Leaderboard

So much to get through here to get this out before the New Year games, so I’ll dive straight in to the Boxing Day fixtures and start at Old Trafford where the Mancs were given several late Christmas presents by Steve Bruce’s Newcastle. Matty Longstaff had all but disappeared after scoring against United earlier in the season, but Newcastle wheeled him out again for the return fixture and he scored again to put them in the lead. Lightning couldn’t strike twice, surely? No, it couldn’t, unfortunately. Solskjaer’s side were given gift after gift after that and ran out comfortable 4-1 winners. Dubravka’s error allowed Martial to equalise, then Schar’s howler allowed Greenwood to make it 2-1 with a thunderous shot. United’s third came via the head of Rashford from a Wan-Bissaka cross. The ginger Longstaff had been smashed in the face by a McTominay elbow in the build up but as we know VAR won’t disallow Manchester United goals at Old Trafford for clear fouls in the build up. Maybe that elbow gave him a concussion as not long after he played a backpass straight to Martial to send him clear for the fourth. Basically three of the four goals were handed to them by Newcastle and the fourth was a present by the officials, but to be fair they were all finished superbly. United do have quality in the final third, even if they’re massively flawed everywhere else on the pitch. United twitter was cock a hoop with the Wan-Bissaka assist (his first of the season, for the record). Cries of “Trent who?” and “this is England’s best right back” rang out all over social media. Trent v Wan-Bissaka is actually a thing, believe it or not. Granted, it’s only a thing on United Twitter and nobody else gives it the time of day, but if you don’t believe me just do a search and enjoy. You can thank me later. The jist of their ‘argument’ seems to be that Wan-Bissaka is a ‘proper’ full back who can defend, and if he can just improve a little going forward then he’ll therefore be miles better than our boy. Here’s the thing. I’ve had a theory on this type of thing for a while. If you’re a full back who is shit going forward (Wan-Bissaka, Eric Pieters, Paul Dummett etc) then the general consensus is that you must a boss defender. Conversely, full backs who specialise in going forward (Dani Alves, Trent, Digne, Marcelo etc) are all seen to be lacking defensively. In some cases it’s true but it also tends to be wildly exaggerated on both ends. Ashley Cole would be the most obvious example I suppose. Believe it or not, there are people (mostly Evertonians) that don’t think Robbo is a good defender. It’s very rare you get someone who is lauded for his play at both ends. Generally though it’s just lazy, stereotypical analysis. Good going forward = shite defender. Shite going forward = strong defensively. Yet this so called elite defender Wan-Bissaka gave away a stupid penalty at Watford with a wild lunge last week. I also remember him being embarrassed by Josh King for Bournemouth’s winner. There’s two howlers just off the top of my head and I don’t even watch them every week. So he’s not that great at defending, is he? And he gives you fuck all going the other way. Trent isn’t perfect defensively but he’s better than he’s given credit for (he’s been a mainstay of the best defence in Europe for the last two years) and he’s by far the best attacking right back in world football. Trying to compare Wan-Bissaka with him is laughable, but this is where United are right now. Always looking for these little ‘victories’ that they can claim because they’ve got fuck all else to shout about. I even saw one of their fan accounts tweeting the goal totals for Martial, Rashford and Greenwood compared with Salah, Firmino and Mané. The United trio have scored more, which apparently means something (even though half of those goals have come against farmers and plumbers in the Europa League). You can have your little ‘win’ there lads, good for you. We’ll just completely gloss over the fact that the rest of our team have scored shitloads more than the rest of yours and we aren’t completely reliant on three forward players. We’ll also completely gloss over the 24 point lead we’ve got over them with only half a season played. You sit there knocking one out to your one assist right back and your three strikers who are apparently better than Sadio, Mo and Bobby. Good for you, Man United fans. Good for you. *condescending pat on the head* Meanwhile, Chelsea lost at home to shite again. What a weird team. They won at Spurs but have recently been