Things We Learned Over the Break

The press of other duties will keep this short but I did have some observations on the international competition.

1.      Surrendering a goal to an overwhelming underdog in the first five minutes is like a slap in the face.

Giving up that goal to St. Vincent & the Grenadines at the five minute mark was probably the best thing that could have happened to the US.  They certainly woke up and played well from there on out.  Not that a 6-1 thrashing proved much one way or the other about the direction of this team

2.      Qualifying for the World Cup out of CONCACAF is not a given for the US team

In retrospect, I was probably too glib about US prospects for the away match against Trinidad and Tobago.  They are not a bad squad and it was on the road.  I guess 2.b. would be that Gyasi Zardes is not Clint Dempsey, as the two-toned hair striker missed some golden opportunities.  Some (like Landon Donovan) were all up in Klinsmann’s face about leaving Dempsey off the roster.  For me, isn’t a road match against a weaker opponent the perfect place to find out if Zardes is up to the task?  The result – a 0-0 draw – isn’t awful but I must admit the doubts have been creeping in lately about whether Klinsmann is taking this team to a new level.

3.      You can grow grass in northern climes.

The fine looking pitches in Norway and Sweden are further evidence for the case that artificial turf should be limited to scholastic programs.  If you can grow grass in Oslo, where they have just two seasons – winter and green winter, you can grow grass in Vancouver or Portland.

 
4.      You can’t claimed to have “seen” the Bosnia & Herzegovina-Ireland match.

You may have watched it but there’s no way you saw it, at least the second half, as the fog descended and left some of us thinking about the Chicago Bears-Philadelphia Eagles playoff game of some years past.  Good on the Irish for toughing out a 1-1 draw on the road, then booking their ticket for the Euros with a 2-0 win in Dublin.  Sure they may have gotten the benefit of a dodgy handling call in the box but many will recall, they were sort of owed one.

Calendar

Not the most thrilling of schedules this weekend, at least for EPL.  The MLS does have the first legs of the semi final series on Sunday; Columbus-Red Bulls at 5 pm (ESPN) and Portland-Dallas at 7:30 (FS1).

Newcastle has a very troublesome fixture in the form of a home match against Leicester.  Aston Villa has a difficult match as well, going on the road to face an Everton side that has been a bit better as of late.  As you might expect, both of those matches are only on live streaming.

For the TV stuff, the weekend gets rolling with Watford hosting Man U at 7:45.  Yawn.  The 10 am TV games are Chelsea-Norwich and West Brom-Arsenal.  Really?  At least the 12:30 match – Liverpool at Man City – has a little appeal.  The Sunday game – Tottenham hosting West Ham at White Hart Lane might be the best match up of the weekend; both are in pretty good form and they are tied in the table right now.  Though he has his Crystal Palace side playing pretty well, Alan Pardew does have a poor record facing Sunderland; the frequent losses (just one win and three draws in nine derbies) to the Black Cats certainly fueled the Toon Army’s dislike of the man and probably hastened his departure from Newcastle.  On the other hand, he was the manager when the Eagles thrashed Sunderland 4-1 last spring.  Enough of a story line there for me to be interested in the Monday fixture between the two.

In a show of support,  "La Marseilles" will be played prior to the start of each EPL match this weekend.

Hand Me the Remote

Not feeling inspired by what I saw this weekend.  Probably watching the wrong games...

Newcastle were outeverythinged but still beat Bournemouth 1-0.  Possession was 33-67, shots were 2-13, shots on target were 1-5, corners were 0-16 (double checked that last one).  Newcastle looked like a superior side that were truly annoyed at being forced to play a friendly against a team from a lower division; the Cherries worked harder, had no trouble dispossessing Magpie attackers, and generally controlled the match.  The goal came on a nice left-footed poke by Ayoze Perez, which almost made up for the him spending much of the match on the pitch, looking for a referee's call when none would be (nor should have been) forthcoming.  Excellent work in goal by Rob Elliot and the back line was pretty solid too.  The midfield was awful; given that Siem de Jong is making noises about maybe leaving, wouldn't this be a good time to play him and find out if he can 1) help us in the midfield and 2) stay healthy?

Of course, after all this whining, it was a win that moved Newcastle out of the bottom three in time for the international break.  And it probably makes up for a match somewhere in the past where they did deserve the three points but were unlucky.

Around the League

Probably shouldn't include in the uninspiring pile the North London derby that saw Arsenal and Tottenham play to a 1-1 draw.  The play was spirited and at times had some of the snarl you like to see in a derby.  I saw a match in three acts - Arsenal in the ascendancy, Tottenham scoring a goal and looking for more, then Arsenal drawing level and looking like they might have a game winner.  I scratched my head at the insertion of Kieren Gibbs (often seen at left back) for Joel Campbell (attacking winger) in the 74th minute with the Gunners down 0-1; of course he scores the equalizer three minutes after entering the match and also nearly had the game winner.

Were I a true Aston Villa fan (as opposed to a more casual viewer who wishes them well most of the time), I might have been more captivated during their totally unexpected scoreless draw with Manchester.  I'll let Dennis supply the passion and will only note that we're seeing how important Aguero and Silva are to the Citizens as they were held scoreless.

