Everton continue to be the gift that keeps on giving. 2-0 up at half time at Newcastle, they somehow managed to fuck it up and lose. In fairness to the Blues we’ve seen this happen to loads of mid-table teams who play in a cup final and then can’t lift yourself for run of the mill games that follow.
They achieved their goal for the season last week by knocking us off the top of the table, so a hangover was inevitable. They might not win another game all season. Lucky for them they had a decent start and have a seven point cushion from the bottom three.
They started well enough against Newcastle though, and Calvert-Lewin headed them in front. Pickford then conceded a pen when he flapped at a cross and then rugby tackled Rondon. Probably should have been a red card too, although there was a defender on the line and refs are always looking for an excuse to not send the offender off in these situations (like Harry Maguire at Anfield).
Pickford then saved Matt Ritchie’s pen, much to the fury of the Geordies who hate him anyway because he’s from Sunderland. 71 seconds later it was 2-0 as Richarlison tapped in from a couple of yards out.
Pickford then denied that Ayoze Perez loser, which prompted the MOTD commentator to say “Pickford is going to have one of those games isn’t he? He’s going to keep everything out.” Hahaha! Classic commentators curse.
Pickford was acting the twat all afternoon though (should have seen him strutting off at half time like Connor McGregor, the knob) so what happened in that second half was extra funny. I mean it would have been hilarious anyway, but Pickford’s antics just added to the whole hilarity of it all.
First he came charging out of his goal and got lobbed by Rondon. He had to go chasing back and wouldn’t have gotten there had it been on target, but the ball drifted just wide of the post and Pickford was grinning and pulling tongues at the fans in the Gallowgate End. If you’re going to be that cocky you have to back it up, and he didn’t.
He wasn’t grinning a few minutes later when Perez and Rondon combined brilliantly for the big man to score with a volley that went smack bang in the middle of the goal. England’s Number One eh?
He was even worse for the Newcastle equaliser. Their new signing, the worm with eyebrows, hit a stinging drive that Pickford made a right dog’s dinner of, palming it down perfectly for Perez to fire home. I’ve always liked that Ayoze lad, good player, very under-rated, and certainly not a loser.
It got even better with six minutes remaining when an up and under found Rondon, who was one of FIVE Newcastle players clearly offside, and although Rondon’s touch was a little heavy, my boy Ayoze was on hand to smash it in for the winner.
No idea how the linesman failed to see the offside there though. It could just have been that there were so many of them offside that it obscured his view of Rondon. Perez was offside from the initial ball in, but not when he latched onto Rondon’s touch. Things were so much simpler under the old rule, but never mind, eh?
I actually think there’s something wrong with Pickford you know. Initially I suspected he might have Tourette’s but it’s not that. He might just be a bit thick, but I’m not sure it’s that either. I reckon he’s on the spectrum of something, as there’s something just a bit off about him.
Speaking of things that are a bit off, what about that Man City opening goal eh? Wait, did I say a bit off? What I meant to say, was that was the worst decision I’ve ever seen in all my years of watching football. Seriously, it is. I genuinely can’t fucking believe it. It’s dodgy as fuck and while the authorities are investigating City’s finances, they might want to check Paul Tierney’s bank account too.
Here’s why this was so egregious:
Sterling was offside and he scored. The linesman correctly saw that he was offside and put up his flag. That should have been the end of it, but for some reason Tierney wanted to go and speak to him about it. Almost as though he was looking for a reason to give the goal.
After talking it over, that’s exactly what he did. The offside rule is now shit and confusing, we all know this, but that’s got fuck all to do with what happened here, because there is quite literally no interpretation of the rule that justifies this being a goal. Tierney just made it up. The question is why?
The apparent justification for giving it was that the defender played the ball, meaning Sterling is no longer offside as it’s a new passage of play. It’s complete horseshit and only a fucking idiot would view it that way. I doubt Tierney is an idiot.
Sterling is offside as Aguero flicks the ball to him. The defender, Janmaat, no doubt suspects he’s offside but a) can’t be sure, b) can’t be sure the linesman will spot it and c) has been told his whole life to play to the whistle.
So Janmaat does what he’s supposed to and he attempts to stop Sterling scoring. He tackles him, and the ball hits Sterling and loops into the net. The key here is that the only reason Janmaat is playing the ball is because Sterling, who is offside, is about to shoot.
