Five Things We Learnt From Watching Football This Week - Week 27

1. Swans stretch their wings and truly fly
Clwb Pel-droed Dinas Abertawa swept to League Cup glory yesterday at the hands of the former wool capital of the world. For Bradford City, 5-0 seemed harsh and this was clearly one game too many in what has become a memorable and historic cup run. Swansea however, deserve every bit of credit going bestowed on them. It has been a remarkable few years for the Welsh team and they are a club that have benefited from having three successive managers who play the game in the right way. It seemed unlikely in August that Michael Laudrup would be able to carry on where Brendan Rodgers had left off. It seemed impossible that he would take them to a higher level again. Swansea aren’t just safe from relegation, they are as close to Manchester City as they are in turn to Manchester Utd. As it was, Laudrup could save his players both mentally and physically for this match over the past few weeks and his decision to do so was fully justified in a marvellous display of passing, attacking football. Swansea made a mockery of Arsenal and Villa’s botched attempts to get past Bradford. They showed their class not by trying to out-score, out-fight or out-pace the team from league two… but by just keeping the ball. Swansea had over 60% of possession, completed more passes than any team outside of Barcelona this weekend and scored five, well taken goals. Europe beckons and on the evidence of the last 12 months the greatest compliment you can currently pay Swansea, is that they will not be out of place.

2. Chelsea are not guaranteed a top four finish
When Rafa Benitez took over at Chelsea back in November I said he should prioritise the cup competitions because there was no chance of his team finishing outside the top four. That claim now looks shaky. Benitez spoke like a true manager prior to the game on Sunday about how a Chelsea win would see the gap close to just one point between them and City, but what he didn’t say was what would happen if they lost it. Chelsea now lie just two points ahead of Arsenal, who have nothing left to be distracted by and whose players currently owe Arsene Wenger a huge last ten games. Spurs sit in between the two and can rise above the Blues if they defeat a struggling West Ham tonight. Whisper it, but Chelsea could easily finish 5^th. Since Benitez took over from Di Matteo, in what somehow remains only the second most offensive sacking this season, Chelsea have played 15 Premier League games and have won just 7 of them. They have played more games than any other team in England (47 so far) and that number is likely to rise to well over 60 following their continued involvement in both the FA Cup and Europa League. It seems implausible that Chelsea could play over seventy games this season in seven different competitions and win absolutely nothing, but that is what is currently happening and they may not even have the consolation prize of Champions League football to cling on to. I can’t be bothered to discuss their faults again on this blog (defence, attack, discipline, killer instinct, john obi mikel) – but for now let us just lean back and dream, that this may just be the most long winded failure of a football season in living memory.

3. The Toon still know how to party
Over the last twenty years you’d be hard pushed to find a venue that has served up as many top flight humdingers as St James Park. So it proved again this weekend, as the most entertaining looking fixture on paper, for once transferred into the most entertaining in practice as well. Newcastle and Southampton served up a feast of attacking football that reminded us what the Premier League was all about. Six goals, bags of chances and high drama were all thrown into a North vs South hotpot of fun that was capped by a goal of ludicrous quality by Papiss Cisse and an own goal of epic comedic proportions. All in all, more entertainment than Stokes last three seasons in the top flight in one match…

4. Everton have only themselves to blame
The writing isn’t on the wall just yet, but back to back away defeats have all but ended Everton’s hope of Champions League qualification and with it the optimism that this could have been their best season yet under Moyes. Everton have a fine team but a weak squad and have several players who have badly underperformed over the past three months. Moyes dropped Jelavic for a single game before recalling him for no real reason that I can fathom. The Croat has scored 1 goal in his last 1200 minutes and is right now making Fernando Torres look lethal. Johnny Heitinga is another who has stumbled badly of late. Everton have kept just one clean sheet all season when he’s started a game and it seems incredible that he was playing in a World Cup final 2 years ago. Everton have players looking tired at the wrong time and whilst they’re still in the FA Cup, the fans are looking over their shoulders rather than upwards. The thought of Liverpool (3 points behind and with a home banker derby still to come) overtaking them is now no longer an outside possibility, but a very real fear.

5. Managers in the Wilderness – Case One: David O’Leary
Given the Premier League title is all but over and I’m on a continued self-imposed ban from openly discussing Arsenal, I have found myself struggling to come up with relevant, entertaining points of late. As such I am starting a new feature that I’m hoping, at the very least, will be slightly more successful than Andy Townsends ill fated “tactics truck” - Managers in the Wilderness. First up… what on earth happened to David O’Leary?

In the year 2001 O’Leary guided Leeds United to the semi-finals of the Champions League with a strike force of Alan Smith and Mark Viduka. Sure he spent a lot of money at the club (£100m in four years), but he never finished outside of the top six and despite not being in any way responsible for Peter Risdale’s actions, appears to still be held accountable for them to this day. O’Leary had a win ratio of 50% at Leeds, which is a fine effort for any manager in a competitive industry and went on to do a fair to middling job at Aston Villa. Sure Villa hardly punched above their weight when he was there, but at least they weren’t involved in a relegation dogfight either. Since then, O’Leary remained out of work for four years. Then in 2010 he took a bizarre and ill-fated job in the UAE where he was sacked after just seven games, despite only losing twice. Other than that period, O’Leary has been out of work for seven years whilst the likes of Steve Bruce still get continued employment. Even Peter Reid has had more action that O’Leary in this timeframe. Now I’m not saying that O’Leary deserves a contract with the next club looking for a manager, but given he appears to be doing literally nothing else with his time, surely there are worse people out there you could take a punt on?

