Long List of Co-conspirators

Many sets of fingerprints were lifted from the scene of the crime - Saint James' Park, where Newcastle lost 1-2 to Liverpool despite playing a man up for over an hour.  The Union played well in DC on Saturday but then committed many of the same crimes Newcastle did Wednesday in Toronto.

Indictments Unsealed in Newcastle Case

Bailiff, read the charges.

On the afternoon of 8/27/23, in the course of losing 1-2 to Liverpool, Newcastle players, individually or collectively, committed the following offenses:

- failure to protect a 1-0 lead despite having a man advantage starting in the 28th minute

- after coughing up the lead in the 81st minute, failure to protect the 1-1 draw despite still having the man advantage

- two counts of defensive malfeasance that led directly to Liverpool goals by co-conspirators Nos. 4 and 33 [Botman and Burn]

- one count recklessly endangering a teammate with an ill-advised back pass by co-conspirator No. 39 [Guimaraes]

- two counts of failure to put a wide open shot on frame by co-conspirator No. 24 [Almiron]

- one count accessory to squandering a lead by failing to find the right mix of tactics, personnel and mentality by co-conspirator unnumbered [Eddie Howe]

Darwin Nunez ensures survival of the fittest
Photo: Ian MacNicol/Getty Images

The facts of the case:

1. Newcastle were playing well and had built a 1-0 lead on a good finish by Anthony Gordon

2. At 28 minutes, Newcastle were the beneficiary of a red card for DOGSO by Virgil van Dijk.  (That case will be adjudicated in a different court.)

3. In the following minutes, Newcastle were the better side and only a great save by Alisson on an Almiron rocket kept the score 1-0.

4. At or around 40 minutes, Newcastle attacking diminished

5. In the second half, Newcastle were tentative and at times outplayed.  They did manage some shots but they went into the stands or Alisson's midsection

6. Eventually, a defensive miscue by Botman sprung Darwin Nunez in on Nick Pope and he found the corner of the net in the 81st minute.

7.  Liverpool continued to press their disadvantage and a second error, this time by Burn, allowed Nunez to repeat his earlier effort for a second goal.

Good luck finding an impartial jury in Newcastle.  Seriously this was awful.  The only good thing about it is...nothing.  

What's the Point?

As you know, we are thrilled with the new EPL policy of yellows for being a dick.  John Brooks appropriately applied it to Trent Alexander-Arnold early in the match for a petulant toss of the ball at Gordon.  Except, minutes later, when Alexander-Arnold committed a tactical foul on a breakaway, he didn't show a second yellow.  Well, if you're going to use the yellow for time wasting or whatever as an excuse to "raise the standard" for the second yellow, you've defeated the purpose.  Jim Beglin's attempted lame defense that it wasn't serious enough to warrant a yellow fell apart when, on cross examination, he readily conceded that Alexander-Arnold would have been shown a yellow for the offense if it didn't already have a yellow.

Any One of Them Would Have Been Fine

We made a big deal about how Everton - Wolves was the clear choice for 10 am viewing last Saturday.  We were right that it was an excellent match, as good a 1-0 game as you'll see.  Wolves came away with all three points courtesy of a late goal but the Player of the Match had to be "No Way" Jose Sa, who had several fine saves, including this YouTubeableMoment of a stop.  It's just that every other match in that time slot - all of which we had pre-panned - was also good, perhaps better.  

Man United spotted Nottingham Forest two goals in the first five mintues and spent the rest of the afternoon catching up.  Which they did, eventually winning the match 3-2.  They were undoubtedly aided by Worrall's red card in the 67th minute.  In one London Derby, Brentford and Crystal Palace battled to a 1-1 draw, with Palace scoring late to grab a point.  In the other, Arsenal spent much of the match down 0-1 to Fulham, then scored twice in the span of two minutes to take the lead, only to cough it up on corner in the 87th minute.  This with Fulham a man down no less.  Yes, it was all good.