Not a ton of passion from me on this one either.  It was nothing short of a miracle that the Villans stole a point from this match and really just goes to show how hard it is to continually lose, even when you are a mediocre team (something about a blind squirrel comes to mind here).  City had at least 3 chances they should have scored - 2 chances from 6 yards out that didn't even hit the target, and one 92nd minute header that rattled the crossbar .  I wouldn't be surprised if this is the only match all season in which City have these types of chances and get shut out.

Compare that to the Villa offense that mustered 3 shots......period.  None of which were on target (other, somehow less flattering, comparisons to blind squirrels seem apt here).  Aside from that little detail about scoring, Villa actually looked half decent - more movement, crisper passing, and much less sloppy defending all contributed to a not embarrassing display.  This was a tough way for Garde to have to start his tenure, but I liked his lineup choices -  he started Clark, Veretout, Sinclair, and Gil - and the general style of play.  That said, Villa thoroughly deserved to lose and didn't, so I'll just chalk this one up to dumb luck, take my point, and lock it away so no one can take it back.  

Also saw West Ham and Everton draw 1-1; again, not terrible but I remember a bit of multi-tasking while watching that one.  Couldn't miss Stoke-Chelsea, which featured Mourinho calling in instructions from the hotel while serving his one-game stadium ban.  Hmm, the instructions either were misheard or not the right ones as Chelsea went down again 0-1.  Frankly, they did deserve a draw because Stoke keeper Butland definitely tried to trip Loic Remy in the box; Remy bravely cleared the sprawling keeper but couldn't stick the landing and could only flail away at the ball while tumbling to the ground.  Easy PK, possibly a red card, but no call was forthcoming.  And did you notice how quickly the Professional Game Match Officials Limited (described here) threw referee Anthony Taylor under the bus?  Within minutes the announcers were informing us that the PGMOL was saying that was a clear penalty.  Not a great match to watch but it leaves Chelsea in 16th a mere one point above Newcastle.


The matches I probably should have been watching were Leicester-Watford and Liverpool-Crystal Palace.  Dennis may have details on Leicester's 2-1 win over the Hornets which included another goal for Jamie Vardy (okay it was a PK but still [And Vardy did do all of the work to earn the PK, so he totally deserved the goal]).  At Anfield, I'm sure Jurgen Klopp coached the pants off Alan Pardew but Crystal Palace beat Liverpool anyway 2-1.  So the Eagles now sit in 8th but I'm still reading about plenty of Newcastle supporters who still think Pardew is an awful manager.  Drives me nuts.  Not saying everything was great during his tenure, just that his managing wasn't the reason for the problems. 


MLS Playoffs 

So I watched the wrong match here as well.  With the Red Bulls holding a slim 1-0 lead over DC United after the first leg, the game in Harrison should have been a nasty, tense affair.  The Red Bulls were unable to add to their lead but even though a single goal by DC United would have meant overtime, there was no sense of  drama to the match.  A late goal by the Red Bulls eventually put the series out of reach.  Probably would have done better to watch Columbus-Montreal or FC Dallas-Seattle, as both of those went to extra time and eventually kicks from the spot before Columbus and FC Dallas clinched their spots in the conference finals.  And the Portland Timbers pulled off a mild upset, netting two on the road in Vancouver and winning that series.  Personally I'll be rooting for the Red Bulls and FC Dallas as they had the best regular season records but can understand it's hard to root against a team that awards slices of logs to men of the match.

Speaking of Timbers fans, Bob K (who is also basquing basking in the big win by Sevilla over Real Madrid) sent along this link of the top 10 MLS players by position.  Thin representation for the Union (Edu, Maidana, and LeToux), which is understandable.  I think Barnetta is a top 10 as well but didn't play enough in MLS this season to merit selection.  Keeper Andre Blake might be a future selection as well but it's clear we need to add some high level talent.  For me, the priorities would be a center back so Edu can go back to his preferred defensive midfielder spot and a top class striker (Sapong is okay but not consistent enough).

International Break

The USMNT begins World Cup qualifying with matches on Friday night against St Vincent & the Grenadines (pretty sure I saw them at the Main Point in the 70s) and Tuesday against Trinidad & Tobago.  Would expect these are wins for the US - I mean these are countries that have to put two countries together to field a team (Or as Ted Lasso might say: "How many countries are in this country?").  Maybe the more interesting thing will be the lineups Klinsmann trots out for these matches.

Possibly more exciting are the two leg playoff series for the final four spots for next year's European Championships.  The match ups are Norway-Hungary (11/12 and 11/15), Bosnia & Herzegovina-Ireland (11/13 and 11/16), Ukraine-Slovenia and Sweden-Denmark (both 11/14 and 11/17).  Check your local listings - these games will be available on the ESPN and Fox Sports channels.

Without access to BeIN Sports, I won't be able to watch but there will also be some great South American WC qualifying matches during this break as well.

Might get to raking some leaves this weekend.  Or a nap.