Yeah. I’m not sure that feature worked either…

https://twitter.com/HinduMonkey

Five Things We Learnt From Watching Football This Week - Week 26

(the censored, no swearing edition)

1. Lampard still has a lot to offer.
It is probably stating the obvious now, such has been the fanfare surrounding the decision by Chelsea to not offer Frank Lampard a new contract, but given I’ve been unkind to the tubby little Londoner before (apparently) - it’s only fair I laud him for his achievements at this juncture. Apart from being a loyal servant, solid role model and but a few deflected shots away from being Chelsea’s all time leading scorer, Lampard clearly still has the ability to play at the top level. In a team that has struggled of late, he has plundered 8 goals in his last 9 starts. His passing range is back up to the level it was a couple of years ago and like Gerrard, he has finally adapted to playing a deeper role. Lampard would get in the midfield of Utd, Arsenal and Man City, so quite why Chelsea are prepared to let him go for nothing when he visibly still has so much to offer is extraordinary. Perhaps Roman has only watched him play for England over the past decade and not his own club? Or perhaps it really is time to clear the decks of the Chelsea old guard and start afresh. Lampard isn’t a box to box midfielder like he used to be, but he is just as fit as Ryan Giggs was five years ago and he is still playing approaching his 40th year. Chelsea’s loss will be someone’s else gain this summer, barring a dramatic and late change of heart. For a man who has given his all to his club and has been vocal in saying he’d like to keep playing for them, he probably deserves a bit better.

2. Will Fulham ever stop giving the game away?

By Fulham’s standards, a nil nil draw to a struggling team is a perfectly decent result on the road; but after several seasons in the top flight, the question remains whether Fulham will ever truly learn to play away from home. Managers and players have come and gone, but the one constant thorn in the Cottagers side has remained. Fulham play attacking, quick passing football at home... and generally seem to forget what to do with the ball away. In their last 100 Premier League home games stretching back across six seasons, Fulham have won 50 times. A hugely impressive stat and one only bested by the Champions League teams. The last 100 away games? 14 wins. A ridiculous discrepancy, which doesn’t even take into account that Fulham tend to lose away, let alone draw. Craven Cottage is a tightly knit and wonderfully old fashioned stadium, and perhaps the players struggle to express themselves on the bigger, more spacious grounds up and down the country. But no manager has come close to solving the problem and in six years Fulham’s best effort has been 4 victories away from the Cottage. Just to put that into perspective, Swansea have achieved that already this season. Fulham are struggling at the moment wherever they play, and whilst they’re unlikely to get dragged into the relegation mire, giving their poor away fans something to cheer about more often would make things a lot easier for them.

3. It could be more remiss than remy for QPR.

Loic Remy is used to talking bollocks (sorry) bullshit (and again) in a potentially inaccurate way... so his comments this week have to be taken with a pinch of salt. This, after all, is a player who announced upon joining QPR for £8m and £80,000 a week that it was in “no way a decision based on financial reasons... it’s an interesting challenge.” Interesting is one way of looking at QPR’s desperate yet seemingly cash laden plight, and they are not being helped by a player who hasn’t been fit enough to play in the last three matches due to a niggling knee injury. This week, Remy was quoted saying “when I have a small problem things get difficult... I’m like an F1 car but when I get a small problem it’s straight in the pits.” Simply looking at his Wikipedia page would have told Harry Redknapp that Remy has been in and out of the treatment room over his career and has also had countless problems off the pitch. Indeed, in the same interview Remy went on to say that “when something’s not right in my head... bothering me... then it becomes a bit difficult.” Well done QPR. You’ve spent £10m trying to stay up on someone who will phone in sick for physical AND mental reasons.

4. Pochettino deserves more than a little bit of praise.

Say what you want about the Nigel Adkins dismissal (I did, but I won’t repeat myself here, mainly because it would be impossible not to swear) his replacement has hit the ground running. Two draws from his first three games didn’t even begin to tell the full story and with Manchester City making up a grueling quartet of opening fixtures, Pochettino has an impressive five points from his first four games. Beyond that though, the manager has added a new layer to Saints play that is straight out of La Liga. Pressing. Southampton didn’t give City an inch on Saturday and it was that mentality that was key to the Champions making critical errors that ultimately cost them probably more than just three points. Saints look like a real team and should be looking up the table not down it on current form. They have lost just twice in a dozen league games and it’s hard to see how any of Villa, Reading, Wigan or QPR are going to finish above them. None of which should discredit for even a second the work Adkins did, but at least the fans can be safe in the knowledge that some genuine thought appears to have gone into his replacement.

5. Europe is crucial for the Premier League.

Over the next five weeks (thanks to a ridiculously drawn out schedule) Manchester Utd and Arsenal will bid to stay in this seasons Champions League at the expense of Munich and Madrid. The odds are not good. Utd have a small chance in that Real have stumbled often this season. In the highly unlikely event that Rafael and um... Phil Jones, can shackle Ronaldo, Utd do at least possess the firepower to outscore Madrid if things go their way over the two legs. Arsenal have no such hope and them beating the German league leaders would represent a huge shock. Arsenal have lost already this season to Bradford, Norwich, Chelsea, Olympiakos, Swansea, Schalke and both Manchester clubs. Munich haven’t lost at all since October. The real problem though, is how such defeats could ripple through the league’s current global standing. Two of our teams have already bailed out in the group stages and to have no representatives at all in the Quarter Finals would be a major blow to a league that still claims to be “the best in the world.” Of course, at the risk of being an “armchair” critic, let us not cast judgement until the die has been cast. After all, Chelsea proved last year that miracles... sometimes really do happen.

