mike23

I'd have probably settled for 2-2 at half time, but to turn it around and then just throw it away again leaves it just feeling like yet another miserable result. The equalizer always looked like it was coming too. Season just seems to be a write off to me now. There's just so much wrong that I don't know how it all gets fixed. We look like a team that has come to the end of a cycle and needs a complete rebuild. I can see us missing out on top 4. We've picked a really shit year to do this. Last year Spurs, Arsenal, and United were all so flawed that the race for top 4 was like a bunch of bald men arguing over a comb. We could have dropped off massively and still probably made top 4 easily. This year Arsenal and Spurs look much better, and even United are starting to resemble a functioning football team. It's too large a sample size not to be worried now and none of the problems seem to be getting fixed. Time after time we just seem to get easily sliced open defensively, and the worrying thing is we've still not played anyone especially good in the league. I can see a few games against top 4 rivals ending up like the Napoli game if we don't sort things out quickly. We've been spoilt in the last few years so I'm going to try and keep some sort of perspective and tell myself it's just football and that there will always be ups and downs.

Just had a look at my goals accumulator and discovered it missed out by 1 game as well. Nil bloody nil between Sunderland and Preston. Football can be really shit at times.

I doubt we're even getting top 4. Turned it around but never looked even remotely secure defensively and the equalizer was no surprise at all. Trent was an absolute embarrassment defensively. Everything they created came from him failing to track runs or just getting skinned time after time. Utter crap from van Dijk yet again on the equalizer as well. A win would have just papered over the massive cracks.

Good to see the break really helped us to sort out all our problems. What an absolute shambles. Could have been an even worse scoreline after 20 minutes but for Alisson. Every single outfield player has varied between mediocre and utter shite. Trent wins the award for being the worst of the lot.

It is a bit of both in that the others are also looking a lot better than usual. Brentford and Palace away are the sort of fixtures that Arsenal seemed to regularly slip up in and yet it's looking like 6 points out of 6 for them from these fixtures this year. I agree that Jesus looks a good signing for them. Saliba looks like a decent signing too. If we sort ourselves out and find anything even close to the form of recent seasons then we still finish above them, but it no longer looks the formality it once did.

This season is really starting to do my head in. We're obviously struggling and there's not even any of the light relief that Spurs or Arsenal have provided for the last few seasons. Even United have put together a winning streak - which we started. It's still early days and surely these teams will have some of their customary slip ups at some point, but so far they keep winning the sort of fixtures they've tended to regularly struggle in during recent years.

I hadn't even realized there was an international break coming up as well. I don't know why I should be surprised but I didn't think even FIFA would be ridiculous enough to insist on a load of pointless friendlies and Nations League matches in a season they'd already ruined by sticking a world cup in the middle of it.

Decent first half and we were unlucky to go in all level. A scrappy and at times sloppy second half but we kept going and certainly deserved the winner. Matip and Thiago were both excellent. It wasn't amazing but it was much better than everything else this season bar the Bournemouth game and it may end up being a really crucial result. That ref tonight was something else. Constantly blowing up for fair challenges from our players and yet okay with one of their defenders just outright wrestling with Salah at one point. Onwards and upwards. God knows where we fit the postponed games in from last weekend and this weekend coming, but the postponements might at least help us gradually sort our form out and turn this complete mess of a start to the season around. How come Rangers and Napoli are playing tomorrow rather than tonight?

Some encouraging signs. We've looked a lot better with Thiago and Matip back. Not sure what Trent is doing on the goal again though. Another 45 minutes like that and we surely find a way to win this.

Agreed. I thought he was playing pretty well in the first half up until he messed up for the third goal. There seemed to be a lot more care with his overall passing and a couple of the balls he played for Mo would have produced goals had Mo been in any sort of form. The second half was rather hit and miss though and he was back to misplacing passes or trying to force things that never really looked on. He still managed a lovely cross near the end, though; unfortunately no one in the middle really seemed to react to it.

