The main story of the weekend was United getting their arses handed to them by Brighton. Again. I’ll get to that in due course, but I’ll start with Saturday’s games first.
Chelsea v Arsenal was certainly entertaining. It was also encouraging from our point of view watching how it all unfolded. There are both a bit shite right now. Chelsea at least have talent and therefore have every chance of getting better fairly quickly, but Arsenal's flaws aren't going to be fixed with the players they have.
Be honest, is there one Arsenal player you'd take for our squad? Ramsay is a good player, but the rest? Nah. Maybe that Maitland-Niles kid has a chance if he hasn't already been Wenger-ed, but that's basically it.
I honestly don’t think either of these could live with us at the moment. Arsenal in particular should be positively shitting themselves at the idea of coming up against our flying machines.
You want to defend on halfway then you need two things. A bit of pace in the backline, and people high up the pitch who can press. Arsenal are doing it with two fucking snails at centre half and Ozil and Aubameyeng charged with pressing the opposition. Amazing scenes. If they try that against us we’ll score ten. Not even kidding.
Chelsea sliced through them at will, it was truly pathetic stuff from Arsenal. Pedro opened the scoring when Alonso was given acres to run in behind and pick out a low cross. No idea where Bellerin was. Probably picking a fight with someone from Arsenal Fan TV or chatting up some sort in the Nag’s Head with his boys Jevon and Rodders.
Chelsea weren’t exactly water tight themselves though. Aubameyang missed a sitter from seven yards out and he paid a heavy price as less than a minute later Morata ran in behind Mustafi to score. Arsenal’s defensive line was a yard inside the Chelsea half when the pass was played.
Mkhitaryan also missed a sitter, but unlike Aubameyeng he soon made amends with a low shot from 18 yards into the bottom corner. Chelsea’s new keeper got a hand on it and maybe should have saved it. Not really sure on that though as it was well struck and maybe he did well to even get near it? Hard to say.
He got nowhere near Iwobi’s equaliser soon after though. Chelsea had been dominant yet Arsenal had created several great chances against them. It was 2-2 but could just as easily have been 4-4 as both defences looked garbage.
Isn’t it boss being able to sneer at other team’s defending without feeling like you’re lashing bricks from inside a greenhouse?
Iwobi then missed two more glorious chances before half time. The finishing was almost as bad as the defending. The mad thing was every single Arsenal attack was identical. Neat triangles out wide, someone getting in behind and cutting it back toward the penalty spot for runners into the box. They created SIX clear chances in the first half just by doing that.
The second half wasn’t quite as open and yielded just the one goal, the winner, for Chelsea, as substitute Hazard crossed for Alonso put one past Cech from close range.
Bit surprising to see Ross Rodwell getting games for Chelsea. He played well too in fairness. Ruben Loftus-Cheek can’t even get on the bench at the moment, which is odd as all summer I kept hearing about how he was the reincarnation of Ruud Gullit.
Elsewhere, Danny Ings scored at Goodison but it was only a consolation as Southampton were beaten 2-1. Walcott got the first after a well worked free-kick. Pickford then made a miraculous save from Ings to recover from his own mistake, and that twat Richarlison scored another scruffy goal soon after to make it 2-0.
Ings pulled one back early in the second half when he was left all alone in the six yard box from a corner. Not sure you’ll see worse defending from a set-piece all season than that, it was truly amazing. Ings was just stood there slap bang in the middle of the goal with no-one even looking at him. It's almost like he had borrowed Mesut Ozil's cloak of invisibility.
Pickford was involved in a contentious incident when he cleared the ball and caught Ings with his follow through, ripping his short and leaving stud marks right down his back. It was dangerous but we all know keepers can do whatever the fuck they like so there was never going to be anything done about it.
Of course Mark Hughes had a good ol’ moan about it, as he does. Not sure there’s a bigger cry baby in the league, other than Mourinho, obviously. I wouldn't have been happy either to be honest.
That was in stark contrast to what happened at Leicester, where the home side got the job done against Wolves but at the cost of a red card and three game suspension for Jamie Vardy.
Wolves started well and Joao Moutinho hit the bar with a screamer when it was still 0-0. He’s at Wolves now? When did this happen? How did I not know this? Fucking hell, that’s a good engine room they’ve got there like, with him and Neves. Shame about the rest of the side.
Doherty headed into his own net to put Leicester in front and the promising James Maddison doubled their lead. If he fulfils his potential at Leicester he may well be playing for us in a couple of years as Klopp and Edwards are big admirers.
Vardy was sent off for a strong challenge in which he won the ball and then caught the man with his follow through. Basically the kind of challenge that always had fans up and cheering but now gets you a straight red. Unless you’re Jordan Pickford.
Newcastle drew 0-0 at Cardiff in a right shitfest. Two bad teams that. Awful game that Newcastle should have won. Some mad refereeing in this one from Craig Pawson.
Kennedy booted a Cardiff player and not only got away it at the time (even though Pawson was right on the spot), but the video panel did fuck all about it either. No consistency whatsoever with this kind of thing. How is that not a suspension? I don't get it all.
Hayden wasn’t as lucky as his team-mate though. He picked up a straight red for a reckless but relatively harmless tackle from behind. Yellow card, certainly. Straight red? Get to fuck. Harry Arter did something far worse and escaped with a booking. Can’t stand him, proper dirty bastard. Can see why Warnock wanted him though.
Newcastle missing a stoppage time pen drew mixed reactions within my family. I saw my Mackem brother in law later that day and it had completely made his weekend. I saw my Dad the next day and it was a completely different story as he was fucking fuming as Newcastle ruined his accumulator.