It’s not like Sterling doesn’t go for the ball and is stood there minding his own business while the ball is smashed against him and goes in. He’s offside and he got toward the ball, which is why the linesman flagged.
So yeah, Tierney getting involved and over ruling his assistant is the single worst decision Ive ever seen. We see officials getting things wrong or failing to spot things all the time. There were some awful decisions this weekend, not least the one that went against us at Anfield, but those are all just standard mistakes that you expect. This wasn’t that. I don’t know what the fuck this was.
I switched the game off in disgust as soon as it happened. City scored again almost immediately, which is probably a result of Watford completely losing their heads about the injustice of it all. Sterling then completed a hat-trick soon after. Watford pulled one back through Deulefeu after he combined with fellow sub, my boy Troy, which at least put the tiniest dint in their goal difference.
A lot of Reds were unhappy at Watford making seven changes for the game and leaving out some of their regular starters. It didn’t bother me because I didn’t see it as them waving the white flag, just the opposite in fact. It told me that Javi Gracia was actually thinking about how he could keep City quiet.
We battered Watford last week and the likes of Deeney and Deulefeu barely got a kick. Gracia left them out and went with pace and work rate up front because their best chance of getting anything was by playing with men behind the ball and trying to counter.
He didn’t pick his best team, he picked a team to play a specific way against a specific opponent. And it was working too until that cunt Tierney got involved. It was 0-0 at half time and Watford had rarely looked in any danger. I’d say it was probably 75% certain that City would have broken them down eventually, but the fact is it was 0-0 up until that joke of a goal. Sickening.
I hate VAR and everything it stands for, but when you see shit like this going down it’s easy to see why so many people want it brought in. Personally I just want refs to not be busy cunts interpreting rules how it suits them. Is that too much to ask?
Brighton and Palace met at Selhurst Park in a game that for some reason is the biggest grudge match either side has. These teams hate eachother. Not sure why, something about Gus Poyet having a shit on a dressing room floor or something.
Anyway, a quality finish from Murray put Brighton in front but Palace levelled from the spot (of course they did). Knockaert won it for Brighton with a sensational curling strike from the corner of the box. He should have been sent off in the first minute though for an over the ball, studs up lunge right into the bollocks of a Palace player.
Here’s a question, if Palace get a penalty every week, and Milovojevic never misses, how is he not in contention for the Golden Boot?
Palace are weird though. No-one likes going to Selhurst as it’s seen as a tough place to go, and Palace are also regarded as a dangerous away team because counter attacking is such a strong part of their game. So how come they’re in relegation battles every year?
Next up, Spurs. Fucking hell. Hard to believe I was actually mildly concerned about them not too long ago. I saw people writing them off because they’re Spurs and will inevitably Spurs it up, and although I suspected that would be the case I did think ‘what if this time they don’t do a Spurs?’.
It was because they kept scraping wins even when their best players were missing. They lost Son, Kane and Alli at various points, and most of the time they were without two of the three but still kept on winning. Then Kane came back and the wheels fell off. They’ve lost four and drawn one of their last five and the only reason they got that draw was because Aubemayeng shit his pants with that last minute penalty. Don’t ever stop being you, Tottenham.
In fairness they were a little unlucky to lose at Southampton as they should have been home and dry by half time. Kane missed two early chances, Yoshida diverted a cross against his post and Eriksen hit the bar with a free-kick before Kane eventually put them ahead. Kane was within a whisker of making it 2-0 and all this was before Southampton even had a sniff of a chance.
They let Southampton hang around though and paid the price. Redmond (twice) and Hoijberg missed good chances, while at the other end Kane ballooned one over the bar. The momentum was clearly shifting though, and Valery stole in at the back post to equalise and Spurs lost their way completely.
Walker-Peters was lucky not to be sent off when he brought down Armstrong who was through on goal, but it didn’t matter as Ward-Prowse brilliantly lashed in the free-kick to win it for the Saints.
There was time late on for Kevin Friend to embarrass himself with a dreadful decision. Redmond took exception to a snide foul by Sissoko and tapped the Frenchman on the back to get his attention. Sissoko turned around and shoved him hard in the chest, and then tried to throw the head in. Friend’s decision? Yellow cards for both. Shithouse.