It's hard to escape the feeling that we completely messed up the preseason work. Just so slow and lethargic in every game with other teams doing to us what we always did to them. Even the best teams will struggle from time to time, even the best players will have dips in form, but I'm really struggling to get my head around how a team who always outworked almost every team they played are suddenly getting outworked in virtually every game. When they couldn't cope with the intensity of the laziest team in the league at Old Trafford it raised some serious concerns and none of the games since have alleviated those concerns at all.

There were times in the first half where I actually thought we played some nice stuff and looked pretty good going forward. Had Mo not completely miscontrolled a lovely pass by Trent when he was completely free at the back post then we might have got back level and it could have been a different story. Individual errors contributed massively to each of the 3 goals. You've got to think those aren't going to happen every game. I'm not sure why Milner would have his arm out like that for the penalty. Gomez was caught out for the second (although they still had a lot to do after that and it was pretty alarming how such a basic bit of play seemed to just slice us open) and then Trent was really bad on the third. By the same token, they also missed a penalty and came very close a few other times so it could have been even worst. The second half was at least better and hopefully the return of Matip and Thiago will help us. I'm just not sure how much we can take from it, though, as Napoli were content to just sit on their lead. Hopefully this is the lowest point and becomes the turning point for the season. The trouble is that I keep thinking we'll look better in the next game and it just isn't happening. We've produced poor performances and struggled against mediocre teams. Tonight was just more of the same but against a much better team who were able to take full advantage of our current inadequacies. I just can't believe how many times this team can start games so slowly. It's like they have to go a goal down before they even start playing.

Diaz did well, Thiago looked good when he came on, Matip was a lot better than the rest of the defenders, Alisson was pretty blameless, Elliot did his best and needs more help from the senior players, and the other substitutes couldn't really be blamed (although Nunez really isn't looking good). Everyone else was awful. Milner is looking his age. Fabinho is looking Milner's age. I'm starting to think the real van Dijk was abducted by aliens in the summer and replaced by an inferior clone. Gomez was dozy as hell. Mo looks like he's forgotten how to play football. Trent did produce some nice moments but he was also woeful for the third goal and there were also a lot of the overhit and underhit passes we've been seeing all season. Robertson needs to be dropped for Tsmikas for a while. What an absolute clusterfuck of a start to the season. I've no idea what's wrong or how it can be fixed but unless it's sorted soon then we'll be out of the champions league as well as the title race. Ajax will rip us apart at Anfield if we produce another display like that. It's embarrassing how easy we are to score against at the moment.

Complete embarrassment of a performance. What the fuck is up with most of these players this season? Absolute shite game after game. Second to every loose ball, miscontrolling simple passes, constantly looking like they're running through treacle. There was no danger whatsoever in the build up to the second and third goals and then Gomez (just 1 minute after being lucky to get away with another dozy moment) and then Trent contrived to somehow gift them easy goals. Why would an experienced pro like Milner have his arm out like that for the first penalty? I've seen people saying van Dijk is not reaching his usual standards but is still playing well by the standards of others. I think even that's being generous. He just looks like a poor player at the moment. I'd have been embarrassed had my first touch been as bad as Mo's was at times in that half. I don't know what's gone wrong this season and how we've fallen so far from grace so quickly. I have no idea how it gets fixed either as there doesn't seem to be one single thing we're doing well at the moment or one senior player who doesn't look like a complete shadow of themselves.

Good point on their left back flopping over every time. The refs appear to have this directive to let more go this season, but it seems to be entirely in relation to challenges from midfielders and defenders. Whenever a forward challenges for the ball in a dangerous area the defenders still seem to get a cheap freekick every single time they go to ground. Time after time forwards are getting penalized for nothing challenges in and around the area that would never result in freekicks or penalties were it the other way around.