Pardon My French

Can’t complain too much about the Newcastle effort against Stoke.  Though the Magpies only came away with a 0-0 draw, they played great attacking football and only the heroics of the Potters’ keeper Jack Butland kept Newcastle from walking away with a convincing win.  England’s number one keeper, Joe Hart, may be hearing footsteps, so quickly is Butland’s reputation growing.  If Newcastle play like this most of the time, relegation will not be an issue.  Of course, if they had been playing like this all along, they wouldn’t be in the mess they’re in. 

Butland was the star of this stalemate Photo: AI

                                    

Whither Mourinho?

Chelsea-Liverpool provided the great theater I hoped it would.  The Blues scored early (too soon?) and then seemed to get conservative.  Coutinho leveled the match in first half stoppage time – actually about 30 seconds after the announced two minutes of stoppage time had elapsed; the announced time is only a minimum and the referee can add more as he deems appropriate but I didn’t’ see anything in particular that suggested a need to extend the half.  Chelsea were more lively after the break but it was Benteke, subbed in by Klopp in the 64^th minute, who made the difference; it was his header that set up the go ahead goal by Coutinho and he then tallied one himself to put the game out of reach.

Hearing two schools of thought on Mourinho.  On the one hand, how different can he be from the manager who led the team to a runaway title last year?  Sacking him would be stupid, let him manage the team.  The flip side is that people are suggesting his style has alienated enough players that he can no longer manage the team.  Watching some of the Chelsea players, I can see this as a real possibility.  As of this writing, he is still employed and the Champions League win over Dynamo Kiev may have bought some more time.  He will be serving a one-match ban this weekend.

I trashed the Everton-Sunderland match as unworthy of a Sunday morning featured match and then thoroughly enjoyed the scoring fest which saw Everton go up 2-0, Sunderland level with two of their own, then the Toffees net four unanswered goals.  The pseudo-South Coast derby between Southampton and Bournemouth should have been so entertaining. 

Saturday’s matches were largely forgettable.  Crystal Palace played Man United tough and came away with a gritty 0-0 draw.  Swansea was really no match for Arsenal; the 3-0 win for the Gunners keeps them level on points at the top of the table with Man City, who bested Norwich 2-1.  And when is NBCSN going to figure out that the Leicester plays the most entertaining football and start featuring their matches on TV rather than online?  Didn’t see the contest but I’m betting the Foxes 3-2 win over West Brom was the best viewing of Saturday morning.

Parlez vous francais?

And then there is Aston Villa.  Didn’t really expect much out of trip to White Hart Lane and the 3-1 loss to Spurs did not overdeliver.  Dennis adds…

...the unforgettable words of Luke P. "Eff Spurs".  Not really though.  Aston Villa just played like crap and deserved to lose.  Spurs dominated nearly the entire match and Villa needed a lucky deflection to even appear like they ever had a chance.  No points expected from this match, no points earned, and not really any positive talking points either. Villa did manage a couple of fairly decent chances, but only generating 2-3 decent chances over the course of a match gets you a lot of ugly losses with a few ugly draws mixed in.

The bigger and longer term (though I use that term loosely, given the length of EPL managers tenure these days) event of the week was Villa signing Remi Garde as manager.  I don't know much about him except that his Lyon clubs finished fourth, third, and fifth in his three season in Ligue 1.  So 17th or better in the EPL should be breeze, right?  Garde supposedly received an offer from Newcastle at the end of last season but said he wasn't ready to take a new gig yet.  We'll just have to wait and see if it is me or my dad that gets to use that an insult at the end of the season.

He started his tenure by banning the players from speaking French in the locker room and forcing them all to learn English, in order to promote better team communication.  Seems like a risky move to me - players could definitely take being forced to learn a new language the wrong way, especially when you have 4 young players that all speak French.  But I guess the alternative is a lot of suspicion in the locker room and it is definitely not good if you're unsure if your teammate is praising you or insulting your mother.  


Advantage, Mike Dean

Referees and refereeing are a common topic here at BFS.  We praise their good calls and question their eye sight.  This weekend, Mike Dean reminded me both that they are having fun and their job is really hard, so getting calls right is worth celebrating:

In the above play, Dean gives Spurs  an advantage call during which they promptly score.  With all the enthusiasm as if he just scored the freaking goal himself, Dean runs a dozen yards with his hands in the advantage signal, points emphatically towards midfield to signal a goal (6 times, I might add), and gives himself a little fist pump to top it off [the fist pump is just awesome].  Now there is a man that knows he made a good call and is having some fun with it.

Binge MLS Watching

Four second round MLS playoff matches (first legs) last Sunday from 3 pm to 11 pm, for those into binge watching.  I only took in two.  The Red Bulls and DC United may be the most intense derby in MLS, even if we don’t call them derbies over here.  What a nasty afternoon that was.  The Red Bulls come away with a 1-0 win on the road and head back to the friendly confines of Harrison NJ (first time that phrase has ever been uttered) in command, if not completely healthy.  Portland failed to capitalize on the home field advantage and drew 0-0 with Vancouver.  Both Montreal and Seattle did well in their home legs, coming away with 2-1 leads over Columbus and Dallas respectively.  Rinse and repeat – the second legs are this Sunday at 3, 5, 7:30 and 10 on ESPN (early two – NY-DC, and Col-Mon) and Fox Sports One (second two – FC Dallas-Seattle, Van-Port). 

