Refereeing and various social events kept viewing to a
minimum this weekend. I will rely on the
kindness of others to fill in the gaps.
Swansea 2 Newcastle 2
A match of contradictions.
Swansea easily carved up the Newcastle central defense multiple times;
only Tim Krul's acrobatics and maybe some luck limited the Swans to just the
two goals. Newcastle's vaunted 4-2-3-1
was as punchless as ever. As I watched,
I couldn't help but start to wonder what it would be like to root for a real
EPL squad.
And yet, the score was 1-1 at half, thanks to great work in
the corner by Gabriel Obertan and a redirection of the
So where are we? I
mean besides 18th in the table. Still no
wins but there have been at least three draws that were surely losses last
year. Will Pardew give up on the lone
striker formation? The draw certainly
took the pressure off him for a few weeks but a loss at home vs Leicester will
put it right back on him. Of the new
personnel, Janmaat (who is, of course, now hurt) and Colback have been pretty
much as advertised. Riviere has yet to
show anything. Cabella has been less
than I expected, and got a seat on the bench in favor of Obertan last
Saturday. And de Jong has logged little
time due to injuries. I'd say where we
are is a big fat question mark.
Here's another take, comparing results in last year's
fixtures to same fixtures this year:
Match 2013-14 2014-15 Differential
Man City (H) 0-2 0-2 0
Aston Villa (A) 2-1 0-0 -2
Crystal Palace (H) 1-0 3-3 -2
Southampton (A) 0-4 0-4 0
Hull City (H) 2-3 2-2 +1
Stoke City (A) 0-1 0-1 0
Swansea (A) 0-3 2-2 +1
Total points 6 4 -2
Surprisingly, three have the exact same results (Man City,
Southampton and Stoke). In two cases -
Aston Villa and Crystal Palace - wins last year have been replaced with
draws. But in two other cases, Hull City
and Swansea, draws have replaced losses.
So the net change for the same fixtures is only -2 points. For some reason, this does not fill me with
confidence, probably because last year included big upsets of Chelsea,
Tottenham and Man United that don't seem too likely this time around.
Lastly, Newcastle fans can be tough but they do have a sense of humor. Witness the banner on display at Swansea:
Manchester United 2 Everton 1
A marvelous match for the neutrals. And the Red Devils faithful. Goals by DiMaria and Falcao. Tremendous saves by De Gea, including one on the Baines PK (Leighton was 14-14 in EPL on PKs but is now 14-15). Quality midfield play from Blind and Mata. Ruh roh, have Manchester United righted their
ship? Don't look now but they are in
fourth place. Naismith's goal for
Everton was pretty cool but I want to make Falcao's this week's YouTubeable Moment for two reasons. First, it's great work by Falcao to steer that "pass" past Howard; pass is in quotes because I'm not sure that was DiMaria's intent (Dennis: it was 100% a shot - have you ever seen someone wind up for a pass like that? Steve: You obviously haven't seen me play recently). Second, it provides a perfect example of another of my pet peeves - no fewer than four defenders raised their arms to call offsides on the play. To me it's like saying "I'm raising my arm because I have been badly beaten on this play and my only hope is for the AR to save my ass with an offsides call." In this particular case it's close but I believe the AR got it right.
Chelsea 2 Arsenal 0
Right now Chelsea look to be a formidable combination of good and nasty. Like the Man City - Chelsea match, referee Martin Atkinson wanted to let them play but quickly had to reverse course and started handing out yellows - seven in all by my count. It was amazing the match ended with 22 players on the pitch. One of those was not Thibaut Courtois, who collided with Alexis Sanchez, stayed in for a little, then left because he was bleeding from his ear. What a wimp...Nice that your backup keeper is Petr Cech. Even the managers got into it a bit, with Wenger shoving Mourinho after a hard challenge on one of his players.
The score does not flatter Chelsea. They seemed in command the entire match. The second goal was a thing of beauty - a perfect long pass by Fabregas spotting the run by Costa, who chested the ball gently into his path and calmly flicked the ball overSzczny's, Scynesy's, Szyzczny's the Arsenal keeper's head. Obviously, we have a long way to go but right now only Man City seem even close to be able to play with Chelsea.
Aston Villa 0 Manchester City 2
This was a classic Aston Villa performance....from last season. We had fairly poor possession (though it was better than a typical match from a year ago), almost no offensive chances, and appeared to be satisfied with a draw after 30 or so minutes. The defense held on for 80 minutes but eventually relented. You may recall a comment I made after the Liverpool game - " I have a feeling that the new-look Chelsea would have managed at least one goal given the same 81 minutes." That sentiment also applies to Manchester City who will almost never be held scoreless given 90, or even just 45, minutes of pure offense.