Two goals from Matty - A stash of Cash?
Photo: Getty Images

Elsewhere, results went largely to form.  Chelsea handled Luton Town 3-0, Spurs beat Bournemouth 2-0.  Man City had a scare against Sheffield United.  Surprisingly this was 0-0 until Haaland scored in the 63rd minute.  More surprising was Bogle's equalizer at 85 minutes.  City did have the last laugh though as Rodri got the game winner at 88 minutes.  Maybe West Ham 3-1 over Brighton is a bit of an upset. Check out the Hammers' goals here; that's some fine finishing by Ward-Prowse, Bowen and Antonio.  Lastly, Aston Villa did just fine at Turf Moor, besting Burnley 3-1 without anyone getting hurt.  At least during the match.  Martinez hurt himself in practice but fortunately, Olsen is a decent back up.  Matty Cash had two for the Villans

Get the Eff Up

Fulham were furious that Arsenal's second goal came with one of the players down on the end line near their goal.  They were clearly expecting Arsenal to kick the ball out.  Except, it was obviouly not a head injury so there was absolutely no obligation on the part of the Gunners to do so.  Here's the best part.  The player had hurt his hand.  Your team is under pressure and you can't get your butt up to help defend.  Maybe if he'd broken his hand or wrist I could dredge up some sympathy but he remained in the game.  The thought that it is "good sportsmanship" to kick the ball out when an opponent is down with an injury has long gone out the window with the overreaction and even feigning of injuries.  Players, you have made your own bed so you can lie it in now.  

The Kompany You Keep

I couldn't pull this look off in a million years

Burnley are off to a shaky start and may be heading for a long relegation battle.  If the Clarets do go back down, the league will lose perhaps its best fashion plate in Vincent Kompany.  The picture shows how, even in a white tee shirt, baseball cap and sneakers, he is the model of sartorial excellence.  Of course, we are free to try this but Will Smith explains here why it won't work for us.

The Company You Keep

Through 12/31/22, the top five most expensive transfers in EPL history were:

Grealish $146m

Lukaku $124 m

Pogba $116 m

Antony $100 m

Maguire $97 m

Now, you could have a reasonable debate about how these worked out but it's hard to conclude that any of these five played up to the expectations that accompanied their transfer fees.  Since January, the list has been amended to add:

Caicedo $146 m

Rice $138m

Fernandez $136 m

 The track record is not good.  On the other hand, the bar is low.  

Conversation That Could Have Taken Place and Did

Steve: Did you say Aston Villa were facing financial difficulties?

Dennis: No I said they need to find some reserves for Cash to add depth to the squad

Seeing Red But Still Getting Points

Three more red cards this week, with the receiving teams going 1-1-1.  For the season, there have been nine sendings off sending offs red cards with the supposedly disadvantaged sides getting four wins and a draw.  

Lousy Draws

Just not a good week for Newcastle as their Carabao Cup third round fixture and Champions League group assignment are tall orders.   We've spoken many times of the quaint tradition in English football of not seeding teams in cup competitions but instead letting teams from the higher tiers enter the competition later.  For the Carabao Cup, the Premier League sides enter in the second round while any team involved in the European competitions (eight this year - Man City, Arsenal, Man United, Newcastle, Brighton, Aston Villa, Liverpool and West Ham) come in for the third round.  So guess who Newcastle get in the third round.  Right, Man City.  Teams get a bye just so they can face each other in their opening round.  This is even richer.  Remember last year's Carabao Cup finalists?  Right, Man City and Newcastle.  Arte Johnson offers his opinion on this approach here.

We knew the Champions League would be difficult.  The reigning champions go into one pot, meaning there's no way they'll be in the same group.  The rest of the clubs are divided into the other three pots, based on their club coefficient ranking.  The Magpies, who haven't played in Europe since 2012, had the fourth worst ranking and were in the last pot.  They were virtually assured of at least two difficult opponents.  As it was, they got three, ending up in the group with PSG, Borussia Dortmund and AC Milan.  The draw was so bad for Newcastle, you could hear the crowd gasp.  Reaching the knockout stage will be a long shot. I understate.

The Costanza Defense

I had stayed out the cess pool that is the management and administration of the Spanish women's national team, preferring to focus on the fine work of the players.   However, the kiss that the head of the Spanish federation, Luis Rubiales planted on lips of Jenni Hermoso (details here) won't go away, especially after Rubiales offered up his first apology:

However, criticism continued to mount, and Rubiales acknowledged in Monday's statement -- according to a Pro Soccer Wire translation -- that "on the outside it has caused a stir, because people have felt hurt by it, so I have to apologize; there’s no alternative."  He characterized his interaction with Hermoso as "something natural and normal," but as president of the national federation he conceded he must be held to a higher standard. “I made a mistake, for sure,” Rubiales said. “I have to accept it. In a moment of such emotion, without any bad intention or bad faith, what happened, happened, in a very spontaneous way. [There was] no bad faith from either side."