beaten at the Bridge by Bournemouth, West Ham and now Southampton. “This kind of inconsistency is what happens when you play youngsters”. Fuck off. It’s not like they’re sending out a side like we put out in the League Cup. They’ve got some boss young players (who are all well experienced from loans at other clubs) and a load of seasoned internationals like Azpilacueta, Willian, Kante, Jorginho and others. Their struggles at home have nothing to do with youth, it’s just one of those things that good (but not great) teams often have problems with. We’ve been there ourselves for most of the last 30 years. Chelsea can raise their game when they play the better sides and they look very good when it’s an open game and they have space to play in. When they face a defensive team and the onus is on them to make all the play and break them down, they struggle. If Lampard is the real deal he’ll figure it out. If he isn’t, he won’t. At the moment it’s too early to tell. Might be an idea to play Giroud in these type of games and look to get wide and get crosses in to him, because what they’re doing at the moment sure as hell isn’t working. It’s not like they’ve deserved to win any of those games. Southampton were well worth the win and have gotten themselves on a bit of a roll of late. Not before time. I’ve been saying for ages they shouldn’t be as shit as they have been because they have some good players there. They rested Ings for this one and his replacement, some cat named Obafemi (never heard of him before) scored the opening goal. Well taken it was too. Chelsea huffed and puffed but couldn’t find a breakthrough and Southampton added a second through Redmond. That was a fucking great goal. It felt like there were about 50 passes and the ball went all around the pitch and back before they worked it forward and played Redmond in. Seriously brilliant goal that. Across London, Spurs were lacklustre in a fortuitous win over Brighton. Kane thought he’d put them ahead only for VAR to rule it out for offside. Really close one but it was off. Brighton were then awarded a free-kick when that full back who looks like a pirate took a dive over a challenge from Winks. Definitely no contact, but Winks was booked which earned him a suspension, and Brighton scored from the free-kick when their centre half Webster thumped in a header. Kane equalised when he scored from a rebound after his initial shot had been saved, and Alli won it with a clever lobbed finish. Mourinho’s arrival doesn’t seem to have had any immediate impact. Spurs don’t really look much different and they’re leaking a lot of goals, which is surprising. The only obvious improvement is that Alli has decided to pick up the tools he downed 18 months ago. MOTD showed an incident where Kane went down holding his face after the faintest of contact from the arm of a defender. Lineker bemoaned how social media complains that they don’t look at incidents like that when they involve England’s golden boys like Kane and Sterling, so they would take a look at this one. The verdict? Murphy said “he got a whack”. Ian Wright said “everyone goes down for that kind of contact” and Lineker said “much ado about nothing”. He then added “Happy now?”. No, Gary. I’m not happy actually. Social media was clearly right. In future you may as well not bother if you’re going to just whitewash Kane’s cuntery like this. Next up, Palace and West Ham. Two dogshit teams, one of whom has been masquerading as something better. I keep saying that Palace are woeful and they keep fucking winning. It’s doing my head in. Mind you, everyone is beating West Ham these days. Things got so dire for them they eventually turned to Davie Moyes. More on that later though. My boy Snodgrass put the Hammers in front with a lovely finish but West Ham old boy Kouyate equalised. Palace won it when another West Ham old boy (I think, it may have been his brother who played for them?) Jordan Ayew scored a sensational individual goal in stoppage time. Beautiful goal that, great balance and technique. I see that Connor Wickham was playing for Palace. It’s funny, every time he plays I think the same thing “fucking hell, I’d forgotten all about him”. It’s because every time he plays he then disappears for ten months. I’ll be writing the same thing this time next year probably. Mark Noble completely lost his shit with Ogbonna and had to be held back by team-mates, including Antonio. If he’s holding you back then you’ve got no chance of getting anything done. I don’t know what Ogbonna did to incur Noble’s wrath but