One bright spot was the return of Christian Benteke. His impact in this game was negligible and he only had a handful of touches on the ball, but it can't hurt to have him back. It was somewhat disconcerting to see Villa immediately revert to the "kick it long and let Benteke do all of the work" strategy of the past (Steve: Everton seems to have the same issue with Lukaku - maybe you can compare notes as Everton is AVL's next opponent). That did not work for us last season and it is not a long term recipe for success. I am hopeful they can deploy Benteke with a little more intelligence, a little less brute force, and maybe even with a little help up top. Given that he was far and away the leading scorer for Villa last season - he had 10 league goals with the two closest players tied at 5 - he should at least re-energize a side that could use something besides a goalless loss. The Villans are still in fine shape at 10th in the table and all hope is certainly not lost, but we could really use a little boost.
Around the League
Chelsea 2 Arsenal 0
Right now Chelsea look to be a formidable combination of good and nasty. Like the Man City - Chelsea match, referee Martin Atkinson wanted to let them play but quickly had to reverse course and started handing out yellows - seven in all by my count. It was amazing the match ended with 22 players on the pitch. One of those was not Thibaut Courtois, who collided with Alexis Sanchez, stayed in for a little, then left because he was bleeding from his ear. What a wimp...Nice that your backup keeper is Petr Cech. Even the managers got into it a bit, with Wenger shoving Mourinho after a hard challenge on one of his players.
The score does not flatter Chelsea. They seemed in command the entire match. The second goal was a thing of beauty - a perfect long pass by Fabregas spotting the run by Costa, who chested the ball gently into his path and calmly flicked the ball over
Aston Villa 0 Manchester City 2
This was a classic Aston Villa performance....from last season. We had fairly poor possession (though it was better than a typical match from a year ago), almost no offensive chances, and appeared to be satisfied with a draw after 30 or so minutes. The defense held on for 80 minutes but eventually relented. You may recall a comment I made after the Liverpool game - " I have a feeling that the new-look Chelsea would have managed at least one goal given the same 81 minutes." That sentiment also applies to Manchester City who will almost never be held scoreless given 90, or even just 45, minutes of pure offense.
One bright spot was the return of Christian Benteke. His impact in this game was negligible and he only had a handful of touches on the ball, but it can't hurt to have him back. It was somewhat disconcerting to see Villa immediately revert to the "kick it long and let Benteke do all of the work" strategy of the past (Steve: Everton seems to have the same issue with Lukaku - maybe you can compare notes as Everton is AVL's next opponent). That did not work for us last season and it is not a long term recipe for success. I am hopeful they can deploy Benteke with a little more intelligence, a little less brute force, and maybe even with a little help up top. Given that he was far and away the leading scorer for Villa last season - he had 10 league goals with the two closest players tied at 5 - he should at least re-energize a side that could use something besides a goalless loss. The Villans are still in fine shape at 10th in the table and all hope is certainly not lost, but we could really use a little boost.
Around the League
Spurs fans should be happy with the 1-0 win over a quality Southampton side. And a somewhat shorthanded Liverpool got by West Brom 2-1.
Let's not forgot about Leicester and Burnley who played an incredibly exciting 2-2 draw, capped off by an excellent 95th minute free-kick by Burnley's Ross Wallace. The Leicester Foxes play some of the most exciting, aggressive football I have seen in the EPL in some time. Granted it is not always the prettiest - "You can really tell the difference in quality" was a comment made while watching the match - but so far, all of their matches have been fun to watch (Steve: sounds like the kind of team that will give Newcastle fits when they meet next week).
International Break
The EPL is off this weekend as there are Euro Qualifiers and other international matches of various import. By the time you read this, the US-Ecuador friendly scheduled for Friday at 7 pm will be in the books. The match itself is of no consequence but it will mark Landon Donovan's final USMNT appearance, which is reason enough for me to tune in.
The Union have a critical match on Saturday at 7 pm as they face the Columbus Crew at home. The last minute draw vs Chicago makes this absolutely a must win. In fact, the Union could be eliminated from playoff contention with the right (wrong?) combination of results this weekend. I found the Inquirer headline regarding MacMath's return to the starting line up for this match to be misleading. It almost sounded like he was getting the start over Mbolhi, who of course had that awful turnover that led to the tying goal last Thursday. Not so, Mbolhi is on international duty so MacMath gets the start in his place.
So it will be a relatively quiet weekend, giving us a chance to rake leaves, take out air conditioners, and otherwise re-enter the real world, if only for a few days.
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