Engerland to even get to the semis. What we do want to see is a dramatic improvement in both technique, holding and using the ball, and tactics, determining when to press and when to let your opponents have their head.

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A Piss-Poor Season Just Got Worse

Not content with having their worst start in 50-plus years, selling their two best players and recruiting a bunch of, frankly, second rate talent, Arsenal continue their spiral of death by losing to Norf London rival Spurs thanks to yet another tentative long range effort. You would have thought that after Danny Rose and David Bentley managed to plunk 30 yarders into the Arsenal net someone might have thought to close down Kyle Walker. But  no. Definitively out of the title race (that’s one of the four things Arsenal aren’t going to win this year), the team are going to have a challenge getting into Europe, let alone the Big Cup this season. Newcastle, currently in fourth, have over twice as many points as Arsenal.  And while making up 8 points isn’t impossible over the rest of the season, it’s a tough ask.

Mind The Gap

With the top seven all winning, we’re beginning to see the start of the gap between the better teams and the rest. So that’s seven teams who’ve all built an additional three point gap over Arsenal. However, it’s worth noting that at this stage of last season Liverpool were worse off, while three seasons ago Spurs had just two points from ten games. Mind you neither one of them managed to qualify for European football.

Games

Man U continued their inexorable progress by just about spanking Naarich. However, the latter were reasonable good, threatening Man U during the second half and moving beyond their agricultural challenging. Dropping Championship bruiser Grant Holt might have something to do with that. Man U seemed less interested in crushing Naarich than they were against Arsenal.

Newcastle have been quietly coming up on the outside. They’re still in fourth, although if Spurs win their game in hand they will probably take over on goal difference, and at this stage that should actually count for something. They have built an interesting new spine of largely French players and have dispensed with the English brutality of their Championship side, removing Carroll, Barton and Nolan. It will be interesting to see how Alan Pardew does given his previous track record of ruining West Ham. The most striking thing about their win at Wolves was how generous a player Leon Best is. Given he appeared to be the replacement for Carroll, he’s not playing the standard no 9 role of a big target man stuck in the middle of the pitch. Instead he’s also bombing down the wing providing crosses for Ba. So while he may not score 20+ goals this season, it’s a fair bet he’ll be directly involved in 30 or so.

Sunderland looked like getting a right pasting. Especially as West Brom were two up in less than 10 minutes. Then Wroy’s Boys gave Steve Bruce a let off, allowing Sunderland back into the match, which then just about petered out into a tedious draw. Steve’s plan of replacing Bent, Gyan and Henderson with a bunch of cold meat cast offs doesn’t seem to be paying dividends.

Everton‘s big match derby with Liverpool looked to be a cut above the usual kicking lumps festival, at least for the first 23 minutes. Then the ref inexplicably sent off Rodwell after Dirty Suarez did his thing of diving over Rodwell’s legs and playing the injured primadonna until his opponent was punished. After that it was all a bit predictable. Everton tried hard, but Liverpool were just a little too good for them. Henderson appeared to do his usual thing of being anonymous all match until everyone realised that he was actually on the subs bench.

Not content with pillaging most of Arsenal’s best players, Man City continue to steal what should have been Arsenal’s year (win a cup, make progress in the Prem) and give uppity tykes Blackburn a good taking out. Again it’s clear that whatever Aguero, Nasri, Dzeko et al do, it’s Silva who runs the show. Consistently the best, most influential player, he was good, but not at his best here. However, the strategy is clear, stop Silva and you stop City.

Say what you like about rubbish manager Alex McCleish, one of his achievements is to get Aston Villa‘s Agbonlahor back to something approaching his best. You might have thought that with both Young and Downing sold over the close season, Villa might struggle a bit. However, their loss seems to have freed up space for Agbonlahor to thrive. He helped defeat a nice Wigan side who are struggling once again to convert attractive football into points.

Spurs beat Arsenal. To be fair it wasn’t exactly unexpected and Arsenal played much better than anticipated, certainly way better than Liverpool had a couple of weeks previously, yet all this result did was reinforce the gulf in class between Arsenal and the Manchesters.

Stoke must be vaguely ruing their Europa League campaign. So far it’s been two group games won followed by two Prem away matches lost. This time they were beaten by a developing Swansea team, who look to be getting up to speed with the Prem. Five bookings for Stoke suggests a ref up to speed on current FIFA dictats.