that’s not something you would normally see from Noble and it shows what a fucking mess West Ham are in at the moment. Another of the claret and blue sides, Aston Villa aren’t doing much better either, although they did scrape a rare win over Norwich. Hourihane broke the deadlock when he fired in after good work by Grealish. Norwich had missed loads of chances before that and they squandered a great one after it when Heaton pulled off a great save. I feel like Norwich are just really fucking unlucky you know. They’ve had loads of games where they deserved more than they got. I’m rooting for them, I want them to get out of it. Greasily is Villa’s one shining light and he knows it. “I love that the lads rely on me and I thrive off it”. Classic big fish in a small pond mentality that. He’s good but maybe he’s more of a Matt Le Tissier than a Jordan Henderson. Ancelotti got off to a winning start as Everton edged out Burnley in a game that was only marginally less shit than their draw with Arsenal a few days earlier. Calvert-Lewin scored again. He’s clearly shit, and most Blues even seem to think so, but somehow he’s finding the net nearly every week. He’s the new Darren Bent, only with tighter shorts. He was linked with Man United this week which would be the funniest transfer of all time if it happened. The likelihood is that it was just his agent putting it out there to get him a new contract, and it looks as though it worked too. I hate that big lump Chris Wood you know. The more I watch him the more I hate him. Nothing personal, it’s not like he comes across as a bad lad or anything. I just hate watching him as he’s a big yard dog. I saw him miss an easy header in this game and it infuriated me. It’s the one thing he’s meant to be good at. You have one job, you big useless fucking dope. That Dan Gosling jabroni put Bournemouth ahead at home to Arsenal but they couldn’t hang on and Aubamayeng equalised from close range. Callum Wilson thought he’d won it but he was just offside when he converted a rebound from a Harry Wilson shot. Arsenal are so fucking shit. Absolute bunch of losers. Arteta claimed they’re the biggest club in England it’s time they started acting like it. Another cunt who thinks nothing outside of London matters. How can anyone make that claim with a straight face? Mind you, he played for Everton and he coached at Man City, so the bitterness is strong in that one. Aubamayeng reportedly wants out in January. Of course he does. Who wouldn’t? He should never have signed for them to begin with though. Why would you leave Dortmund to join Arsenal? Money, that’s the only reason. Still, he couldn’t have imagined they’d be as bad as this. He’s got China written all over him I reckon. Watford’s improvement under Nigel Pearson continued as they picked up a battling point at Sheffield United. Deulefeu ran through to give them the lead but Will Hughes brought down Baldock and Norwood equalised from the spot. The Blades were the more likely winners but they came up against Ben Foster on one of those days he tends to have now and then where he looks like the best keeper to have ever played the game. Such a strange one him. I don’t think there’s anyone in the league who makes more incredible saves than him but he’s also prone to massive clangers. He’s the English Hugo Lloris. The day after Boxing Day saw a cracking game at Molyneux where Wolves came from 2-0 down to beat ten man Manchester City. This is almost too good to be true now, isn’t it? It wasn’t that long ago when City never lost any games, now they’ve lost five in their last 12 or something. It’s fucking great. This loss will have really hurt them because they put so much into it and for a while it looked like they were going to pull off a hugely impressive win against all the odds. Ederson was sent off early doors but they took the lead from the penalty spot soon after. It took over five minutes from when the incident took place to when the ball ended up in the net though. What a farce that was. Initially the referee didn’t give the penalty but VAR intervened and over-ruled him. A lot of people weren’t convinced but to me it’s a stonewall pen as the defender stands on the foot of Mahrez as he’s running. Definite pen, but let’s also make a point here of drawing attention to VAR benefitting City as it seems to have been lost on some people (most notably City’s fucking deluded conspiracy theorist fanbase). Sterling stepped up to take it and was denied by the keeper. Then VAR intervened again to rule that Conor Coady had encroached and