Five Things We Learnt From Watching Football This Week - Week 25

1. The title race looks over.
Bigger leads have been clawed back than 9 points over the past 20 years, especially with 39 still to play for… but not often. And not with one of the teams in contention struggling as much as Manchester City have been. It is a damning reflection on the league that the Champions can play as poorly as they have done for most of the season and still be certain of finishing at least second. The league is made to look ever poorer upon closer examination of Utd’s squad. Ferguson has built many great teams over the years, but only the most deluded Red Devil would claim this was one of them. A forward trio of Rooney, Van Persie and Hernandez certainly deserves a debate against the likes of Cantona, Yorke, Cole, Ronaldo, Van Nistelrooy et all… but the rest of the team? A midfield of Valencia, Nani, Carrick and Cleverly simply bares no comparison at all to Giggs, Scholes, Keane and Beckham in their peak. The defence meanwhile, including Evra, Rio and Vidic was great four years ago… but all of that trio are inferior players now and the new additions, not least the keeper, are nothing on the greats that have filtrated the Utd ranks over Fergie’s reign. The main reason why Utd remain on course to break a Premier League point’s record, let alone snare another title, is Ferguson himself. After what happened last season, when Utd threw away victory at the death having fought so hard to regain the initiative, it seems barely plausible their manager will allow the same to happen again. Utd’s gain is the league’s loss, the title race simply looks over, whichever way you look at it.

2. Liverpool are improving.
Two draws away at Arsenal and City is not to be sniffed at in any teams book, but in truth Liverpool deserved to win both games and are slowly, but surely, improving under Brendan Rodgers. The defence remain prone to pace and Pepe Reina is not the keeper her once was, but Liverpool pass the ball well and Sturridge has already formed an impressive looking partnership with the detestably brilliant Suarez. Key to all of this though, has been the form of Steven Gerrard. I’m far from the Liverpool skippers biggest fan and would agree with those who claim he has been a hindrance rather than a help over the past three years, but he has grown into Rodgers system and is regaining the form that made him the player he was 5 years ago. The maths always help, Gerrard has scored five and bagged nine assists in the last ten games, but it is not just the maths in this case. Gerrard has found his role in Rodgers team, he is a far better player with Lucas alongside him and he is finding space between the number ten role and the number eight role. Space that never used to exist, but with the invention of 4-2-3-1 is now amongst the most pivotal on the football pitch. Liverpool are playing the system brilliantly, because Suarez peels off and drags men with him, so Gerrard can make runs unmarked into the last third. Time and time again he is playing a telling final ball or rifling them in from distance. Liverpool still have a long way to go, but their fans are starting to believe that they might just have a team again.

3. Geordies don’t speak French, but they let the funky football to the talking.
Firstly, I cannot apologise enough for referencing a Girls Aloud song in the title of this entry. Secondly, after recording back to back league victories for the first time this season, Newcastle fans are coming back round to Alan Pardew’s unique French Revolution. Utd moved quickly this transfer window to tie up the services of six new players, five of them French; and none of them have settled in so quickly as Moussa Sissoko. The former Toulouse man looked impressive away to Villa, but at home to Chelsea he was dominant. Granted Chelsea’s attacking midfield leave wide open spaces for the opposition to exploit, but Sissoko grew into the game and was the best player on the park during the pivotal last half hour. Scoring two and creating two further clear chances, Chelsea couldn’t handle him. Coupled with the return to fitness of Yohan Cabaye, who was very much in his “velvet boot” mould on Saturday, Newcastle suddenly have reason to hope again after a pretty desperate season. Whether French is now the main language in the dressing room remains unclear, but Geordies won’t care as long as the players keep on letting the football do the talking.

4. Stoke are all kinds of dull.
Stoke aren’t without their merits, but it is very hard to like a team who seem to suggest they would take the starting scoreline within a second of kick off. This weekend was in no way an anomaly, Stoke set up to contain if they’re home to Reading or away at Manchester Utd. They are a negative, boring and agricultural team who are very, very hard to like. Pulis has spent a lot of money at Stoke, more than most people would think, and his signings have been a very mixed bag. Some (Huth, Shawcross, Delap, Crouch, Walters) have been a success, but others (Pennant, Adam, Jerome, Upson, Owen) haven’t. It would be too simplistic to say those who have been successful are those who can adapt to an overtly physical long ball game… but those who have been successful are those who can adapt to an overtly physical long ball game. Nobody has seen less goals than Stoke fans this season. A paltry 54 have flown in over their 25 games, even West Ham have seen 64, Sunderland 65 and Man Utd a bountiful 91. Their top scorer is Walters with 5 and it will be to nobody’s surprise that they sit at the bottom of the Premier League’s fair play table, averaging three times more fouls and cards than Southampton. There remains a strange charm to Stoke, in that you can make a lot of money by betting on nils nils when they play, but on times like Saturday it’s very hard to not come and away and say anything but “fuck me they’re dull.”