Who’s In Charge of Programming?

Okay, even though I’ve incorrectly labeled certain games as duds before, I’m still puzzled by some of the programming choices.  Bournemouth-Newcastle as the Saturday morning opener?  As a Magpie supporter I’m pleased that I won’t have go online to see this match but we’re talking about 17^th and 18^th in the table.  BTW, this really has to be a W for Newcastle.  Looking at the 10 am matches we see Man United-West Brom on NBCSN and West Ham-Everton on USA; the former doesn’t offer much hope of a competitive contest but the latter does look worthy.  But once again, Leicester (uh, that would be third place Leicester) is left out in the cold, as their match with Watford is on live streaming.  Saturday’s late match is a Mourinho-less Chelsea traveling to Stoke; if Chelsea lose, can they sack Mourinho, even if he wasn’t the manager?  Guess I can’t argue with that one being on TV either

Sunday morning sees Aston Villa offered up as sacrificial lambs to hosting Man City; not hopeful of an interesting match there.  Then at 11 we have the North London derby with Arsenal taking on Tottenham at the Emirates.  Relegated to live streaming is the Liverpool-Crystal Palace match; I’d guess that one to be more entertaining the AVL-MCI but what do I know?

Toothless Possession, Not Bad Call, Sinks Magpies

The fans and pundits seem to get it.  Not sure the manager and players do.

Newcastle pushed Sunderland around the pitch for the first 44 minutes on Sunday but on a late counter Coloccini was called for a foul in the box and was sent off for DOGSO.  Ten-man Newcastle continued to move the ball well in the second half but yielded two more goals and lost the Tyne-Wear derby for the sixth straight time.

Though Robert Madley got the red card wrong (the FA overturned it saying it was "obviously in error"), the call is not why Newcastle lost.  A full half's worth of possession without seriously threatening to score and a rash challenge in the box are. You leave yourself open to lose on a random counterattack when you have the run of play but don't score.  And the random counterattack has a higher probability of success when you foul the attacker in the box.  I've seen refs let barges like Coloccini's go but it looked like a penalty to me.  Totally unnecessary challenge too; keeper Elliott was always going to get the ball.  Even if Madley was incorrect in sending Colo off, it was still going to be 1-0 at half.  And there's no guarantee that an 11-man Newcastle would have necessarily scored in the second half.  In fact, they blew some pretty good chances.  Blaming the ref is not going to solve Newcastle's problems.

Things were not much better in Wales, where Aston Villa again surrendered a second half lead and lost to Swansea on a late goal.  If Dennis is talking about it now, maybe he'll add some color.

If by color, you mean some drab gray (or grey, I suppose) then sure, why not.  Stop me if you’ve heard this one before: Villa take a lead around 60 minutes, surrender that lead within 5 minutes, and lose on an 80 something minute goal.  Nothing especially noteworthy in this contest, but I did learn, or relearn, several things:

• There is a reason several of our defensive starters are rejects from other teams – they are simply not that good.  Lescott, in particular, looked overmatched the entire time.  Losing Vlaar was apparently a bigger blow than I anticipated and I don’t think I gave him enough credit.
• If your opponent’s team has Gylfi Sigurdsson on the field, DO NOT GIVE AWAY A FREE KICK JUST OUTSIDE THE BOX!  As Sigurdsson lined up for the kick, I left the room to get lunch, saying something along the lines of “He always scores these anyway and I’m hungry now.”
• Aston Villa simply cannot hold a lead under any circumstances outside of playing against Bournemouth.  Not sure if it is a tactical switch or a player mentality, but our passing and defense break down (further) almost the second we take the lead.

 The 6^th EPL loss in a row was apparently the final blow to Sherwood’s tenuous hold on the manager position (more on that later) and coupled with Sunderland’s win, put Villa on the bottom of the table.  I would like to take some solace in the fact that they are only 4 points from safety, but then I remember that they only have 4 points. 

The Manchester derby underwhelmed (0-0) while the Everton at least made things interesting against Arsenal even while going down 1-2.  Tottenham gave up an early goal but crushed Bournemouth 5-1.  Liverpool left Klopp still looking for his first win but the 1-1 draw with Southampton was mostly pleasing on the eye; Mane had an interesting finish - the equalizer in the 86th minute followed by two yellows in stoppage time.

Dennis at least got the winner in the BFS Shadow derby with Leicester edging Crystal Palace 1-0.  Aside from the result, the game was somewhat of a letdown as neither side played the free flowing football we're used to seeing from them.  Nothing cheap about the Jamie Vardy's game winner, this week's YouTubeableMoment.