because he cleared the ball, the kick needed to be retaken. Coady wasn’t in the box but he was in the ‘D’ and that’s not allowed. Even as a schoolkid I knew that, but as we’ve discovered over the last couple of days poor Conor struggles a little bit when it comes to understanding the rules of the game. So anyway, Sterling got another chance and this one was saved too. Not surprising at all to me, as honestly, he’s probably the last person in that Man City team I’d be letting anywhere near a penalty kick. I couldn’t believe they let him take it as despite the amount of goals he scores, his ball striking is shite. He scored from the rebound of course, as six yards out in front of an open goal is very much his comfort zone. In fairness his second goal was finished superbly. Good run, lovely linked finish over the keeper. 2-0 at half time and I stopped following it at that point as my phone battery was low, so I plugged it in in the kitchen and forgot all about it. I had a nice pleasant surprise when I checked the phone at full time! My boy Traore had gotten Wolves back in the game with a powerful blast from 20 yards into the bottom corner, and then he robbed the hopeless Mendy to put one on a plate for Jimenez to equalise. A draw would have been great, I’d have been made up with that, but it got even better when Doherty won it in the last minute by dancing around the traffic cone that is Otamendi and beating Bravo. There was still more drama as City were awarded a free-kick in the dying seconds and Sterling hit the bar with it. Defeat was probably harsh on them all things considered but they can’t defend so they keep losing games they normally never would have. Turn out the lights, the party’s over for Man City. Onto the next round of fixtures now. Leicester traveled to West Ham without Vardy and with Brendan making sweeping changes. Only Schmeichel and Evans kept their places and everyone else was rested. If West Ham were ever going to get a result to ease the pressure on Pellegrini then this was the time. And they couldn’t do it, the fucking bums. Leicester’s reserves got the win with goals from that Iheanacho cunt and Demarai Gray to stay in second place and maintain their lead over Man City. I had been hoping for a West Ham win to put Leicester even further back. I’m not actually worried about being caught by them but the bigger cushion we have the better. On the flip side, if they finish ahead of City then that will send Brendan’s ego soaring into another stratosphere and it will be a blow to Guardiola that might send him scuttling off back to Europe to look for another job where the deck is stacked in his favour. After all, ‘Pep’ doesn’t like competition. Don’t know why he doesn’t just go to PSG or Juventus and be done with it. West Ham reacted by ditching Pellegrini (an obvious call they should have made a while ago really) and bringing in Davey Moyes. It’s a mad one that, as he was there before and they didn’t want to keep him as they thought they could do better. Now they’ve gone crawling back. Moyes is seen as a joke figure by most people but I think he’s an obnoxious twat, just because of how arrogant and deluded he is. Look at these comments he made when he took the job: "They are getting a very experienced Premier League manager. I think there's only two or three managers with a better Premier League win record. That's what I do, I win. I'm here to get West Ham wins and get them away from the bottom three." I mean fucking hell, who talks about themselves like that? Mourinho maybe, but when you’d got a CV like his you can boast all you like. Yeah, it makes you look like a right big headed bastard, but no-one is actually going to dispute the validity of it. Moyes has won fuck all but acts like he’s God’s gift to footy management purely on the basis of the job he did at Everton. Ask Sunderland fans if they think he’s a winner. Or Real Sociedad fans. Or Man United fans. He’s lying his arse off as there are loads of managers with a better win record than him. If he had an ounce of humility or self awareness I wouldn’t have a problem with him, but such levels of arrogance from someone who has achieved so little just makes him an unlikeable prick. He’s like Tim Sherwood and Alan Pardew only without the fun aspect. Yeah, they’re both wankers but those two at least have a ‘wrestling heel’ persona about them. They know they’re twats and they play up to it. Moyes is just a charmless, dull, big headed bastard who doesn’t even know he’s a wanker. I really hope he takes them down. Anyway, moving