It wasn't really that much of a surprise. Everton don't beat us very often (bit of an understatement) but we've had far too many draws at Goodison in recent years. We started and finished the first half well and made a really bright start to the second half. But then there was a really ropey spell where we were fortunate not to concede. The goal looked offside as soon as I saw the replay, but I thought that at Old Trafford the other week as well so it was a relief when it was confirmed. We might not have got a match report this week had it stood as I could have imagined Dave spontaneously combusting with rage had Coady scored a derby winner. We came on strong again at the end but it wasn't to be. Fair play to Everton. They actually had a go and didn't just spend the whole game timewasting like I was expecting. I can't really fault the effort. Everyone is trying but there's just too many players out of form at the moment and everything is a struggle. It was like most of the other performances so far. There were times when it was looking like we were clicking into gear and starting to look like the team from last season, but we could never sustain it for any period of time. We had more than enough chances to score. We didn't get much luck, hitting the woodwork 3 times and Pickford producing some decent saves, but the frustrating trend of us needing way too many chances to score continues. Mo was really starting to do my head in in truth. And we could easily have lost the game too but for Alisson and some wayward finishing from Everton. I fancied us to win the league this year so this start has been a major disappointment. I think we're just in a race for top 4 now and the only real hope of glory is another go at the champions league.

Barcelona also somehow seem to have got a fee and a player from Chelsea in return for Aubameyang - a player Arsenal were struggling to give away back in January. I'm starting to wonder if Chelsea's new owner has been set some Brewster's Millions type challenge to spend a certain amount of money before the transfer deadline.

Shades of January 2021. They only finally acted then when Matip got injured near the end of the transfer window even though they should have had signings ready to come in on 1st January. And just like then they also seem to be looking for the cheapest solution possible.

There was a proposal that games should be shorter but that the clock should be stopped every time the ball is out of play and only started again once play resumes. I'm starting to think it's a good idea because refs seem to be genuinely hopeless on clamping down on timewasting and adding on the correct amount of lost time. I'm genuinely sick to death of seeing keepers being allowed to take the best part of a minute over a goal kick. Unfortunately it's a tactic generally employed by shit teams and as the media love upsets they're not going to complain about any tactics that might help increase the chances of an upset occurring. If it carries on like this though the premier league will surely have to do something because it's making some games completely unwatchable. It would be interesting to know how much time the ball was actually in play out of the 98 minutes tonight.

It always takes 1 big moment to turn things around for teams when they're struggling. Maybe that will be the moment for us. Quality play from both Salah and Firmino to combine for the equalizer and it came after a spell of a few minutes when we finally seemed to be finding ways to unlock their defence. But it all reverted to being a lot of huff and puff with few signs of a winner coming after that. Credit to the ref for adding on the right amount of time at the end and it seemed poetic justice for a team who had been timewasting all night to lose to a 98th minute goal. Great finish from Carvalho. Him and Elliot have been the 2 positives from this difficult start. Still a lot of senior players looking short of form and confidence. It says a lot about the form of both Trent and Robertson that Jurgen took them both off with 20 minutes to go in a game when we desperately needed a goal. We can look forward to the timewasting being ramped up even more at Goodison on Saturday. We sure would make it a lot easier on ourselves if we didn't concede the first goal again in that game. There was still a lot wrong with tonight's performance but credit to the players for keeping going until the end and getting the result through sheer will of effort.

Utter shite. Compare the effort Newcastle defenders are putting in to block everything compared to all our defenders just standing around like statues for their goal. Saturday fixed nothing. Starting to think even top 4 is unlikely. Arsenal and Spurs are both flying and we look like a really shit tribute act of the team from the last few years. Fail to turn this around and win and we're in full blown crisis.

Lloris to be booked for it in around the 87th-88th minute if Spurs still have a narrow lead at that point.

Great stuff. Everyone was excellent. Let's build on it and go on a run now.

I missed the first 2 goals due to struggling to find a working stream. Some really nice goals and general play since. |I'd have been happy with any sort of win today just to get us going but this should be a nice confidence boost for everyone. Maybe a chance to rest a few players in the second half even with the lack of options on the bench.

The timekeeping - or lack of it - in football really does my head in. 6 minutes injury time are held up, United make a substitution a minute later so at least another 30 seconds should be added on, yet the ref blows up on 6 minutes and 15 seconds. It's not like Southampton were going to go the length of the pitch in that time and score but it's just such a basic thing to get right. Then again, they managed to miss a United player handballing it twice in the same move so I'm not sure why I'm expecting competence.