The Struggles of A Decidedly Mid-table Team

Hammered by the Gunners, sitting 10th in the table and barely able to advance in the FA Cup against a 16th place Championship side.  Yes, Newcastle look and play like a mid-table side right now.

Newcastle Score Two and Lose 4-1

The Emirates continues to be a House of Horror for the Magpies.  They looked beaten from the opening whistle.  An own goal from Sven Botman allowed Arsenal to convert all that pressure into an opening goal.  Kai Havertz made it 2-0 minutes later and the rout was on.  The lead extended to 4-0 in the second half before Joe Willock got a late consolation goal.  A thorough beat down.

Dubravka stopping the PK; he was the difference in the
FA Cup win over Blackburn (Photo:Getty)

Tuesday the Mapgies were on the road to face Blackburn in an FA Cup Round of 16 match-up.  They were only slightly better against the lower tier club.  In fact, the Rovers had the better of the scoring chances but thanks to fine work by Martin Dubravka, the match entered the late stages 0-0.  Anthony Gordon gave Newcastle a lead that last all of eight minutes.  Heading into extra time, Blackburn looked the more likely side to score.  Fortunately, Newcastle got through that to bring the match to penalty kicks.  Dubravka stopped two and the Magpies advanced to the quarterfinals.  We'll make his PK save this week's YouTubeableMoment; the take wasn't that bad and Dubravka needed full extension to get there.  

Almost makes you forget they put up two weak performances in four days.

A Proper New Manager Bounce

Crystal Palace easily beat Burnley 3-0 in Oliver Glasner's debut as the Eagles' manager.   Of course, it was Burnley, who have scored the second fewest and allowed the second most goals.  And, they had a man sent off at 35 minutes.  The Clarets managed two shots, none on goal and posted an xG of .20.  Still it was a win and Palace are now 13th, eight points clear of the drop zone.

Net Two Points for Everton

Dunk's header levelled the Brighton - Everton match
and the Twizzlers Toffees had to settle for one point

A son-in-law kind of week (decent enough, but not everything you had in mind) for Everton.  On the pitch they dropped two points after taking a 1-0 lead in the 73rd minute only to see Dunk's stoppage time goal foil their plans.  The late equalizer was all the more a gut punch since Brighton were playing down a man after Billy Gilmour got sent off in the 81st minute.  A point on the road probably would have sounded good at kick-off but not so much at the end.

Off the pitch they got four points back, as the 10-point reduction for violation of Financial Fair Play rules was scaled back to six points.  Again, not everything they wanted but considering where they were, maybe not so bad.  The immediate impact is that they are now five points, instead of just one, clear of the relegation zone.  

Everton were successful on just two of the nine points they outlined in their appeal.  Initially they were accused of being "less than frank" in the information provided and not acting in the "utmost good faith."  The appeals committee basically said "just being wrong" isn't necessarily acting in bad faith.  The other winning point was that the initial penalty did not account for relevant benchmarks of sanctions leveled against spending violations of clubs in lower tiers of the EFL and the sanctions against the six clubs involved in hitherto failed attempt to create a European Super League.   

So much is left undone here.  Biggest issue is that both Nottingham Forest and Everton face hearings for additional financial violations, with a verdict on those cases expected in mid-April.  Since both sides aren't that far ahead of 18th place, any points deductions at such a late date in the season could wreak havoc on the relegation scrap.  We also have the unresolved financial transgressions of Man City and Chelsea, which have not been fully "adjudicated" yet.

Don't Look Behind You

Somehow Aston Villa are now five points clear in the fourth position.  Well not somehow.  They got the job done with a 4-2 win over Nottingham Forest (shouldn't have been that close but I switched to Brighton - Everton when it was 3-0 so that's on me) while Man United were dropping all three at home in a 1-2 loss to Fulham. Harry Maguire looked to have rescued a point for Man United with an 89th minute goal but Alex Iwobi stunned everyone with a stoppage time goal, seen here.

With their wins this weekend, West Ham (4-2 over Brentford) and Wolves (1-0 over Sheffield United) floated past Newcastle in the table.  Man City hardly overwhelmed but did get a 1-0 win over Bournemouth.

Quad Is Not Dead

Dutch Treat: van Dijk directs the winning header home

Liverpool and Jurgen Klopp got the first piece of hardware this year with a 1-0 win over Chelsea in extra time to take the EFL Cup.  A decent match decided on a header by Virgil van Dijk.  The Reds stayed alive in the other domestic cup competition with a 3-0 win over Southampton in a Round of 16 FA Cup match in which Liverpool put out a young line up that was missing many of their big guns.  Sitting atop the EPL as we head into March and poised to do well in the Europa League, four trophies are still possible in Klopp's final season with the club.

