Pining for Mid-table Mediocrity

Despite Newcastle’s dreadful run, I hadn’t been all that concerned about relegation until this weekend.  The oblivion of mid-table would be quite comforting now.

Saturday’s match versus Swansea started out well enough,with Ayoze Perez netting his first goal in ages in the 20th minute.  The best part was that it wasn’t against the run of play.  But the euphoria didn’t even last until halftime.  As he did all season for my Chester Blues, Gylfi Sigurdsson lofted a perfect corner that was converted by Nelson Oliveira for the equalizer in first half stoppage time. Sigurdsson (left) continued to torment me with an early second half goal. Jack Cork’s goal at 71 minutes seemed to put things out of reach.  The Magpies were at least able to make the finish interesting when Siem de Jong (this summer’s marquee acquisition who has missed most of the season with a thigh injury then a collapsed lung) scored in the 88^th minute but in the end, it was a 2-3 loss.  

With the results at the bottom of the table this weekend, the threat of relegation is a little too real at this point.  The Toon Army was well aware of this and staged a sort of protest during the 34th minute (chosen based on the 34 million supposedly unspent in the Newcastle coffers), showing owner Mike Ashley the red card.  Sissoko and maybe Dummett are back this weekend, and Cisse returns the following weekend so maybe things won't end too badly.  And, the run-in fixtures are Leicester, West Bromwich, QPR and West Ham; if there’s not a point or three in those, Newcastle deserve to be relegated. 

Drama at the Bottom of the Table

The Burnley-Leicester match was a bit of a bust, but Leicester and their fans probably don’t give a sh hoot because the 1-0 win took them clear of the bottom three.  For Burnley, the season may have turned on a 60 second span in which they missed a PK, then allowed a goal at the other end.  Hull City, who had looked absolutely bound for the Championship division, scored a mild upset over Crystal Palace, then doubled down with a bigger win over Liverpool on Tuesday night; they now sit in 15^th , four points clear of relegation.  Even Sunderland (1-1 draw with Stoke) and QPR (0-0 draw with West Ham) picked up points.  Aston Villa were not so lucky, as Dennis will describe below.

Well, when you do THIS (alternate angle HERE) in the opening 5 minutes, your chances to win go down considerably.  Given their recent form, Villa started this match uncharacteristically sloppy and were honestly lucky to only be down 1 after 25 minutes.  They slowly grew into the match and began to resemble the side I've gotten used to for the past month.  City doubled their lead halfway through the second half on a decent free kick, but one that should have been stopped by the wall.  Kieran Richardson was just kind of hanging out just off the end of the wall and when Kolarov hit the free kick, Richardson actually ducked away from the wall and let the ball sneak in the near post.  Look, if you don't want to be in the wall, then go mark someone, but don't half-ass being in a wall - all you have to do is stand their and cover yourself! 

Villa answered almost immediately on a goal that should have been called offsides on Benteke (which  would have been the 7,457th time this match he was called offside) and actually managed to deservedly even the score at 2 in the 85th minute.  But a bonus point was not meant to be as more sloppy defending on a City corner allowed them to reclaim all three points.  Take off the first and last 5 minutes of this match and Villa looked great, but a good 80 minutes doesn't put points on the board.  I wasn't counting on these points, but losing one so late hurts, especially when everyone else keeps creeping up.  Their remaining fixtures are fairly tough and I will certainly be sweating watching the other relevant matches.  It's going to be a hell of a ride the next four weeks and just like Villa, I'm not sure I'll make it through. 

So things are still really tight, with nine points separating 14^th from 20^th.  I was going to link to a Sky Bet relegation predictor but I have found at least two mistakes in it; they have West Brom with 36, not 37 points and they ignore that somebody has to pick up points in the Newcastle-West Brom match (though with the recent form of both clubs you can maybe understand how they missed that).  Working on old-fashioned paper, I did find a couple of scenarios in which 38 points is not enough but they involve things like Sunderland beating Arsenal and Chelsea in the space of five days.  I’ve also found some scenarios in which 32 will keep you up.

Less Drama at the Top

The first half of Arsenal-Chelsea was riveting, and not just for the controversial choices referee Michael Oliver had to make.  For my two cents, Oliver should have awarded a PK and issued yellow to Ospina for his foul on Oscar, should have made no call on the Fabregas incident in the box (yellow to Cesc for simulation was a bit harsh because there was minimal contact - though he really didn't argue and almost seemed to be saying, yeah, you caught me acting), and got the no call for handling on Cahill correct.  The second half wasn’t quite as open and the 0-0 draw basically ends the title race.

Despite a 3-0 thumping by Everton, Manchester United is probably still safe for a Champions League spot thanks to a 2-2 draw between Southampton and Tottenham (for me the most enjoyable match of the weekend to watch) and Liverpool’s 0-0 with West Brom followed by a loss to Hull.  Barring an Aston Villa win in the FA Cup final, Tottenham, Southampton and Liverpool will be the Europa League entrants from the EPL.  The tricky part is that the final is after the season ends so the three teams will need to assume they’re fighting for two spots (or possibly tanking for one).

Union Not Getting Better

Actually, they’re getting worse, as evidenced by the 4-1 thumping at the hands of the Columbus Crew.  The franchise appears directionless, with no plan for development/improvement.  The good news is that I’ll be at PPL to witness the carnage up close as they take on Toronto.

Chester Season Wrap-up

We did manage a draw on the final day with Manchester United.  Unfortunately Aston Villa and Liverpool both won so we finished 6^th.  Still, not bad at all for a club that a few short years ago was playing in the 5^th division.  Michael B and Dennis will be quick to point out that this is indeed fantasy football as Tottenham was third and Aston Villa fourth (I almost made this comment at the beginning of the paragraph, but decided to read until the end before I said anything...).

Preparing now for the summer transfer window.  We got over $24 million for finishing 6^th so I’m hoping ownership will spring for a transfer budget north of $20 million and a salary budget of over $300k a week.  If that doesn’t happen, my decision to turn down the Everton job will, in retrospect, be unfortunate.

Matches with Consequences

We start early Saturday (7:45 am) with Newcastle at Leicester; the Foxes were brought back to earth with a 1-3 mid-week defeat by Chelsea but still seem to have plenty of fight.  Newcastle get some reinforcements but will they be enough?  The 10 am matches include Aston Villa hosting Everton (don’t like the Villans' odds in this one against a surging Everton side), QPR at Liverpool (would have said mark this down as a defeat for the Rangers but Liverpool’s recent indifference makes me wonder), Sunderland hosting Southampton (the Saints should prevail) and Burnley traveling to London to face West Ham (who knows?).

Sunday at 11 sees Tottenham hosting Man City; pretty much the last chance for Spurs to challenge for a Champions League spot, plus a loss could likely leave them third in the race for the Europa League spots.  The other Sunday match is Arsenal at Hull; relegation candidates would prefer the Gunners take care of business here, thank you very much.

Don't forget first legs of Champions League semis are Tuesday and Wednesday.