But for sheer fun, nothing topped the London derby of Chelsea visiting West Ham.  A little bit of everything. The Hammers took the lead in the 17th minute but Chelsea had appeared to level things at 35 minutes.  Except the goal line technology showed that the ball hadn't completely crossed the line (see above); closest call I've ever seen with GLT.  A few seconds later another subplot unfolded when Nemanja Matic clearly committed a tactical foul and was booked.  In the 43rd minute Fabregas was whistled for offside; live it seemed close but the picture below suggests it wasn't that close and was correctly called. In the 44th minute, Matic committed a second tactical foul, earning a second yellow and the requisite red card.  Chelsea players and staff totally lost it.  Costa and Fiberglass quickly picked up yellows for dissent.  Soon after a Chelsea assistant was sent off.  When the second half started, Mourinho was in the director's box because, we were told, he had tried to get into the referees' room at half time.  But Chelsea were not going to go, ahem, quietly. Cahill equalized things at 56 minutes and it looked like the Blues might come away with a draw.  But the introduction of the man-bun sporting Andy Carroll in the 69th minute raised the spirits of the Upton Park faithful.  West Ham basically started jacking crosses into the box hoping that Carroll would get his head on one.  And he did in the 79th minute with what would be the game winner in a highly entertaining contest.  Only thing left is to wait on the disciplinary findings and/or the possible sacking of Mourinho.  Tuesday's loss to Stoke in the League Cup won't help matters.



Football Manager Update

It really was a bad weekend.  Even my Chester Blues lost - for the first time in 20 EPL matches - to Arsenal on a goal in stoppage time.  We were underdogs on the road and played well plus we still sit in second (six behind Everton) but it was a tough loss coming on top of real life defeats.  Finally figured out that I've been calling the Belgian midfielder Alex Witsel when his first name is really Axel.  Probably explains why our efforts to sign him haven't gotten too far.  Well that and his club is asking $18m and we have less than $10m to spend. 


EPL Manager Sack Race

Tim Sherwood, who was third on the oddsmakers list, was let go by Aston Villa after the Swansea loss and after saying essentially "I'm managed good but our players suck."  McClaren and Mourinho remain 1-2 but personally I think McClaren has a longer leash because it's still early in his tenure while Jose regularly implodes in year three.

I don’t really get into the tactical level of the team as much as I maybe should, but without actually knowing what Sherwood is telling the players to do, it is very hard to tell if problems are coming from players or the manager. That said, I tend to lean towards agreeing with Sherwood – the players haven’t been good enough yet.  Whenever Villa end up playing 10 minutes of straight defense (a frequent occurrence), it is usually because they are unable to string a dozen meaningful passes together, not because Sherwood has told them to bunker up.  Maybe a manager shake up will ignite some kind of spark like it did last season, but I would be very surprised.  I am also concerned about the effect of changing managers with such a young and inexperienced team.  Giving them time to grow together in one system might have been the best recipe for success but, as is often the case, the Villa owner/board was not willing to wait and find out.  Hopefully I am wrong and Sherwood really was holding them back, but so far I have not seen any evidence that Villa is really a mid-table team being managed into oblivion.
 
Soccer in the News

BFS Senior Social Media Consultant Emily M tipped us off to this article about Man United's Bastian Schweinsteiger being unhappy that a Nazi doll not only bears his first name but looks quite a bit look him too.  Case will probably be in court for years.  One of our favorite political bloggers, Charles Pierce has this piece on possible candidates to succeed Sepp Blatter.  Aside from highlighting some of the more interesting names in the race - Tokyo Sexwale, Prince Ali, and Jerome Champagne - the money quote for me is:  

Also, those irrepressible scamps over at Deadspin have hipped us to the names of the candidates vying to replace Sepp Blatter, the renal disease who once presided over FIFA, the world's most corrupt sports organization. (At one point or another, every major sport has come under the influence of organized crime. FIFA actually is organized crime.)

Union not Last

Close, but not last.  They finished the season with a 1-0 win over Orlando.  They also announced that Earnie Stewart, former USMNT player, to be their Sporting Director (first time the club has had someone in this position).  Stewart has had success as an administrator in Holland so maybe he'll have some good ideas.  I do worry whether he'll be given enough of a budget to make a difference.  Also too, I hope he doesn't go out and acquire two or three more keepers.

At the other end of the spectrum, the Red Bulls took care of business by defeating Chicago and won the Supporters Shield.  In Europe, their job would be done.  In America, it don't mean diddly unless you win in the playoffs.  I wish them well but will acknowledge a fine season regardless of what happens from this point on.


Fall Back

Newcastle have a home match against Stoke at 11 am (online only) from which they need to take away at least a point; which side will show up - the one that scored six vs Norwich or the one that was shut out by Sunderland?  More importantly, will they keep 11 on the pitch for the entire match?

Don't envy Aston Villa's assignment - a Monday trip to White Hot Hart Lane to face surging Tottenham.  Not a likely place to find points right now.

The weekend has what should be an entertaining start with the 8:45 match (NBCSN) between Chelsea and Liverpool.  The Reds are looking for their first win for new manager Klopp while the Blues are looking for last season's form.  Plus the match will be played against the backdrop of the drama over Mourinho's future.  Another match which could entertain is Swansea-Arsenal (11 am USA).  League leader Man City should coast at home vs Norwich.  I'll be interested to see how Crystal Palace does at home against Man United; the Eagles have done well against the big boys this year but last week makes me wonder if they're starting to slip.  Rounding out Saturday's schedule, third place West Ham (only 2 points behind MCI) travels to Watford and fifth place Leicester are on the road to West Brom.