5. Does anyone give a flying fuck about the international break?
It is a measure of how far International football has fallen that friendly games are now being played midweek between Premier League fixtures. This Wednesday sees England take on Brazil and despite half-hearted attempts by some to claim that the match conjures up the old whiff of magic and mystery… it doesn’t. England fans have seen the same players fail for their country too many times; the revolution hasn’t yet happened and it is likely that Cole, Johnson, Lampard, Gerrard & Rooney will all line up again alongside some other players who will fail to turn consistent club performances into anything recognising genuine international pedigree. There used to be a debate, even anger about the performances of England over the past ten years, but that has long since turned to apathy. The dependable and deathly dull appointment of Hodgson put an end to any whimsical notion that England would change their ways and anyone who watches them now does so in a vaguely interested slumber. England could well beat Brazil this week and more people will likely watch it than Man Utd v Everton or Spurs v Newcastle this weekend… but when all the chanting and drumming has died away, will anyone really, actually care?

https://twitter.com/HinduMonkey

Five Things We Learnt From Watching Football This Week - Week 24

1. QPR are living on the edge .

In 18 months, since July 2011, QPR have signed or brought in on loan the following players. Bothroyd, Dyer, Gabbidon, Campbell, Murphy, Barton, Young, Traore, Wright-Phillips, Ferdinand, Onuoha, Cisse, Zamora, Macheda, Puncheon, Taiwo, Diakite, Perone, Fabio, Nelsen, Johnson, Green, Park, Hoilett, Bosingwa, Cesar, Granero, Magri, Mbia, Ben Haim, Samba and Loic Remy. 32 players, with the promise of at least 2 more today, in 18 months. No other team can get close to that level of transfer dealing insanity… and it’s likely no team would want to. The most worrying thing for QPR fans isn’t the signings, or indeed the insane wages being paid to attract such a stellar cast of mercenaries, it was the words spoken by Tony Fernandes last week that he would “leave the club” if QPR got relegated. It is hard to think of a bigger potential disaster in English football. Imagine Portsmouth, but in a just a few months not a few years. The new players will have big relegation clauses written in, but the older ones won’t and are likely to get huge severance packages if they get relegated. It’s hard to see how their values will have done anything but decrease, having helped to take down the most expensively assembled squad in the clubs history. No, the bottom line is that QPR have gambled absolutely everything on staying up. It is a risk that should not be allowed and is indicative of a game that is spiralling desperately out of control. Football clubs shouldn’t belong to millionaires and their toys, they should belong to their fans. And it is the QPR fans who are right now on a knife edge, just five months away from the potential total collapse of their football club. Shame on you Fernandes and shame on you all who have joined that club solely for a quick pay day.

2. Rafa Benitez is probably not going to be the permanent Chelsea manager.
Going behind in matches is problematic enough, Utd have continued to dig themselves out of such holes this season but the law of averages say you will eventually come unstuck; but if there’s one habit that’s even more destructive, it’s giving up leads over and over again. Chelsea, under the historically defensively minded Benitez, aren’t just giving up leads… they’re giving up two nil leads to teams they have no right to. Chelsea are short on confidence and looked ragged last night when Reading pulled a goal back. Despite there being only 3 minutes left on the clock… and it being Reading. The interim managers’ team selections continue to baffle, picking Torres ahead of the vastly superior Demba Ba for a second game in a row for no fathomable reason. He has continued to play Ivanovic at centre back, where he makes at least one horrific error a game, as opposed to right back, where he scores or assists a goal every game. Lampard is being overplayed, despite what Chelsea fans may think, and a midfield shield of him and Ramires is nowhere near defensive enough to protect the back four when the going gets tough. Chelsea continue to create chances, thanks largely to the mercurial Juan Mata, but Chelsea are in a rut and need to dig deep to get out of it. With Pep Guardiola having planted his flag in Germany early, the question now isn’t whether Rafa has any chance of getting the job full time… but whether he’ll even last the season.

3. Where now for Aston Villa.
Since winning at Anfield, Villa haven’t won in 7 Premier League games and have been dumped out of both cups by lower league opposition. They have shipped 22 goals and scored just 5. They are 19^th in the league table, 4 points off the bottom, 3 points away from safety and have not brought in a single player during the transfer window. There have been many “too good to go down” teams over the years… and it is an insult to those teams to bracket Villa in with them. They have a team short in quality, short in experience and short in heart. The defence can’t keep a clean sheet, the attack doesn't function as a unit and the midfield is a mixture of under performing  over paid washed up failures and children. Holman, Bannan, Westwood, Ireland, N’Zogbia, Herd, Albrighton and Delph have played 7,205 minutes between them this season and have scored one goal. Let me just repeat that in case you missed it, the 8 midfielders of a single team in the Premier League have scored one goal in 24 matches and over 7,000 collective minutes. Nothing I say could be more damning than that stat. Paul Lambert did a fine job at Norwich, and he has had his hands tied to a large extent at Villa, but that is simply not good enough. The formation changes every week, the personal changes every week, but the results are not changing. All the teams around them currently possess the ability to improve… Villa don’t. After 25 years in the top flight, the Championship is coming.

