Slowly Sinking to Their Rendezvous

Apologies to The Band

Such an apt description for Newcastle and the Union.

Despite clerking at Penn Relays, I did get to see much of the action thanks to the electronic marvel of DVR.  Spoiler alert: Many of the results are not good.

What's the Opposite of Pyrrhic Victory?

Nothing Eze about this shot - it was unstoppable:
David Klein/Reuters

Newcastle actually played pretty well in a fixture that has been historically disastrous.  They made
Arsenal sweat out a narrow 1-0 win with the only goal coming on a brilliant strike by Eze.  They basically gave as good as (or even better than) they got.  Possession was 55/45, shots were 13/11 and xG was 1/.49, all favor the Magpies; Arsenal did have a slight advantage in shots on target at 4/3.   Of course, Newcastle still got no points for the effort and saw their chances of relegation rise from .01% to .09%.

Run That By Me Again

So after we basically awarded Aston Villa one of the five Champions League berths in last week's post, they of course went out and lost 1-0 to Fulham.  Along with Liverpool's win over Crystal Palace, the loss dropped them to fifth place.  However, with an eight point lead over 6th place Brighton, the Villans are still a good bet for top five.  Fourth or fifth, Villa fans probably won't care either way.

But the rest of the league does care because Aston Villa still have another route to next year's Champions League - win the Europa League.  Should Villa finish fifth but win the Europa League, their spot earned via the EPL finish would go to the sixth place team.  Oddly, if they finish fourth and win Europa League, the spot goes to another league.  Say what?

The fifth spot allocated to the EPL is called the European performance spot and is based on the relative ranking of the EPL compared to other European associations.  Due to an incredible quirk in the rules, that spot is treated differently than one of the four "regular" qualifying spots.  If a club qualifies by winning the Champions League or Europa League and also finishes in the top four, the EPL's regular allocation of four is reduced by one; the EPS is not affected so the EPL would still have five entries.  However, if the team doesn't finish in top four and earns the Champions League berth via the EPS, the rules specifically allocate that the EPS to the sixth place finisher.  Who dreams this stuff up?

Just for fun I checked Opta predictions to see which sides they believe are "still in the hunt."  Turns out it goes all the way down to 13th place Crystal Palace who still have a .17% chance of finishing sixth.   I suppose this is good in a way because just about every match for the next few weeks will matter.  But I also wonder does it create some "perverse incentives."  According to this article in the NYT, turns out it might. The money quote: 

The chasing pack may be breathing down their necks, but the above scenario throws up the possibility that Chelsea could be incentivised to lose away to Liverpool on May 9. Liverpool are three points behind Villa, boast a superior goal difference and have been eliminated from all other competitions, giving them room to focus solely on the league.

Unless Chelsea achieve the unlikely and overtake Liverpool from their current position seven points behind the outgoing champions, it would be in their interests for Arne Slot’s side to finish ahead of Villa, shunting Emery and company down into fifth. Chelsea will still have two more games to play after that trip to Anfield but, in the final reckoning, a loss there might help their Champions League cause.

Whoops.

Status Quo In Relegation Race

All three relegation contenders came away with three points so the relative standings did not change.  Nottingham Forest had the easiest time, dispatching Sunderland 5-0 on Friday, allowing them to sit back on Saturday and watch their pursuers sweat it out.  Wolves and Spurs seemed destined to finish in a 0-0 draw, with not too many scoring chances (xG was .70-.92 favor Spurs).  Palhinha rescued Spurs bacon with a 82nd minute goal for a 1-0 final.  Meanwhile in London, West Ham spent most of the second half nursing a 1-0 lead over Everton.  An 88th minute goal from Tewksbury-Hall leveled things and for a time, dropped the Hammers behind Spurs.  A stoppage time goal from Callum Wilson, seen here, gave West Ham all three points and kept them two ahead of Spurs.

So how did the weekend change the relegation odds?  Spurs went up slightly from 58 to 59%, West Ham stayed flat at 38% and Forest dropped from 4% to 2%.  

In "A Great Match for the Neutral," It's More Fun To Be Neutral

Taking in the first leg of PSG versus Bayern, I had a very slight rooting interest for the German side but not all that much.  Therefore, I was able to enjoy the 5-4 contest favor PSG that had just about everything.  At  5-2 I was so close to moving on to something else except I realized there was nothing else I needed to move on to.  