Sunday's TV games look a little underwhelming.  Everton hosts Sunderland at 8:30 then Southampton takes on Bournemouth at 11.  The latter may have more potential than meets the eye, as it is a revival of the New Forest derby, though the fact that the two sides haven't faced each other since 2011 suggests that rivalry is probably too strong a word here. 

Remember we turn the clocks back this weekend and you know what that means - an extra hour to watch soccer.

Gini Grants Newcastle A Wish

Silly me.  Recall that last week I chided the schedulers for setting Newcastle-Norwich as the only fixture for last Sunday.  Who knew that the Magpies and Canaries would put on such a fine show?  The final score reads 6-2 in favor of Newcastle but it was a much closer match than the score would indicate.  And a highly entertaining contest, too - beautiful crosses raining down in the box all afternoon with attackers applying clinical finishes to many of them.

Georginio Wijnaldum of Newcastle celebrates after scoring his fourth and Newcastle's sixth goal 2015 Newcastle United

No one enjoyed the day more than Georginio (Gini) Wijnaldum, who put four past Norwich keeper John Ruddy, all of them of the highest quality, no cheapies.  Mitrovic had a nice one where he took a long pass off his chest at the 18, let it bounce once, and buried the shot.  I made it this week's YouTubeable Moment because things were still tense at that point.  Perez also got one, based on superior footwork and concentration.  Norwich's two were special too - excellent crosses with difficult finishes.  Not a great day for defenders.

And as much fun as the match was, I need to be the glass is 5/8ths empty guy now.  First, despite scoring early and often, Newcastle were not in the clear until late.  1-0 became 1-1, 3-1 became 3-2.  From 45-60 minutes, with Newcastle up 3-2, Norwich was in total control and I had resigned myself to a 3-4 or maybe even 3-5 loss.  Two quick counterattacking tallies at 64 and 66 minutes put the margin at 5-2 and everyone started to breath easier.  Second, the match could have been 3-6 by the 60th minute since Norwich hit the post twice, had a certain goal cleared off the line by Wijnaldum (!)  and were denied a penalty shot when Anthony Taylor declined to call Janmaat for a shirt pull in the box.  He did indeed tug the attacker's shirt but I don't think that was why he fell and with all the shirt pulling we've seen it would have been just Newcastle's luck to get whistled.  Third, Newcastle is still not functioning well defensively.  It wasn't so much the back line this time but the midfielders failing to track back and stay with attackers (looking right at you Sissoko - the crosses were nice but you left Janmaat hung out to dry twice).  And fourth, this was Norwich.  But damn, that was some great finishing.


This Is Not My Beautiful Game

Went through a bunch of games this weekend but other than Newcastle, none were all that stirring..  Tottenham-Liverpool wasn't awful but...Neither team parked the bus and the ball moved well enough but both teams seemed to be able to cancel out the last pass or block the shot in a 0-0 draw.  Turned next to Chelsea-Aston Villa.  Ooh, not good, as Dennis will relate.  Okay, Everton-Man United will be better.  Well there was some good finishing but not really a compelling match.  Man United has been looking pretty good lately so maybe the easy 3-0 win shouldn't have been a surprise.  Watford-Arsenal?  The Hornets fought gamely but once the Gunners had their first, the match wasn't in doubt.  Swansea didn't look like themselves and went down to Stoke 0-1 on a penalty shot.  Man City didn't seem to be too troubled by Bournemouth as they rolled to a 5-1 win to stay atop the EPL.

Wish I had seen Southampton-Leicester; that sounded a bit more exciting.  Dennis's shadow team continues to impress.  My back up, Crystal Palace spent the second half down a man and ended up surrendering two goals in the last five minutes, losing 1-3 at home to West Ham; didn't see the match but I'm sure somehow it was Alan Pardew's fault.

I saw the halftime score of 2-0 to Southampton while watching another match, so I only watched the second half.  But when Leicester is involved, the second half is all you need to watch.  Vardy managed to score 2 for Leicester including the equalizer in stoppage time and, in all honesty, the more surprising fact is that he actually missed an excellent chance to score that equalizer ten minutes earlier.  Seriously, I have said it before and I’ll say it again – just watch them play already!  Their intensity cannot be matched and it brings a level of excitement that Aston Villa some teams can only dream of achieving.

Give it Away, Give it Away, Give it Away Now

I swear, the Aston Villa players must all be blasting this Red Hot Chili Peppers classic before every match.  I thought their giveaway problems were bad before this match but Guzan and Lescott decided to take it up a notch in the 34^th minute.  Guzan threw a routine outlet to Lescott who miscontrolled it directly to Willian at the edge of the box, leading to an easy Costa finish.  Usually we at least make the other team work a little to capitalize on our mistakes, but I guess this is easier.  Costa scored again early in the second half on a lucky deflection to seal the 2-0 loss.