4. Mario will be missed.
Say what you want about Mario Balotelli, he was Box Office. On field, off the field, you were never sure what you were going to get… but it was always entertainment. Balotelli was no doubt a disruptive influence, and it’s hard to see how him leaving will be anything but a positive for City. Unlikely to buy anyone over the next few hours, three strikers into two fits a lot better with the team out of the Champions League and not staring at a possible fixture pile up. Mancini has already expressed his disappointment in his surrogate son leaving his side, but the move will surely help him exert more power on the rest of his troops now he isn't wasting time man-managing a child. Given the strength of Mario’s appeal, it’s likely the media will continue to follow him around to see what escapades he gets up to next. City’s gain though, is the league’s loss. Mario, wherever you are, whatever you do, we’ll be watching. Please, for the good of all things fun, don’t ever grow up.

5. Has any team got a worse collection of barnets than Everton?
Fresh from almost throwing away another three points at home to West Brom, Everton moved to within one point of a Champions League spot and left me wondering if any team could boast such an impressive array of failed hairstyles than David “Zombie” Moyes’ players. Steven Pienaar has at least dropped the Predator look, but the move to convict was surely a bridge too far? Likewise Leon Osman and Johnny Heitinga, who both look like they belong in prison garb rather than football shirts. Captain Phil Neville has had his mum cut his hair his entire career, and Fellaini’s ‘fro is both absurd and questionably legal. Jelavic meanwhile, looks to be struggling with his locks as much as his form. What was once slick, now appears to have moulded into lank, uneven curls that cling to his forehead. The real stand out though, in every way right now, is Leighton Baines. The full back may well be as good as anyone currently playing in the league, but appears completely unable to accept that he isn't living in 1960’s Liverpool Beatlemania. Presumably the management took one look at Leroy Fer’s perfectly normal hair cut during his medical… and pulled out the deal faster than it takes Seamus Coleman to comb over his ridiculous side parting.

https://twitter.com/HinduMonkey

Five Things We Learnt From Watching Football This Week - Week 23

1. Bayern’s gain is Chelsea’s loss
The news that Pep Guardiola will take over the reins at Germany’s most prestigious club this summer came as both a shock and a surprise to many in the English game. Last seen championing the merits of the Premier League, it looked as if Pep was sounding out the major clubs to see how much they really wanted him. In truth, Guardiola had two firm offers to consider (Munich and Chelsea) and took the one which offered him better control, better protection and a greater sense of history. At a time when the German league sits toe to toe with the Premier League in the games standing, this was a hammer blow for English football and in particular for Roman Abramovich. With Dortmund having already blazed a trail in this year’s Champions League, the most damning thing for Chelsea fans is that Pep Guardiola looked at the two teams who contested the final last year and threw his weight behind the losers. Having already been eliminated from this season’s competition, Chelsea’s long sought after win is already beginning to look like an anomaly which time will soon forget, rather than the beginning of a new era which their owner craves. It was a fitting end to the careers of some of the old guard who had served Chelsea well, but with an owner who has refused to invest in youth and has panic bought and panic sacked at every step, it is little wonder that Guardiola decided to move to Bayern and begin building what he hopes will be a second dynasty. People who criticize Guardiola for having the world’s best players at Barcelona miss the big picture. He inherited a mess which he cleared out and promoted many of the youth team that he had coached. The pivotal midfield figure of Busquets was arguably the most crucial, alongside the early promotion of Pedro and the recalling of his main defender Gerard Pique from his spell in the Manchester wilderness being compared to Jonny Evans. Pep achieved almost unrivalled success in his four years at the club and developed Xavi, Iniesta and Lionel Messi from exceptional talents to three of the greatest footballers to have ever played the game. Ok so they haven’t done too badly since he left, but then unlike Pep, the new manager did inherit a team in its prime. How the Spaniard will be judged remains unclear. Will simply winning the Bundesliga be enough? Especially given it looks like Munich are already well set to reclaim the title this season? No. It is likely, that having not won the Champions League since 2001, that is to be Guardiola’s target. That… and building a team that once again will be the envy of anybody who picks up a football in any park, pitch or playground across the world. No pressure then…

2. Ferguson reserved his respect for AVB, but not the officials
Having been taken apart in 45 error strewn minutes at Old Trafford earlier in the season, Alex Ferguson showed Spurs rare respect on Sunday by taking his team to White Hart Lane and for the first time I can remember, setting them up to contain. Utd played a 4-3-3 formation that was, for the most part, a 4-5-1 with Phil Jones playing exclusively to track Gareth Bale and Michael Carrick sitting so deep he was almost part of the defence. It was, in many ways and until the last 60 seconds, the perfect away performance. So much so, that it prompted both Jamie Redknapp and Gary Neville to see it is a dry run for how Utd would play against Real Madrid. There were many talking points from the match, but the most interesting for me was the level of respect shown by Ferguson toward his opposite number to do that. Away at Chelsea, Arsenal and even Manchester City this season, Ferguson has stuck with his attacking instincts and taken the game to his opponents rather than play on the back foot. AVB has come a long way already in his on/off time in English football, but 4 points against Manchester Utd is something that hasn’t been achieved by this club since 1989. Those points were well deserved, although Utd played much better than Scott Parker’s strange post comments implied. Comments, that were consigned to a footnote by another famous Ferguson rant about almost nothing of consequence. To complain about a single bad decision given against you in a match where almost everything else had gone your way is pretty poor anyway, but to do it against Spurs? A team who in previous years appear to have had a curse over their heads when they’ve stepped up to do battle with the red of Manchester. It was a shame, especially following a game where there was so much football to talk about, that Ferguson once again gave the press all the ammunition they needed to make it all about him instead. He may have showed Spurs and their young manager respect, but he is a long way off ever doing the same for officials.