Southampton’s win made it all the more important that Cardiff got something against West Ham to stay in touch. They won, fairly comfortably.
Junior Hoilett, my boy, gave Cardiff the area start when he converted a Murphy cross after just four minutes. Camerasa bundled in to make it 2-0 and Niasse then missed two sitters as Cardiff ran all over the Hammers. Rice hit the post and Arnautovic brought a good save from Etheridge, but Cardiff were good value for the win which keeps things interesting at the bottom given that Newcastle, Southampton and Brighton all won.
West Ham are just a complete nothing team now aren’t they? Not quite bad enough to go down, not good enough to be in any way relevant. The Everton of London, if you like.
I mentioned last week about a dive from Hernandez that was so good it fooled everybody on first viewing. He tried it again and failed miserably, getting himself a booking. Cheatarito.
Elsewhere, Brendan got his first win as Leicester boss as they saw off Fulham at the Kingpower Stadium. Vardy spurned a one v one with the keeper to unselfishly put one on a plate for Tielemans to get the opener. Love that, not many number 9’s would do that, especially when they’re on 99 career goals. It reminded me of Bobby.
Fulham levelled through some lad I’ve never heard of. Nice run but a fortunate finish as it deflected off Maguire and wrong footed Schmeichel.
Vardy did get goal number 100 when he raced onto a Maddison through ball and finished in typical Vardy style. Goal number 101 came soon after. Brendan was all over him on the pitch afterwards, the creepy bastard.
You know who’s been shit? That Seri lad for Fulham. There was a time when both the Reds and Barca were looking at him as an alternative to Naby. Turns out they are very similar, as they’ve both been massive flops this year.
Bournemouth finally got an away win, although it was only Huddersfield so I’m not sure that even counts. Wilson finished off a lovely move between Brooks and my boy Ryan Fraser to open the scoring. Lovely goal, but their second was even better. Brilliant play by King saw him play in Wilson, who squared for Fraser to side foot home.
Onto Sunday, and the race for the top four took a couple of interesting twists. Chelsea almost lost at home to Wolves and needed a last gasp equaliser from Hazard to snatch a point. In the other game, Arsenal ran out 2-0 winners over the Mancs to go fourth and close the gap to Spurs to just a single point.
Chelsea just don’t look good at all right now, but if they win their game in hand they’ll go level with Arsenal and United will be in 6th again, right back where they started when the Goblin took over.
Chelsea’s game in hand is at home to Brighton, so they should win it, but when you watch them play it’s hard to have any confidence in them beating anybody. They had loads of the ball against Wolves and defeat would have been harsh on them, but they certainly didn’t deserve to win the game.
Wolves did what they do. Well organised, strong defensively and a threat on the counter. Jota and Jimenez are turning into quite the partnership now, and they combined well for Jimenez to give them the lead midway through the second half.
Chelsea never really looked as though they had an equaliser in them until a bit of magic from Hazard saw him make space and lash one in from 20 yards. When he goes this summer they’re gonna be fucked as that transfer ban means they can’t replace him.
Pulisic isn’t fit to lace Hazard’s boots at this moment in time, and they still need a centre forward too. Maybe one of the three thousand players they have out on loan will be the answer?
Finally, Solskjaer finally lost a league game. Not before time either. Too much has been made of their ‘revival’ so it was nice to see Arsenal doing what ourselves and Spurs should have done and put them to the sword.
Mind you, we never have the benefit of a soft penalty and De Gea dropping a bollock like he did in this one. How much of a mistake that was on Xhaka’s opener is up for debate. Carra and Neville got into it over that one, with Neville saying it’s a howler and Carra saying it wasn’t.
I can’t make up my mind. Ordinarily, a keeper being beaten from 25 yards by a shot that goes right in the middle of the goal is clearly a mistake. When you look at this from behind the goal though, I dunno, I feel as though there wasn’t much he could do about it as it swerved that much.
I don’t really care. It went in and that’s all that matters. Same with the second half penalty to make it 2-0. Never a pen in a million years. Fred did nothing wrong there at all, he was just running alongside Lacazette, who flung himself to the turf.
United really aren’t in any position to complain about penalty decisions after the week they had though, the twats. At least we don’t have to hear about them being unbeaten anymore, and hopefully they’ll be back in that sixth spot they seem to love so much.
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