S7M16: Cracking

Goals galore this weekend, with some great games.

The Rafa return was not a happy one at Stamford Bridge, with Chelsea winning comfortably. The Newcastle bubble of a month or so ago seems to have truly burst and needs something to invigorate it, like a sale...

Liverpool also ran amok on the South coast, with their Keeganesque approach to life being ideal for good highlights packages, but less ideal for winning leagues. Special mention to Lewis Dunk too for his valiant attempt to score an own goal against every side in the league this year, The other side of Liverpool was also content with a solid 2-0 win over the promoted Huddersfield who also seem to have hit a bit of a wall of late. New manager bounce and all that...

Burnley lost which is a shock of sorts, although Leicester have been quietly effective under Puel. An early goal from Demarai Gray settled that one; he incidentally being a key figure in Iain MacIntosh's relatively successful FM17 challenge. Weird that. Stoke, who are rubbish, beat Swansea who are worse. Watford who are doing ok drew with Spurs who are not really doing ok by their recent standards. Sanchez saw red for them for an elbow that frankly might not be malicious, but is certainly indefensible, much as Spurs Twitter tries...

...speaking of which, let me start at the end of the Arsenal-Man Utd game, which was one for the ages. Pogba's tackle was filthy and dangerous and frankly I'm amazed Bellerin didn't sustain a nasty ligament injury. It's reckless, and a deserved red and this nonsense about Bellerin's leg being in the wrong place is just ridiculous. It's not on a defender to block the ball and then remove themself from potential harm's way. It's on the attacker to not go in studs showing and plant them into their opponent.

It's remeniscent of this:

To the game itself, it was very good of the rest of the Arsenal defence to preemptively show solidarity with Bellerin's injury and shoot themselves in the foot. We know how Mourinho sides set up away from home. We know they have a little burst early on and then drop deep. We know they struggle to score. Stay focused, keep it tight & ride out the storm. Don't give away a soft goal by giving the ball away and then all running after the ball like 5 year olds in the playground. Don't give away a soft second goal within 5 minutes by having a mindblank outside your own area. Special mention to a delicious assist from Martial. 2-0 down, more goals that Utd have scored away from home in big matches since the days of Matt Busby or some such statistic & a mountain to climb.

Let's not paint this as a Mou masterclass. He parked the bus but left all the windows open and the key in the ignition but a combination of average finishing and extraordinary goalkeeping saved Man Utd. The one from Lukaku's acrobatic og attempt was my favourite I think. The chutzpah of choosing Lingard as MotM...

Then, when it seemed that an equaliser was imminent, another stupid goal conceded on the counter. Pogba did brilliantly (he was so badly missed, and will be so badly missed now) making Koscielny look every one of his 32 years (75 in Achilles terms) and squaring for a tap in - infuriatingly after Xhaka tracked the run brilliantly, then decided to ignore the man he's just seen in open space in the box.

There is no capacity for face-palming in blogs but rest assured that I have done so in real life.

There was no real serious comeback after that - 2 good shouts for a penalty not given but that was that. A weird game where Man Utd obviously the happier, but Arsenal fans were pretty heartened given their performance in a big game - something that often goes awry. An xG of 5:1 Arsenal apparently at the end if that's your thing - all I know is you play that game 100 times and we win more times than we lose.

WBA & Palace played apparently. Very nice too. The Mouth Derby ended 1-1 with more penalty controversy on the Sunday. Do we believe that a ref apologised mid-game for missing a dive? I don't. Would critically undermine him for the rest of the game. Man City came from behind to win with yet another late goal to basically ensure their win streak goes on forever. Mark of Champions & all that. 13 in a row now, and if they win this weekend, they equal the record.

Let's get statty:

This week, 26 people played

Most popular predicted results: Chelsea & Man City WINS (26/26)

Most disputed result: Arsenal vs Man Utd (11-11-4 split)

Highest odds: AFM (8906/1)

Lowest odds: Josh Daniels (374/1)

Average odds: 2741/1

Best predictors: WhoScored.com & Joe Abbott (8/10)

Worst predictors: AFM & David Silverman (4/10)

Average score: 5.96 /10

Best predicted result: Chelsea & Man City WINS (26/26)

Worst predicted result: Man Utd WIN (4/26)

Everyone's scores:

Leaderboard (>2/3; 11/15)

This week's predictions:

West Ham vs Chelsea - CHELSEA
Burnley vs Watford - BURNLEY
Crystal Palace vs Bournemouth - DRAW
Huddersfield vs Brighton - HUDDERSFIELD
Swansea vs WBA - SWANSEA
Spurs vs Stoke - SPURS
Newcastle vs Leicester - LEICESTER
Southampton vs Arsenal - ARSENAL
Liverpool vs Everton - LIVERPOOL
Man Utd vs Man City - MAN CITY

Good luck guys