3. Are Wigan finally running out of lives?
Roberto Martinez was the toast of the league this summer after guiding Wigan to another great relegation escape. All but down in March, the Latics rallied to win seven out of their last nine games and pull themselves free with the sort of escapology and entertainment not seen since Harry Houdini. Villa and Liverpool both came calling for Martinez in the summer, but he stayed put and buoyed by his success, aimed to secure Wigan a more stable campaign this time around. That was looking like an option after the first few games, but not anymore. Wigan have won once in eleven matches and are firmly entrenched in the relegation zone. They look incapable of keeping a clean sheet and are making the sort of errors that it looked like Martinez had successfully managed to eradicate from their game toward the end of last season. They may yet escape again, but do the players have the heart for another relegation battle after starting the season with such renewed promise? The Spaniard has done wonderful things for this club, but unless they reverse their fortunes soon, they are running into some very tricky matches at a time when it is unlikely that lightning will strike twice.

4. West Ham need a striker.
After starting the season in fine form, West Ham have hit a bit of a wall of late; not least away from home where they have scored just 5 goals all season. They haven’t been helped by a smallish squad and an increasingly more comical injury list. But they certainly haven’t been helped by the complete inability to find a centre forward who scores goals. Andy Carroll’s injury hasn’t helped, but in fairness the striker had managed just one goal before departing to the clubs bulging hospital. Big Sam has played Carlton Cole in most games since, but he’s managed a miserable 2 goals all season, at a rate of 1 every 500 minutes. None of this then, explains the mystifying decision to buy Marouane Chamakh. We all know that Big Sam loves a target man, but surely there was someone available who could actually score goals rather than just head the ball vaguely in the general direction of the net. Few footballers have declined as quickly as Chamakh, who offers almost nothing of value other than wondering if he’s actually a well-dressed Fox. Joe Cole’s signing has already proved successful, but the likes of him, Jarvis and Mark Noble need somebody to actually convert the chances they keep creating or West Ham are going to get dragged further into the mire. I could labour this point more, but given West Ham are such a lamentable club I really can’t be bothered. It’s not like I care anyway.

5. Shame on Saints.
Football has been guilty of many sins over recent years, but in terms of managerial madness, few decisions rank lower than the one taken last week by Southampton to sack Nigel Adkins and replace him with Mauricio Pochettino. Let’s get one thing clear, if Saints had unveiled Pep Guardiola this would still have been the wrong call. Pochettino is not Guardiola, or Mourinho, or Alex Ferguson for that matter. He is a young, promising manager with some good things and some not so good things on his cv. He has never managed in England and can barely speak the language. There is simply no logic for his appointment at a time when Adkins had lost just one game in ten, and was turning Saints into a genuine Premier League team who had added defensive solidarity to vibrant attacking play. Aside from all of that though, the thing that really galls here is the complete lack of class or respect that the Saints hierarchy have paid to a manager who has done more for their football club than anyone in 20 years. Back to back promotions, the reinvention of the Southampton youth and investing in a style of play that is a joy to watch. The statement given by the board over his dismissal was invisible and the match day programme of yesterday’s game contained not a single mention of him. That is not good enough. The man should have been given a long and proper send of and been allowed on to the pitch for the fans to say thank you to a manager who will surely be reemployed again in a heartbeat. The worst thing about this call from the clubs perspective is that Saints staying up this year will, in no way, justify this decision. But if they go down, it will be held up as the reason and used as the stick to beat them with. As Blackburn, Leeds, West Ham, Wolves and Southampton themselves have shown to their peril in recent years… a long period of decline can soon follow. Saints deserved better than this. Adkins deserved better than this. Football is a wonderful and often brilliant sport, but with the contracts and wages given to players, how can we expect them to listen and respect their managers if they continue to be treated in such a fickle and disrespectful way?

https://twitter.com/HinduMonkey

Five Things We Learnt From Watching Football This Week - Weeks 22

1. Juan Mata’s most for Chelsea.
Chelsea continued their slightly random form this weekend by tearing apart Stoke City with more than a little help from John Walters. With two own goals and a missed penalty, it’s hard to think of a more terrible afternoons work in Premier League history. Aside from Walters, Chelsea’s best player was once again the imperious Juan Mata. Dictating the play from a free role, Mata’s passing and movement is the main cog in the Chelsea machine. His stats this season are frightening. In 34 games he has scored or assisted 33 goals. A record better than Iniesta, Fabregas, Ronaldo, Robben, Bale, Van Persie, Suarez… infact better than anyone in top flight European football apart from Lionel Messi. It’s not just the numbers though; Mata is one of those players who seem to think two seconds quicker than anyone else on the pitch. He sees moves before they happen and his range of passing – short, long, dead ball or one touch – is just extraordinary. What is perhaps even more incredible is that this man can get nowhere near the Spanish national team. Sure he has 20 caps and will probably get to 50 or 60, but most of them will be against lesser teams or in games that don’t matter. That’s not to say that Mata necessarily should be ahead of Iniesta, Fabregas or Silva in Spain’s thinking, but a player of his ability should probably consider himself slightly unlucky that arguably the only people better in his role in the world… are the same nationally as him.