QPR continue their attempts to become the Blackpool of 2011, what with playing attractive, engaging football and being humped 6 – 0 by Fulham. You suspect that the energy they put into their last couple of matches has weakened them. Maybe as Shakespeare suggests (albeit in Shakespeare In Love) once they have spent themselves where else did they have to go but down? Still this was a game where the likes of Barton, Tarabt and Wright-Phillips were eclipsed by Zamora, Murphy and, amazingly, Andy Johnson. Time for some squad building during the international weeks for the hoops.

Finally, Bolton continued their nosedive down the Prem table by shipping five against Chelsea. That’s not progress, that’s the sound of obliteration.

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Was That A Hospital Pass Or What

Week 6 saw, among other things, the return of the hospital pass, or if not the hospital pass, then the reemergence of suicidal defending. And we’re not talking the kind of moron quality backpassing we saw last season from the likes of Phil Neville. In some cases these are even worse.  Wigan squandered a perfectly good start against Spurs when Adebayor was gifted the ball and set up their first, while Everton’s new boy Roysten Drenthe isn’t going to be playing any crossfield balls any time soon.

Where Are Your Glasses Ref?

We also saw a return of that familiar fan bugbear, inconsistent refereeing. You have a player through on goal for a one on one with the keeper and the defender behind him brings him down from behind. Clearly a foul and a booking/red card for the defender. Certainly at Arsenal, where Bolton’s Wheater brings down Wallchart and gets a yellow, but not apparently at Stoke, where Woodgate gets away with leaping into the back of Hernandez. Pretty obviously the same situation, albeit the Woodgate foul was far more blatent, yet patently different results. Shurely Shome Mishtake.

That Is The Sound Of Consolidation

The table takes shape. All the top six, bar Man U, won, while the bottom seven, bar Fulham and West Brom who drew against each other, all lost. Meanwhile, Arsenal continued their slow climb out of the bottom by winning. The Manchesters aside, no one has opened any clear gaps as yet, but you feel that the clubs at the bottom are going to be strugglers, while the clubs at the top are going to be fighting for the big four finishes. Only Bolton, whose unfortunate fixture list has seen them face both Manchesters, Arsenal and Liverpool already, Arsenal, who clearly can’t have become that crap that quickly, and Newcastle, who may be punching above themselves, look likely to make any serious moves on their current positions.

Overall it was a poor weekend’s football, with few, if any, really good matches. Certainly none on a par with last week’s Spurs/Liverpool or Man U/Chelski ties. Maybe all the big boys were saving themselves for the Big Cup. Far too many matches reminded us that most of the Prem is still low-grade journeyman dross. You know things are bad when neither team is capable of playing the ball on the ground. It’s called football for a reason. Mind you, below Real Madrid and Barcelona, the Spanish league isn’t much more engaging.

Ahh I Love The Smell Of Football In The Morning

Man U should have been one up and Stoke a man down as early as the fourth minute as Woodgate launched into Hernandez, who had picked up a long ball and was running at the Stoke keeper. As clear a penalty as you will see. However, it was double bonuses for Stoke as a foul was avoided and Hernandez was forced out of the match through injury. Stoke then proceeded to foul their way through the game before Nani popped up with a great solo goal only for Crouch (Crouch!?!) to level things up with a header from a corner.  Who would have thought that Man U’s makeshift defence couldn’t defend set pieces?

Chelsea managed to repeat their defensive frailty from last week, conceding to an identical free kick that cost them at Man U. You have to wonder whether someone at Swansea had been doing their homework or had someone at Chelski been neglecting theirs? Still it wasn’t all bad, Torres continues his flip-flop redemption, scoring a great goal, then being sent off for a terrible tackle. Getting a three match ban is not a great thing to do as Drogba returns to fitness. Ramieres, presumably keeping Frank out of the side, looked very dangerous, his first goal was a great team move, although they were playing against a poor defence.

Like Liverpool under Benitez, Chelsea are building an Iberian spine. Interesting that the best players nowadays are coming from Spain and the Spanish league rather than the French league, which, along with their increasingly uncompetitive wage structure may explain Arsenal’s declining form. Chelsea’s new(ish) spine of Mata, Meireles and Torres looks far more fluid, if less obviously direct than the aging Lampard, Malouda, Anelka and Drogba one. Swansea were poor. Easy Chelsea win.

Man City weren’t as fluent as they have been at home to Everton. Maybe they are better away, when teams have to come at them thereby creating space for City to move into – certainly they played their best football once Everton had gone behind and had to come out and chase the game. But it seems as if this year’s City have been found out and once again it was clear that if you stop Silva, you stop City. Things didn’t really spring to life until he started to free himself.

