S13M24: Compression

Best League in the World TM delivers the drama again. Everton kicked us off with a late equaliser at home to Spurs. Without their 10 point deduction, they'd be solidly mid-table, but as is are still in the relegation mix, although you have to assume they'll pull clear at some point.  Brighton recovered from their recent thumping to hand out a thumping of their own to not-real-derby rivals Palace who's manager looks increasingly forlorn each week. He's actually incredible at pushing the boundaries of forlornness. Also, when he gets sacked, he needs to take over at Sheff Wed. Obvs. Also also, I'm a huge fan of Joao Pedro and think he's going to be a great signing for whoever he leaves Brighton for. I'd happily take him next summer.

Another late equaliser for relegation-threatened Burnley, alongside jsut a standard 4-4 at St James Park. Luton with just the casual 8 in 2 games now. Villa handed out another thumping to absolutely dreadful Sheff Utd. Not a great Saturday for home teams.

Bournemouth vs Forest was boring, but the drama continued at the Bridge where Wolves did a number of Chelsea - a highly self-inflicted defeat and the #PochOut mutterings are becoming louder. Bring back Frank Lampard I say. An easy home win for Man Utd against West Ham was followed by the Super Sunday game between Arsenal and Liverpool for the 3rd time in 6 weeks. Some dreadful errors handed a goal to each team, but Liverpool were dominated in a way that doesn't often happen, with Arsenal winning 3-1 quite comfortably.

The same scoreline greeted Haaland's return as City saw off Brentford easily enough after going behind. A hat-trick from Foden was well received by me, as he's in my fantasy team - this was then tempered by me seeing that he's in bloody everyone's team, so no advantage there.

S13M23: KlopPOW

There's only one place to start and that's with my take on the Klopp news.

My initial reaction, tbqhwy, was elation. Like when Fergie went, or when Spurs hired Mourinho. The schadenfreude runneth deep.

I'm not going to lie. I was wrong. I thought he'd burnt out at Dortmund and didn't think he'd have the energy to make Liverpool work - a very unhappy club at the time if you recall - before the fans got all sack-happy.

But yeah, hands held up. He built well, front-to back with a strong backroom and back-office staff, helped out by Barcelona offering stupid money for Coutinho. They grew, he grew and it all culminated in the emotional maelstrom that really only Liverpool can achieve - for better or for worse. It's no surprise that he's emptied the tanks. Trying to rebuild that side will be a challenge and he has nothing left to prove. 

I never really loved Klopp - I didn't go into for the fawning. He's as psychopathic and hypocritical as the rest of them, and his toothy grin can be viewed as charismatic or a shark about to eat you depending on perspective. But I hella respected him and there's no doubt that Liverpool will be worse off without him, at least in the short term, regardless of who (Xabi Alonso) they bring in to replace him.

What will it mean for this season? Will they use this to fuel them to a quadruple? I doubt it - I still think City will be too strong for them in the League, but wouldn't be surprised at a cup treble providing bodies stay fit.

S13M21: Drawn Out

 It's this time of the year where absolute tomfoolery kicks in. Post-festive fixture scheduling, we get a staggered winter break mixed with 2 continental championships. Why? Who does this? The latter thing is what it is, but why not just have a winter break? Between that and a 5 day 3rd round of the FA Cup, I'm just bamboozled as to what's going on, who's playing when and who's still around. Much as I scoff at the "Back in My Day" lot, you never had to worry about this nonsense in 1952.

In time honoured fashion, I will not be recapping the events of many weeks past, save to say that personally, harrumph. 

S13M20: Once more onto the beach

 I am, chronologically, not an old man. I will accept I have maybe always skewed more to the "old" side mentally, but I'm hardly a Little Britain, rose-tinted tuppence a bus ticket Luddite. I've always been pro-VAR conceptually (even if I've said on many, many, MANY occasions that the execution is about as bad as could be) alongside other forms of innovation, data, technology etc.

I however, do find myself on the David Mitchell soapbox when it comes to fixture scheduling over the last 10 days. As if Friday night games aren't bad enough, it's been a drawn out trudge through the festive period, with a single day of relief today before another 4 days. There will have been PL fixtures on 11 of the 13 days around this time, with only 1 day off before the FA Cup 3rd round starts, again on a THURSDAY.

Enough is enough. I don't care what colour your boots are but come on.....traditions matter. Otherwise, we might as well become the NFL with their nonsensical stuff designed to just sell more merchandise and TV subscriptions.