This was easily the most frustrating loss of the season.  Chelsea looked like garbage and we simply handed them two goals instead of earning a probably deserved point.  Not that Aston Villa looked great or anything, but when both sides are terrible, it really hurts to not even get the draw.  I went to WhoScored.com to see if the Villans pass completion percentage for this match was worse than their season average since it felt like they gave the ball away at every opportunity.  While the results did not support my theory - 80% season average compared to 78% for this match - I did find the best summary of this match (and most of their matches this season):

Team showed no significant strengths indeed…

Fast Forwarded Past the First Goal

I couldn't even hit the stop button on the remote quickly enough to catch the Red Bulls first goal against the Union.  Seven seconds! And we had the tap!  Things proceeded downhill from there, ending up as a 4-1 win for the home side.  Dallas won its match too so they are still tied with the Reds Bulls for the Supporters Shield, except that the team that plays in New Jersey has a six goal lead on goal differential.  So if the Red Bulls win over Chicago, Dallas would need to beat San Jose by six.




Derby Derby

Two big derbys Sunday.  The Tyne-Wear derby is at 8 am, with Newcastle traveling to the Stadium of Perpetually Changing Managers to face Sunderland.  Sunderland have been awful but Newcastle can't seem to get anything going in this derby.  At 10 am, Man United and Man City square off at Old Trafford.  Both look to be in fine form so here's hoping for an entertaining match.  If you need more on Sunday, there's also Liverpool hosting Southampton at noon; that could be interesting football.  You'll have to stream Tottenham-Bournemouth as they also play at 10 am Sunday.

Of course, this is all after a crowded Saturday, which for some reason is mostly set for 10 am.  The TV games are Leicester-Crystal Palace on USA (ooh, shadow BFS derby!) and a London derby - West Ham hosting Chelsea on NBCSN.  Arsenal takes on Everton at 12:30 on NBC; the Toffees haven't been looking so good lately so this could be a tough assignment.

In England, they turn the clocks back this weekend so the games will be an hour later than usual this Sunday and next Saturday.  Adjust your alarm clocks as necessary.

Dos a Cero (Mas Tres)

They call it the international break but there was no respite from the bad news.  Though there was some positive results mixed in, they were few and far between and, again, my Football Manager Chester Blues were the brightest spot of the week (3-1 win over Portsmouth to move into second in the EPL).

Though high on entertainment value, what with the two comebacks, the 2-0 (+3) loss to Mexico still goes down as a pretty devastating loss.  But it might have been better than a win on PKs, which could have buried the lead story, namely, that they played like crap.  Hard to say how much of the poor performance was because of the game plan and how much was execution.  Klinsmann, feeling that this was a critical match, went with a largely veteran roster.  Not going to fault him too much for that.  But he also seemed to have laid out a game plan that conceded the first two-thirds of the field to Mexico and relied on set pieces and quick counters for any offense.  Well that's not the type of team he told us he was building.  As for execution, how many passes went directly to the opposition, how many times were US players beaten to the ball, how often did they just look, well, not fast enough?  Old and crafty might work but old and slow doesn't. 

This column by Ridge Mahoney is one of the more measured critiques of Klinsmann.  The "grit and determination" that he cites was certainly on display Saturday, especially after falling behind in extra time.  But, as he also notes, grit and determination were never in short supply for US teams. The problem was/is they could/can only take us so far.  Looking at the Saturday night's roster, how many of those players do you see on the 2018 World Cup roster?  Bottom line, it feels like there's a lot of work to be done.

A Krul Twist

In warmups before the Netherlands-Kazakhstan Euro qualifier, the Dutch number one keeper Cillessen injured himself. Number two keeper, Newcastle's Tim Krul started and was doing well until he landed awkwardly, rupturing a ligament.  The Magpies will now be without their number one keeper for the rest of the season.  We didn't even have a match this weekend and there was bad news for Newcastle.

Not that everything was great for the Dutch either.  Though they defeated Kazakhstan, they lost to the Czech Republic and failed to even grab one of the third place playoff spots, meaning they will not be in next year's European Championships, despite the expanded field.  Hard to imagine the Netherlands not in the top 24 in Europe.

Belgium fared much better, notching a couple of wins and finishing top of their group.  This is a talented group that has arguably underachieved to date.  They may need to win something soon before they find they are past their prime. Excellent article on the Red Devils here.  I'm am really trying to get Alex Witsel on my Chester team but so far he claims no interest in joining.

A few other Euro tidbits.  England won all ten of their qualifying matches.  Gibraltar and Andorra lost all of theirs; Gilbraltor takes last place on the strength (?) of a minus 54 goal differential (2 for, 56 against), well ahead of Andorra's minus 32.  And we saw a dismaying number of matches on artificial grass, including the one in Kazakhstan where Krul was hurt.  I get that they may not be able to grow grass there but did you notice all the brown patches?  They can't even have green artificial turf.  Dennis pointed out perhaps the most offensive sight of the weekend - England playing Estonia at Wembley Stadium with the football lines (and a giant NFL logo to boot) from the Jets-Dolphins game still visible on the pitch.

D'oh

The Red Bulls stumbled on their way to the Supporters Shield, losing 1-2 to Toronto while FC Dallas was winning 2-0 over Vancouver.  The two sides are now tied with two matches remaining.  The schedule seems to favor NJ/NY, with matches against the Union and the Chicago Fire.


 Utley Slide - Red or Yellow?