Everton’s game plan was to defend en masse and when that failed, they didn’t have the strength/quality to really do any damage. Mind you they didn’t help themselves for the second goal. Royston Drenthe hopefully won’t be playing many passes as poor as the one he played to David Silva, from which Silva shimmied past a trio of defenders to fashion Milner’s winning goal.

These are cruel times for Arsenal, so they’ll take any little piece of luck they can. But you have to ask why Bolton made it so easy for them. Traditionally an Arsenal bogeyman, why leave Kevin Davies on the bench? Obviously there are plenty of acceptable football ones, he’s not very good and gives too many fouls away to name but two, but on a psy-war level, that was almost like giving Arsenal a one goal lift. Inexplicable.

Szczesny. Was. Excellent. A fantastic one handed stop to effectively neuter Bolton’s attack for the entire match when it was nil – nil. You begin to see why Arsène didn’t want to spend big (or even small) on a keeper last season. Song was quietly great in midfield. I suspect that, just as in the mid ’90s, Arsenal’s defensive solidity has to start at the front of the midfield rather than at the back. Once they determine a solution for the absence of Fabregas and Nasri and the injury to Wilshire, the defence will perk up too.

It was the same old Arsenal: 27 goal attempts, 3 goals, restricting Bolton to 3 shots all game, you end up feeling if they were just a little more clinical in front of goal Van Persie would be celebrating his 150th goal instead of his 100th and they would be winning matches like this 6 or 7 – nil. Wallchart was similarly inconsistent, some nice wingplay, but yet another one on one that he’s not converted. Bolton were very poor.

Newcastle continued their quietly excellent run by taking apart a surprisingly muted Blackburn, who displayed none of the pacy wingplay they showed against Arsenal. For some reason they didn’t seem as up for it. Newcastle’s Best creates chances, both for himself and others, but his finishing is poor. You feel he is a 10+ a season striker rather than a 20 goal a season winner. Ba showed his strengths, scoring a nice hattrick. Very much a Drog of a striker, although again probably in the 10+ mould rather than anything higher.

More suicidal defending as terrifyingly poor marking by Newcastle allowed Blackburn to grab a goal. As with the Arsenal match, it appeared very much against the run of play. Nice to see Ben Arfa back. A year after he was put out of the game by De Jong.

Wolves continue their quiet plummet to the depths, failing to muster much effort against a still poor Liverpool. Great goal from Dirty Suarez. Did Henderson play? Apparently yes, but he continues to demonstrate a genuine talent for anonymity. New boys Downing and Adam also conspicuously innocuous. The returning Gerrard was like a new signing. Only he almost made an impact.
Wolves never really looked threatening. Except when they scored. Especially that 11th minute bullet header that made it 1 – 0. To Liverpool. A bit like Blackburn.

Spurs really couldn’t have wished for an easier ride at Wigan. A stunningly inept mid-field pass gave the ball to Adebayor, who passed it to Van Der Vaart for a tap in. And that was that. Interesting to see that Defoe was absent. You wonder how many games he will get while Van Der Vaart and Adebayor are fit. None would be my guess.  Maybe in the Europa League.

A classic, ho-hum nothing of a game between Uncle Wroy’s West Brwom and his former charges Fulham. Nil – nil flattered both sides.

A game of two halves on Sunday. First half QPR were dominant, although never as much as in their previous two matches, but inexperience, unfamiliarity and lack of a striker let them down. Neither Boothroyd nor Campbell look to be regularly dangerous, more in the Carlton Cole 6+ goals a season mould, which is going to hurt QPR in the long run. Villa were awful in the first half.

Things couldn’t continue. In the second half, Villa realised they were in a match, while QPR never really came out of the changing room. Triore, whose attacking runs had pinned back Villa, spazzed out, letting Villa move forward and getting himself sent off once QPR had conceded. Good to see manager Colin W return to form by publicly slagging the player. You can’t buy class like that. A point each was about the maximum either side deserved, but if both sides could have been given none that would have been a more accurate reward.

A classic Monday Night Football when it’s big cup week and all the decent sides have played on Saturday. At least Naarich looked like they wanted to play. Sunderland were ghastly. As they capitulated, you had to wonder how they beat Stoke 4 – 0 last week. Again neither side really deserved to be rewarded for their efforts.

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