This will not stand

I was a little less of neutral for Atletico - Arsenal and it was a much different contest.  They finished 1-1 with both goals coming on PKs.  Also, there was a PK call overturned (see picture left) which left Arsenal fuming.  To be sure, this was a tough call either way.  My bias here is that it was called a PK on the field and you can see there was contact.  The cleaner result would have been for the ref not to call it on the field.  I had been expected a tense but basically uneventful contest and was pleasantly surprised at how watchable this was.

What are you doing Luca?

I was definitely not neutral for Aston Villa vs Nottingham Forest and while the 1-0 loss was not a
disaster, their play was disappointing.  The only goal came on a brain cramp of epic proportions by Luca Digne (see right).  As the ball was heading out for possible goal kick for Villa, Hutchinson rescued it by the slimmest of margins and it went to directly to Digne, who for unknown reasons, had thrown both arms in the air.  To what purpose? If the ball goes out it's a goal kick  Chris Wood buried the PK and that was the extent of the scoring.

Crystal Palace had the best result of the EPL sides, getting a 3-1 result on the road against Shakhtar Donetsk.

Meet Me Halfway, Take A Shot

Recall the old Italian (Jewish, insert nationality here) about the man praying to God to help him win the lottery, recounted here.  I did not see the Union's 2-0 loss to Columbus but was sort of following on line.  When I first tuned at about 10 minutes, it was already 1-0, and the Union had three shots, none on target.  It stayed that way for about another hour prompting Dennis to note "a 2-0 lead is second most dangerous in soccer but only if the trailing team can mount an attack."  They did rally for some shots in the final minutes but to no avail.  I had also noticed that Columbus was stuck on four shots, three on target.  Then the goal is posted but the shots don't change.  How can that be?  Oh crap, the dreaded own goal.  Seen here, we appear to be a bad team with bad luck. 

You Make the Call

BFS Track and Field Consultant Jack W sends along this video from a youth soccer match. Note that the attacking team didn't stop and put the ball in the net anyway.  BFS Referee Consultant Graham R and I have been trying to dissect what is the correct call here.  The answer depends on whether you consider the adult who pushed the player a team official or an outside agent.  If the latter, the call is a dropped ball for the defending team since the ball would have been inside the 18 when he stopped play for outside interference.  That does seem incredibly unfair but them's the rules.

There are two possibilities if you consider the adult a team official.  First, since this would be a violation under Law 12, the referee could play advantage, which in this case ended up with a goal being scored.  If the referee blew the whistle before the ball went into the net, the restart is a direct from kick from the spot of the infraction; since this was inside the 18, that's a PK.

For both Graham and I, the real takeaway here is that this is exactly why you don't allow anyone to hang around the goal.

You Know the Drill

Pretty much the same as last week except this time there's a full EPL calendar.  Things get underway Friday at 3 pm with a match that appears to have nothing riding on it - Leeds vs Burnley.  The Clarets fate is sealed in a bad way and Leeds are safe from both relegation and European competition.

All three Saturday 10 matches have consequences.  West Ham continue to fight for their EPL lives while Brentford are still in the hunt for Europe in one form or another.  Wolves are done but Sunderland aren't out of Europe yet.  But we will be taking in Newcastle - Brighton to see if the Magpies can drop that relegation chance to 0.00% while Brighton remain in the thick of their chance to finish 6th (or better).  Opta has it 40/33/27 favor Magpies but that sounds "opta-mistic" to me. The feature 12:30 contest is a London derby between Arsenal and Fulham.  The Gunners have no room for error and need these three points.

Sunday has three more matches that matter, spaced out in an odd way.  Bournemouth - Crystal Palace are at 9, Man United - Liverpool are at 10:30 and Aston Villa - Spurs are at 2 pm.  Villa and Liverpool will be looking to solidify their Champions League credentials.  Bournemouth will want to protect their position at 7th in the table. Spurs will be hoping for any result to help in their fight to stay up.

The matchweek concludes with a weird 10 am weekday kickoff for Chelsea - Nottingham Forest, then a more normal 3 pm start for Everton - Man City.  Again, all of those sides are either looking to end their relegation threat or improve their chances for Europe next year.

For this year's European competitions, just flip the home and away sides from last week's schedule.

We will be at Subaru Park for the Union versus Nashville as well as a sausage sandwich. Only one of those things is a sure bet to satisfy.

A heads up.  I did the Thursday edits with some kind of nasty cold or something similar.  In other words, I was less clear headed than even usual.  All errors are mine, not staff's.