on. Norwich’s bad luck continued as they fucking battered Spurs but ended up drawing after conceding a late equaliser. Vrancic (whoever the hell he is) put them ahead after Foyth was caught in possession. Norwich do that high press very well and they caused Spurs a lot of problems with it. My boy Pukki thought he’d made it 2-0 only to see it ruled out by VAR. It’s just bullshit this. Under the stupid fucking rules they have now, technically he is offside, but as I keep saying, look at the feet as that gives you a much better reflection of what ‘should’ be offside and what shouldn’t. His feet are well onside because he bent his run to get onside, but because he’s leaning forward as he’s sprinting, and the defender is standing more upright, his shoulder is an inch or two offside. In terms of the cruelest VAR offside calls we’ve seen, this might be number one. I just feel bad for Norwich as they deserved to win this game and morally that should not be offside. Morals have nothing to do with it though unfortunately. Eriksen’s free-kick drew Spurs level but an own goal from Aurier restored the Norwich lead. He’s shite that Aurier but there was nothing he could do about that. Didn’t stop social media from savaging him of course. Kane then went tumbling in the box to win a pen, which of course he buried with the minimum of fuss. Not everyone thought that was a penalty but as much as I’d like to accuse him of diving (again) I just think that was clever play. The defender launches himself into a tackle and slides right across him. To me, Kane is an idiot if he tries to avoid that. Spawn point for Spurs to go with the undeserved three they got against Brighton. Watford smashed Villa at Vicarage Road as my boy Troy enjoyed himself against the side he hates more than any other. He grew up a Birmingham fan and loves scoring against Villa. He reacted first to a loose ball to put the Hornets 1-0 up. Mariappa was then sent off for two quick yellows but it didn’t make any difference. Deeney won a pen and smashed it home to make it 2-0 and Sadio’s ‘shy boy’ Sarr added a third. Watford are off the bottom now and have a decent run of games coming up. Things are looking up for them it seems. Villa were unhappy that Watford didn’t put the ball out before the second goal as one of their players was on the floor with a pulled hamstring. Villa had the ball and could have put it out themselves, but Grealish tried to nutmeg a Watford player and gave it away. Deeney said “They lost the ball. Are we then supposed to put it out? It is what it is, we’re in a relegation battle, we’re not here to shake hands and be nice”. I agree with him, as I usually do because he talks a lot of sense. This is different to the Iheanacho thing the other week and Watford were within their rights to do what they did. They probably SHOULD have put it out, but when Grealish didn’t do it that gave them the justification to play on. When you watch the replay though Grealish has no idea his team-mate has gone down, but you can’t expect Watford players to be aware of that at the time. Villa also thought they should have had a free kick in the build up to the third when Grealish appeared to be caught late. The ref saw it and gave nothing so VAR didn’t want to over-rule and the replays suggest that Grealish made a meal of very little (if any) contact because he’d given the ball away. It’s immaterial anyway as Watford were well deserving of the win and should have scored more than they did. Dean Smith said as much to be fair. “I was frustrated with that (the non-foul on Grealish) but I was more frustrated with how my team played”. I like him. He’s the only thing about Villa that’s decent. Ancelotti’s winning start continued as the Blues went to Newcastle and won. They went in front when the ball broke kindly for Calvert-Lewin to finish from close range, but Carroll had the ball in the net after Almiron’s shot hit the post, only he was a yard offside. Didn’t need VAR to spot that one. Carroll then nodded one down for Schar to equalise but Calvert-Lewin restored Everton’s lead from a couple of yards. He almost fucked it up, completely missing his kick only for it to trickle over the line. Like I said, the new Darren Bent. Somehow Newcastle were denied a late penalty when Sidibe shoved Carroll in the back with two hands as he attacked a set-piece. How is VAR not giving that? I can understand why Lee Mason missed it because he’s shit, but when you can clearly see the defender shoving him with two hands in the back while Carroll is in the air, I just don’t know how