2. Lambert scores from the spot but misses the mark.
Rickie Lambert has scored 31 penalties from 31 attempts for Southampton. A record that is every bit as implausible as his comments after the match against Aston Villa on Saturday when he called the decision to award his team a spot kick “stone wall.” The call was anything but that, it was a clear dive and I am getting tired of people defending players by saying “they expected contact.” Unless somebody swipes so high and wide the player would have to move two yards out of the way, there is simply no excuse for anyone falling in the box when there is zero contact. Like with Santi Cazorla earlier in the season, there was no doubting that the player in question made an air kick, but in both cases the player could just have carried on running unimpeded. Instead, Jay Rodriguez was the latest footballer to go down when there were several inches between him and anyone’s boot. The decision was a travesty; it was a clear dive and should be retrospectively punished. There is no debate, if there is no contact, unless it’s obstruction it’s a dive. Every time. I don’t care how fucking fast Simian Bale runs, if he “expects” contact and there isn’t any he’s a cheat if he goes down. Which, let’s be fair, we all know he is.*

(* this blogger accepts this is an unrelated and possibly needless swipe at Simian Bale, but is still bitter that the wise folk at Fantasy Football decided to give him three bonus points this week for no earthly reason imaginable)

3. Everton still lack the killer instinct.
If Arsenal win their game in hand (a big if, but they are home to West Ham) there will be 3 points separating them, Spurs and Everton for the final and vital Champions League spot. With the greatest respect to West Brom, and absolutely no respect at all to Liverpool, it is between those clubs. What must be frustrating for Everton fans is that they are consistently playing the better football of those teams but are failing to turn draws into wins time after time again. Having not kept a clean sheet in 14 league matches, Saturday’s shut out would have been barely celebrated as for the first time this season they failed to score at the other end. Thus far the Toffees have drawn with Newcastle, Swansea, Fulham, Norwich, Arsenal and Stoke in games that they should have all won with room to spare. If they had done, they’d be 12 points better off and lie in second. As it is, they lack the ability that the bigger guns do to kill a game off when they’re dominating. So good have the performances been of the likes of Osman, Pienaar, Baines and Fellaini that it has barely been mentioned that ahead of them Nikica Jelavic is firing blanks. The Croatian has 6 goals granted, but he has missed a hatful of chances and having played virtually every game, he is averaging a goal every 300 minutes. If Everton want to play Champions League football next year and take their place in the Emerald City, they need to find their way back to the Jelavic road again first.

4. Nonsense still rules common sense when it comes to the laws.
There was a certain irony in Sky celebrating the 150^th anniversary of the laws of football this weekend, before witnessing yet another game be ruined by perhaps it’s worst ever amendment. The professional foul rule continues to offer almost no plausible benefit to football matches. It was brought in to stop cynical fouls being committed as the last man, but nine times out of ten it is applied to genuine but mistimed attempts to win the ball. Laurent Koscielny clearly conceded a foul yesterday and a penalty call was correct, but it left Mike Dean with no option to dismiss the Arsenal defender and as such, even though the penalty was missed, it ruined the game. City could have been out of sight at any point in this match had they been bothered to get out of 3^rd gear and despite a dramatic last 15 minutes thanks to another red card (also undeserved, given Kompany led with one foot and it wasn’t especially dangerous) – the game was essentially over as a contest before it had begun. This law has to be changed. A penalty is punishment enough and if the professional foul occurs outside the box then a penalty should be awarded just the same. Football has come a long way since 1863, but in areas like this it continues to take steps back when it should be striding forwards.

5. Danny Welbeck could do worse than follow Daniel Sturridge.
Danny Welbeck somewhat generously picked up the man of the match award against Liverpool this weekend, and whilst that probably should have gone to Vidic or the excellent Tom Cleverly, it was a statement more about his work ethic and tireless energy than anything else. The same could of have been said of Daniel Sturridge, who changed the game following his goal and added thrust and impotence to an otherwise static Liverpool attacking line. Both players have been on the fringes of clubs for too long and their errant finishing points to badly needing consistent game time. They have played their best football when they have played regularly. Sturridge at Bolton and then under AVB at Chelsea; and Welbeck first at Sunderland, and then at Utd when Hernandez was injured and Van Persie not on the books. They are 22 and 23 respectively and represent the future of English attacking football. Sturridge however, has now made the move to a club where you think he will be first choice. Welbeck on the other hand, whilst playing for a better team, is 4^th choice on the team sheet with the world’s best all round striker, best poacher and the best player in the National team ahead of him. In short, he needs to leave. He has scored more for England in the past year than he has for Utd and cannot continue to be part of Hodgson’s plans if he gets such little game time. There is something a little perverse about the squads of the bigger clubs that allows people like Welbeck, Jones, Richards, Lescott, Milner, Chamberlain and Sturridge to sit on the bench for over 50% of matches when they would walk into 15 of the 20 teams in the league. It is to England’s loss and to nobody’s gain. What the solution is remains unclear, but if Sturridge plays regularly for Liverpool and plays well, it’s likely that Welbeck could see himself be 4^th choice for his country soon too.