Oh. 

S13M(Festive): Good Tidings

Only one thing I'd like to talk about this week and it's not football.

Tom Lockyer. 

To suffer a second cardiac collapse in 5 months on the pitch is just absolutely mind boggling to me. Many of you will know my discomfort when Eriksen returned to playing at Brentford after his on-pitch cardiac arrest in Euro 2020 (in 2021) - you've been given a second chance at life, you've got money, achieved professional goals - don't push your luck. Especially when you can't say you've "fixed" the cause - just tried to make sure that *if* it happens again, you won't die. To me, this is an incomprehensible approach to take - recognising that everyone - and especially elite athletes - have different value systems.

Lockyer is slightly different in that he theoretically had a curative procedure in May, and was under the care of Prof Sharma, who will have forgotten more about sports & cardiology than I will ever know as a general paediatrician. But maybe it's just me, but relying on medical teams to resuscitate you on the field every 15 games might not be the best strategy.

Eriksen came back to the UK because he was banned from playing in Italy as a result of his procedure. I think I'd prefer a similar zero tolerance approach to health here (I think I've written before on head injuries and football...a whole other story).

I read something a couple of weeks ago on how bodies mark and "signpost" the route to the summit of Everest, and I don't really understand why the lessons of Foe, Puerta, Muamba, Nouri, Tiote, Eriksen and so many more haven't been learnt. The trajectory seems to be increasing even with screening - so why are we allowing this?

S13M17: Top of the Tree

Festive period fixtures - officially started now? Weird kick off times, unusual days and an additionally coded fixture calculator to take into account travel & policing requests. Magical.

Congestion causes rotation, fatigue and injuries - so we often get some weird results this time of year. Like pretty (below) average beating Liverpool 1-0 on moral victories, until the ubiquitous PGMOL manacle was clamped to their collective ankle. 

Similarly - home banker for Brighton turned into dropped points against Burnley and Man Utd - well I'm not sure they have bankers, but being morally beaten 4-0 at home to Bournemouth is bad, even for them. Ten Had forever.

Sheffield United also won. What on earth went on last weekend? A rupture in some wormhole? Some football happened in the Midlands which nobody watched, Everton showed the power of an us against them mentality, winning for the 2nd time in a week against good expensively assembled opposition to vacate the relegation zone. With their 10 points back, they'd be 10th.

Fulham continue to be the Pride of West London, Luton did a Palace against Man City - it's the hope that kills you before Spurs ended their streak of turning leads into losses, thumping a Newcastle side that look to have lost their legs. Or their heads. #geopoliticaljoke.

I'd not planned to discuss referees, VAR or the PGMOL because I'm so so so bored of it, but I will mention the FA and the judgement yesterday against Mikel Arteta, where he was effectively found innocent or whatever the phrase is.

Well - not the FA. The Arsenal legal team who attempted in their submission to mitigate his words by saying English isn't his first language and Disgrace and Desgracia have different connotations in English/Spanish.

Mikel takes the stand and goes "yeah, nah, I knew that, I meant disgrace". Brilliant stuff. Who'd be a lawyer*....

*Me probably. Suits looked fun.

S13M16: Emery the Sandbagger

December starts, festive season run up, with games coming more or less twice a week until the FA Cup 3rd round now. So prepare for some double matchday blogs.

Let me do broad winners & losers from the 2 rounds of games.

Winners:
*Arsenal - 2 wins including another late late show and a little gap opening at the top
*Everton - 2 wins to pull away from trouble, even after the points deduction
*Liverpool - don't sleep on a quietly strong season, even after a total midfield rebuild
* Aston Villa - maybe disappointed to drop points to Bournemouth but a late equaliser and then to dominate Man City in a way a Pep team has never been dominated before was special.
*West Ham - Another decent season brewing, even after losing their totemic captain

Mild-winner:
*Man Utd - for still getting points even when being rubbish, and then finally having a performance where they 1) weren't rubbish and also 2) really showed what rubbish is. 
*VAR/PGMOL - not the headline! Woo Hoo!

Losers:
*Chelsea - see above
*Notts Forest - it's pretty bad
*Burnely - see above
*Spurs - 1 point from 15. Not good enough mate
*Palace - just what's the point
*Man City - 3 points from 12. Mini-wobble from Man City.

We've also seen the first sacking - Sheff Utd doing a Watford and bringing back the old guy. Will definitely go well....