Speaking of bets, I might go and see what odds I can get on Cardiff not scoring a goal all season. Arsenal would probably fuck that up for me though, the losers.
Looking at that Cardiff team I wonder how they even got out of the Championship, but then I suppose you have to allow for the fact that at Championship level Neil Warnock has few equals. He’s the fucking man when it comes to managing outside the top flight.
A great white shark is the king of the ocean but put it on land and it’s fucked. That’s Warnock in the Premier League.
Lucas Moura opened the scoring for Spurs against Fulham but the newly promoted side almost levelled quickly when Mitrovic hit the post. He then did grab the equaliser after showing some quick reactions, somehow heading in despite having been flat on his arse after missing the initial cross.
Trippier curled in a free-kick to restore the lead for Spurs and Kane wrapped it up late on with his first ever goal in August. At least we don’t have to hear about that anymore. It was becoming almost as boring as that “when the year ends in a one” shite about them and the FA Cup we used to be bombarded with back in the day.
Kane is such a horrible bastard though. He wanted a penalty after he lost his balance, stood on a defender’s foot and fell down. Anthony Taylor was having none of it, presumably because when he’s not reffing our games he’s actually semi competent at his job.
I see West Ham lost again. Being spanked at Anfield is one thing but losing at home to Bournemouth will set some alarm bells ringing after the money they spent this summer.
Bournemouth just keep ticking along every year. They seem to have the same team they had when they came up too, there’s a lot to be said for that kind of continuity, especially when knobheads like West Ham are bringing in eight new players every summer just to stand still.
Hernandez won a penalty that was converted by Arnautovic. I watched a few replays of it and still don’t know if Hernandez was touched, but if he wasn’t then it’s one of the best dives you’ll ever see. He's had enough practice though.
Wilson equalised after running through about six West Ham players. Risible defending that. Noble was just jogging along behind him while the others watched and never bothered trying to tackle him until it was too late.
Big Steve Cook came up from the back to head Bournemouth in front six minutes later and West Ham had nothing left. Good start by Bournemouth, which is in contrast to what happened last year when they really struggled early on.
Onto Sunday now and Watford’s surprisingly good start continued with a win at Burnley.
My boy Troy made the opener with a rampaging run down the right following by a driven cross that was volleyed in by Andre Gary against his former club. He didn’t go mad but didn’t do that annoying “don’t come near me, I’m not celebrating” bullshit either. A suitable celebration, which is all too rare these days.
Burnley equalised when Tarkowski headed in from a corner and at that point you’d normally think everyone might as well just go home, as there’s usually a two goal limit on any Burnley game. Watford hadn’t got the memo though and my boy Troy slotted in to get himself off the mark for the season and then Will Hughes hit a pile driver to put the seal on a great away win for Javi Gracia’s men.
A lot of people were tipping Watford to go down this year. I don’t see it myself. There are more than enough teams much worse than them. They'll be fine, especially if the front two stay fit. Deeney and Gary have only started three games together, and they’ve won all of them. They should stick with those two and fuck all those other random shit forwards they have right off.
Hopefully Burnley will get back in their box this season as seeing Sean Dyche sucking his own cock on telly every week quickly became tiresome.
City walloped Huddersfield 6-1. I never bothered watching it because it was inevitable what would happen. City don’t need Kevin De Bruyne to win these games as they just plug Gundogan in there and carry on as normal. Where they’ll miss De Bruyne is when they play anyone good. ie not Huddersfield.
This was a massacre. Aguero ran riot, David Silva was great and Mendy was involved in everything. Pretty formidable but it’s not worth worrying about as it’s completely to be expected. They’re not going to drop many points so we just have to take care of our own business so that if and when they eventually do drop some points, we have to be right on their shoulder ready to capitalise.
I’m looking at it from this perspective: Level par for City at home against anyone shite is a four goal margin. Anything less than that is a win for us. The margin of victory against Huddersfield was five, so that wasn’t a win for us but it was more or less what we should be expecting so why worry?
City will do this to most bottom half teams at home, but then so should we. Away from home I’d set par at a two goal margin.
I don’t know what Huddersfield were even trying to do though. They certainly didn’t try to sit deep and make it difficult. Instead they pressed high and got spanked. They didn’t even commit one fucking foul in the first half!! How are you going to get anything against City if you’re not even trying to get in amongst them and stop them playing?
I don’t see how Huddersfield can survive this year. It was a minor miracle what they did last year and great credit to them for that, but it’s not happening again. I’ve got no beef with them and ideally would like them to survive but it’s not happening. Not this time.
Finally, United lost at Brighton and deservedly so. I don’t watch them as you know, but I saw bits and pieces of this when I heard they were 3-1 down, and they looked proper shite. No threat at all and dodgy as fuck at the back.
Not really a surprise, this is who they are now. They’ve got enough individual talent to scrape through and pick up plenty of wins but they’re no threat to anybody as long as Mourinho is there.
There’s all sorts of drama surrounding them and this week Pogba’s agent was laying into Mourinho. Usually I’d be lapping this up, but honestly I can’t be arsed with any of it as we’re so good right now this means very little.
Of course it’s funny and long may it continue, but I’d be taking a lot more out of it if we were shit and we needed something to distract us from that. We’re boss, so all this drama at United is just background noise really.
I don't want it to come to a head as I'd rather things just carried on like this for a while longer. Let Mourinho do just enough to keep his job and he can continue to set them back years with his selfish short termism.
I don't think I'll get my wish though, he'll be gone by Christmas sadly.
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