https://twitter.com/HinduMonkey

Five Things We Learnt From Watching Football This Week - Weeks 20-21

1. Mark Lawrenson & Garth Crooks need their own moderators.

As a long time hater of Crooks (I view Lawro with a mere mild disdain in comparison), it was only a matter of time that once again he irked me enough to appear in my blog. The crime of both these “pundits,” aside from being supremely annoying, is that neither seem to have the faintest idea about current football. Crooks “team of the week” features Steven Gerrard by default, a keeper seemingly picked by random generator and any defender who has scored, regardless of whether or not they actually played well... in defence. This week he announced that, behind Van Persie, Utd’s player of the season so far was Patrice Evra. A full back who’s positional sense is now so bad he’d get in the Arsenal team. Lawro meanwhile, each and every week treats us to a series of banal predictions which are ALWAYS 2-0/2-1 to the home/big four team or 1-1 if it involves two of said big four playing against each other. He has written the words “you never know what to expect from Wigan” 132 times. Despite that fact that the Premier League is more of a goal fest season on season, Lawro has predicted to date that 422 goals will have flown in by the close of the 20th round of games, an average of 21 a week. The real figure is 567, an average of close to 29 per week. And that figure is rising. The real fun though, comes with the “Lawro League Table” in which you can see how your team would be doing if all of his predictions came true. There are many stand outs, not least Man Utd having conceded just four goals in 20 matches. But Norwich on just 10 points? Reading to have scored just 12 goals all season? Almost nothing is right... but in a sea of so much wrong... QPR in 7th place really takes the fucking biscuit. Both of these idiots need someone to check their work for them...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/20790407

2. What will become of Theo Walcott.

Theo Walcott has played four games in the last few weeks in a central strikers role, a position he has been chirping about filling for several years. In that time he has been fantastic twice and invisible twice. What is clear though, is that if you give him the ball in behind and play to his strengths, he can be lethal. The odds were on Walcott filling his boots again vs Southampton but Adkins team are becoming more wise to the Premier League and they defended admirably against a misfiring Arsenal. Just three days before, Walcott and Co had blown away Newcastle (who inexplicably opted to play a high line) with a mixture of madness, magic and mayhem. Whether Theo truly craves the number 9 shirt or a bigger pay cheque remains unclear, but what is certain is that he’s not going to be walking into the centre forward role at any team currently bigger than Arsenal. The only large club who have a striker shortage are Chelsea, who would no doubt be interested, but have already all but signed Ba and will be looking at bigger fish in the summer. Liverpool also have such a shortage. But they’re not a big club. At Arsenal, Theo has a trio of creative, penetrative central midfielders to provide him with through balls and it would probably suit all parties if he stayed put. Whether or not he has the credentials to get anywhere near the rather huge mantle of “Henry’s Heir” remains very unclear. But it should at least be fun watching him try.

3. Robin Van Persie was worth every penny.
Barring injury, it’s impossible to see how Robin Van Persie won’t be the first person since Thierry Henry to win back to back Golden Boots. The Dutchman has carried on for Utd where he left off for Arsenal, and Mancini for once wasn’t playing mind games when he said he was currently the difference between the two Manchester clubs. Van Persie scores easy goals, wonderful goals and weighs in with assists as well. He has scored or created 25 league goals so far this season, more than any other player. His nearest rival is Suarez, who’s combined total stands at 19, a full 6 behind Utd’s new talisman. Van Persie was brilliant against Wigan, the man of the match by such a distance that others should have been happy to just be on the same pitch as him. He scored two, created one and could have had a couple more. Utd may have a defence that is capable of conceding a goal at any given time (a possible byproduct of making Jonny Evans your first choice centre back) - but with Van Persie playing like this, the 20th league title is looking increasingly more likely. If they do land it come May, with RVP snaring the golden boot, the money spent on him will look like a snip.

4. Ba Humbug comes late for Newcastle.
Newcastle’s grueling festive period never looked like yielding too much in the way of results, but conceding 13 goals surely can’t have been on the agenda. Given the way he has played this year, it’s likely retaining Demba Ba was top of many Geordies Christmas lists. That hasn’t happened and despite the faint silver lining of freeing up Papiss Cisse to play in his favoured role, it’s unlikely that Newcastle fans will be pleased in anyway by the way their season has unfolded to date. 2 points clear of the relegation zone after 21 games, the Toon army have just lost the one player who was keeping them from falling further into the nether regions of the Premier League table. Where Ba will fit in at Chelsea remains to be seen. He probably fits their style much better than Torres and by rights should go straight into the first team. That seems unlikely to happen though, and how he adapts to rotation rather than week in week out football will probably decide how long he stays a Chelsea player. Ba is a decent signing for Chelsea, but if they were looking for a strong, powerful forward who can hold the ball up and has an eye for goal... it would have been cheaper to just recall Lukaku.

5. Rafa Benitez is no mug.

Few pundits would praise the decision making of Rafa Benitez after a home defeat to the worst team in the division, but by “resting” the likes of Mata, Cole & Hazard for the visit of QPR, Rafa told us a lot about his priorities. Most managers would be playing the big guns in the league before giving them a break in the FA Cup this weekend, but then most coaches haven’t been given the dubious job title of “interim” manager. It’s barely plausible to believe that Chelsea will win the league, and highly unlikely they’ll finish 5th or below, so with that in mind, what is there for Rafa to play for during his 6 months with the club? In a word, cups. If Rafa had knackered his star players out against QPR and lost either of the two cup games his team have next up, it would have far greater repercussions for his future than the difference between finishing 3rd or 4th in the Premier League come May. As it is, several of his players have had a nice rest and in a weeks’ time will likely be in the 4th round of the FA Cup and have one foot in the final of the Capital One. Given the desperate inconsistency of Spurs & Arsenal, Rafa knows exactly what he’s doing...


https://twitter.com/HinduMonkey