you can not give that. Obviously I wanted Everton to lose but I’m fine with how this played out as their winning goal came right after the Geordies had been singing “Feed the Scousers”. Fucking have some of that you clueless, Tory enabling wankers. Speaking of which, you know how irrelevant the Mancs are now? I didn’t even know how they got on at Burnley until just now as I’m watching it on MOTD. That’s how irrelevant they are, I’m not even looking out for their scores as it means fuck all. For the record, they won 2-0 as Burnley followed Newcastle’s lead and gift wrapped the opening goal for Martial, before Rashford finished it off following a late counter attack. Brighton beat Bournemouth as Dom Solanke’s scoreless run stretched to 29 games. Some lad I’d never heard of put Brighton in front and then started crying because it was his first goal. Dread to think what Solanke will do if and when he ever scores, but chances are it’s going to be NSFW. Dan Burn had a goal ruled out for another one of those comical offsides. His chest was maybe an inch ahead of the defender’s chest. It’s so shit this isn’t it? It didn’t cost Brighton because my former boy Mooy made it 2-0 and gave them three valuable points. There was another of those infuriating disallowed offside goals as Palace had one ruled out purely on the basis that Zaha has bigger feet than the defender. Tomkins did put them in front with a powerful header but Ings seized on a terrible pass from Martin Kelly to equalise. He nearly won it with a sharp near post header that was well saved. That Palace keeper is sneaky good. No-one ever talks about him but he’s boss on the sly. He made three great saves in this one to earn them a point. Not a bad result for either side though. Sunday’s game at the Emirates that saw Chelsea do what Chelsea do, and Arsenal do what Arsenal do. The Gunners murdered Chelsea early on and deservedly led through an Aubameyeng goal. Lampard saw what was going wrong and made a change before half time, bringing on Jorginho to give them an extra body in midfield. That made a big difference but Arsenal still led at half time. I said to my Dad as we were on our way to Anfield though that there is zero chance of Arsenal holding onto it and they’d probably lose but might just sneak a draw. I’m generally shite at predictions and I never bother betting on games because it would be a complete waste of time. One thing I do know though is that Arsenal are fucking spineless and shit. They conceded twice in the final seven minutes, the absolute shithouses. The normally reliable Leno completely flapped at a cross and left Jorginho with an open goal for the equaliser, and then they got done on the counter attack with the kind of goal they’ve specialised in conceding over recent years. Really well executed from Chelsea’s point of view and it was nice play between Kevin Abraham and Willian, but Arsenal do this so often. Every time they attack they look like they’ll concede. Chelsea brought on a kid at right back who I’ve mentioned in the diary a few times as I’ve seen him playing against our Academy sides and he’s fucking brilliant. Tariq Lamptey is his name, defo one to keep an eye on as he looks dynamite. Now that their ban has been lifted all these kids will be up for grabs in a year or so. Finally, ManchesVAR City (not as catchy as LiVARpool but I’m making a point here) edged out Sheffield United at the Etihad to end the Blades long unbeaten away record. It could have been so different though if Mousset’s goal at 0-0 had been allowed to stand. Again, he was off by about an inch. It was goalless at half time which shows just how tough Sheffield United are to play against. They were the better team in that half and Mousset missed a sitter before his disallowed ‘goal’ and another great chance after it. It’s just so easy to get in behind City these days. City eventually took the lead in controversial circumstances when the referee obstructed Fleck causing him to lose the ball to De Bruyne who sent Aguero in for the finish. If the ball had touched the official he would have had to blow the whistle and award a drop ball, but he dummied it so he was able to play on. The ref was Chris Kavanagh, from Manchester. Just sayin’. I think that’s everything covered now but it’s been so mad over the last week that if I’ve missed any games then I’m not going to apologise because it’s New Year’s Eve and I’ve spent all day watching three episodes of MOTD and writing this, so just be grateful for what you have. Only messing, Happy New Year. I love you all.