Okay, maybe it's not as bad as the George Costanza defense but it is the classic "I don't think it's wrong but if you are offended by it, then I apologize."  Things deteriorated from there.  He has refused calls to resign and claims the kiss was consensual, which Hermoso categorically denies.  The whole team says they will not play for Spain unless he steps down. 

 

Foiled By the New Manager Bounce?

Things went well for the Union down in DC as they handed United a 3-1 defeat.  Uhre and McGlynn had them up 2-0 within 13 minutes and Gazdag added a PK late in the first half.  DC got a consolation goal late.  The stats, especially xG (1.96-1.63), suggest a closer match but I don't recall feeling like this one was in jeopardy.  I was watching on my phone so maybe I didn't see everything.

The trip to Toronto was not so nice.  This club had lost eight straight (10 if you count League Cup) and hadn't won since May 27th.  On Monday, the club announced that John Herdman, who has had some success with the Canadian national team, would be taking over as manager formally on October 1.  He was in the stands for Wednesday's match and presumably has had some contact with the team already.  Does that qualify for a new manager bounce?

Not sure who makes that call but it doesn't matter.  The Union were behind the eight ball for this match, looking slow on defense (and it wasn't just the crappy Apple streaming feed) and generally outplayed.  Possession was 42% and they only had two shots on target (but 17 total shots).  Somehow, xG is 2.2 -1.7 favor the Union.  Guess those missed shots were high percentage.  It certainly didn't feel that close.  The loss takes the U from second to fourth.      

First place was really already gone anyway.  But home field advantage for the playoffs is a reason to want 2nd or at worst 4th in the standings.  Certainly not out of range.  

Don't Look at Your Shadow, It's Behind You (apologies to Stephen Stills and Manassas)

Last week, we highlighted the steep hill Inter Miami will need to climb to make the MLS playoffs. Well, off the two games this week, Chicago better not look behind them.  Miami got four points from a 2-0 win over Red Bulls in Harrison (which featured the YouTubeableMoment East of the Atlantic Division, with Messi getting the secondary assist on his own goal) and followed it with a 0-0 draw at home to Nashville.  Chicago meanwhile dropped six points, losing to LAFC and Vancouver.  So, Miami is now 10 points back of Chicago with two games in hand.  Reworking last week's math,  Miami can reach 50 points by winning out from here.  Chicago would need to get 19 points from eight matches if that were to happen.  They are currently average 1.23 points per game so that would get them only another 10 points.  At that rate, this ain't over.

Rinse and Repeat

Another busy weekend ahead of the international break. Opta's predictions for the week are here.

We start on Friday again with Luton Town (again) hosting West Ham at 3 pm on USA.

Might be worth getting up at 7:30 for Sheffield and Everton.  Both teams need to get points off of teams like each other if they want to avoid relegation.  Opta has it as the most competitive match of the weekend.  This one is on USA so we can sleep a little later and catch up on DVR.  

Four 10 am choices - none look all that competitive with the options being Brentford - Bournemouth, Burnley-Tottenham, Chelsea-Nottingham Forest or Man City - Fulham.  Hard pressed to pick one out of that bunch.  Chelsea - Forest is the USA match.   We'll probably go with Burnley-Spurs to see what Kompany is wearing and to see if Spurs can maintain their exciting level of play.  Probably the least likely of the four to be a rout.  

Newcastle again get the spotlight, this time on the NBC feature match at 12:30 as they face Brighton down the shore as we say in Philly.  Both sides are coming off of somewhat unexpected losses.  Brighton are favored at home but the Magpies snatching a point doesn't seem out of the question.  

Sunday has the best match of the weekend with Arsenal hosting Man United at 11:30 on USA.  Two choices for your 9 am warm-up.  We'll go with Liverpool - Aston Villa, even if we fear a tough day for the visitors; that's on USA.  Crystal Palace - Wolves, on Peacock, might be a close one.

We get the tickets for Sunday night at Subaru Park as the Union face Red Bulls.  Recall that Jim Curtin threw out some lockerroom bulletin board quotes after the last time the Jersey Boys were in town.  Should add to the atmosphere.  It's never pretty when these two play.  

In the playoff saga, Inter Miami travel to California to face the always tough LAFC.  An early challenge to winning out the season.  Chicago are at DC.

European Championship Qualifiers run from Thursday to Tuesday.  We might get to look in on France-Ireland Thursday at 2:45.

Busy but manageable.  Uh oh, refereeing starts 9/9.