"Fun" With Math

Newcastle are currently 15 points behind Aston Villa.  This is despite the fact that the Magpies beat the Villans twice.  Without those wins, Newcastle would trail them by 27 points.  

Sometimes When You Lose, You Actually Tie

Rosie Perez explains here how the Union were able to advance to the Round of 16 in Concacaf Champions Cup after the second leg at Subaru Park with Saprissa ended up 2-3 favor the visitors.  Here's what Jim Curin actually said after the match:

It’s a win, or a tie that’s a win, that feels like a loss, really

So what happened was after the second leg, the two sides were tied at 5-5 with the same number of away goals.  So they played 30 minutes of extra time, during which the Union scored to make the aggregate 6-5.  But that hardly dents the surface of a crazy Tuesday night in Chester.

The Union entered the night with a 3-2 lead from the first leg and a big advantage with three away goals, the first tiebreaker.  They relatively quickly surrendered a PK on a rash challenge by Glesnes.  Still ahead on the tiebreaker but no margin for error.  Not to worry as Carranza got a nifty header goal quickly followed by a rocket from Sullivan after a scramble in the box.  Now up 5-3 on aggregate, things looked great.  But they didn't stay that way for long.  A goal just two minutes later eliminated the cushion.  A free kick in the 62nd minute completed the comeback for Saprissa, including wiping out the Union's away goal advantage.  

Letter of the Laws: That's a a red for Elliott

As the match headed toward extra time, the Jack Elliott got a straight red in stoppage time.  The call looked horrible from the stands.  There were Union defenders between the attacker and the goal so a red for DOGSO would have been a horrendous call.  And the challenge didn't look all that nasty.  To us it looked like a classic yellow for a tactical foul.  The challenge did look worse on replay and it was from behind, which does have its own special line in the Laws, as in:  

Any player who lunges at an opponent in challenging for the ball from the front, from the side or from behind using one or both legs, with excessive force or endangers the safety of an opponent is guilty of serious foul play.

Elliott did lunge in an arguably dangerous way.  After the match Jim Curtin conceded it might have been the right call and indicated he will not appeal the card, which means Elliott will miss the next match.

The short-term problem was that the Union would now have to play 30 minutes of extra time down a man.  Best option in that situation is to hopefully score on a set piece, which is exactly what they did.  Four minutes in, Jack McGlynn sent a low corner that somehow managed to go through the box untouched, allowing Mikael Uhre to fire a shot into the net.  Here's the goal as recorded by someone sitting with the Sons of Ben, with the attendant fan reaction we love.  Follow that with 25 minutes of parking the bus, surviving a last minute scramble that saw Saprissa hit the woodwork twice within seconds and the Union are on to the next round.

I did not see the league match on Saturday - a 2-2 draw with Chicago.  I did hear that the replacement referees did not distinguish themselves, especially the ARs.  Replays did show that they really should have put the flag up on two Union goals that were eventually disallowed by VAR.  As for the result, a home draw to Chicago doesn't sound all that good, except when you realize they had an equalizer at 86 minutes disallowed and still snatched the draw with a stoppage time goal from Daniel Gazdag.  

A Continuing Mixed Bag

We have EPL, MLS, Champions League, Europa League, Europa Conference League and Concacaf Champions League piled into the next week.  

Piled in definitely describes the Saturday 10 am slot as we have six matches to choose from.  We'll be going with Newcastle - Wolves - a six-pointer for 9th place in the table.  Opta has the Magpies as a big favorite (48% win, 28% draw) but color us skeptical.  TV has Everton - West Ham, which on paper looks really competitive.  Also projected as competitive is a London Derby between Brentford - Chelsea, a sign of how far the Blues have fallen.  The other London Derby in the time slot, Tottenham - Crystal Palace looks more like the end of the new manager bounce for Palace.  Fulham-Brighton might be close too.  Not so likely to be interesting is Nottingham Forest - Liverpool.  The 12:30 feature match (USA, not NBC this week) is Luton Town hosting Aston Villa.

Sunday has both sides of the table featured with Burnley - Bournemouth at 8 (USA) and then a Manchester derby at 10:30 (Peacock).  Opta does not see this as derby-like, posting City at 62% for the win and 23% for the draw, with United only at 15% for the win.  There's a Monday "contest" with Sheffield United hosting Arsenal at 3pm on USA.

Champions League matches are Tuesday and Wednesday and the other Europa stuff is packed into Thursday.  

The Union have a league match on Saturday at Kansas City - 8:30 on "free" Apple TV.  Then they have the first leg of their Round of 16 tie with Pachuca at 6 pm on Tuesday at Subaru Park.  That one is on FS2.

Ho hum, another week with six straight days of football.