Was it just reckless or did he use excessive force?  Some have argued no foul because he got the ball was able to reach the base.  As we've explained before, it doesn't matter if you got the ball if you commit a foul in the process.  Red card for me, deserving of suspension. If this was soccer I mean.

Speaking of baseball, the St. Louis Cardinals won 100 regular season games but were ousted from the playoffs by the Chicago Cubs.  This early exit reminds me that my disenchantment with baseball began, not with the Phillies decline, but paradoxically with their finest season, 2011.  What was the point of assembling a team like that when, to even get to the NLCS, you had to go through a best of five crapshoot?  That was an awesome team that is a mere footnote in history because of the post season failure.  But that means they couldn't do it in the clutch right so by definition they couldn't be all that good.  Maybe your definition.  I remember being disappointed that Cliff Lee didn't hold a lead in game 2.  Guess he's not a clutch player.  Except in 2009 he was 4-0 in post season with a 1.58 ERA in 40 IP (and a bad-ass, seemingly FU catch in the World Series.  Turns out he was thinking of letting it drop to try and get a double play but decided against it).  Maybe he had a character transplant that took out his "clutchness."  Or maybe, it's a just a small numbers problem.

Contrast that with Chelsea, which won the EPL by a fairly wide margin of eight points last year.  Their performance in the two biggest playoff type competitions was mediocre; they lost in the Round of 16 in the Champions League and lost in the Fourth Round of the FA (to Bradford no less).  Okay, they did win the Capital One League Cup but who talks about that?  My point is that the 2014-2015 Chelsea is clearly recognized as the best team in the EPL last year on the strength of league play, not any of the playoff type stuff.  It's very straightforward - you play every team twice, once at home and once on the road.


Back to Work

EPL is back and the weekend starts off (7:45 NBCSN) with bang - Tottenham-Liverpool at White Hart Lane.  Off recent form you'd be tempted to favor Spurs here but Liverpool may get a bounce playing their first under new manager Jurgen Klopp.  The 10 am TV matches are Chelsea-Aston Villa (oooh, probably not the time or place for the Villans to find some points) on USA and the more appetizing Everton-Man United on NBCSN.  The late Saturday TV match features Arsenal traveling to Watford.  Can't imagine what the powers-that-be were thinking when they made Newcastle-Norwich the featured only match on Sunday; that's one scintillating match-up.  Even without Krul, this really has to be a win for the Magpies so watch out for the St. James' Park crowd if Newcastle fall behind.

You'll have to go on-line but it might be worth it to see Southampton host Leicester City.  I'm betting Dennis will stream that one.  Refereeing obligations will probably keep me from seeing the London derby featuring Crystal Palace and West Ham.  First place Man City is also demoted to on-line this week, probably on the basis of their opponent, Bournemouth.

After taking in the Newcastle-Norwich classic, you might want to check in on the Red Bulls-Union match (3pm on TCN) in Harrison, New Jersey, where the Union have already won twice this year.  Wait, what?  Wow, that's correct.  Not holding my breath for a third, especially given the importance of the match to the Red Bulls.

Going to be chilly this weekend.  I suggest getting a fire going and watch soccer.

Good Until It Wasn't

As a teenager, Dennis once offered up a succinct review of the film Chronicles of Narnia, stating "it was a good movie until it started to suck."  That would be my review of the 1-6 Newcastle loss to Manchester City this weekend.  The first 41 or so minutes couldn't have been better, especially the header by Mitrovic that had given the Magpies a 1-0 lead.  The late first half goal by Aguero, which seemed only annoying at the time, was really foreshadowing a disaster.  Three goals in four minutes and five goals in 13 minutes left the score at 1-6 by the 62nd minute.  Five of the six tallies were from Aguero.  Somebody was going to pay for his scoring drought.  Unfortunately it was Newcastle.

So, heading into the international break off this defeat, Newcastle sit in last place with three points from eight games.  I choose to look at the bright side because I am a glass is 1/16th full kind of guy.  Looking through the eight matches so far, I would argue that had things gone okay, the Magpies would still only have six points right now.  Losses to Chelsea, Arsenal, Man United, and Man City were pretty likely.  Draws against Southampton at home and Swansea City and West Ham on the road should have garnered three points.  Watford at home should definitely have been a win.  They missed the five points from the West Ham, Swansea and Watford games but picked up unexpected points in the draws against Chelsea and Man United.  That's a net loss of three points.  Probably shouldn't panic at this point but I'm guessing they will.  I probably will too if they don't come away with a good number of points (say eight) in the next four matches against Norwich (H), Sunderland (A), Stoke City (H) and Bournemouth (A).


Meanwhile, Up in Birmingham

Dennis is away so he won't be telling us whether 'tis better to have led and gotten your ass kicked then never to have scored at all.  I didn't see the match so all I know is that his Villans lost 0-1 to Stoke in the friendly confines of Villa Park.  This was not the result he was looking for.


Merseyside Derby

Interesting enough.  Certainly spirited if not filled with goals.  Everton remain with just one win over their rivals in the last 18 matches.  But the draw was not enough for Brendan Rodgers to keep his job.  The mild mannered, generally reserved Jurgen Klopp will be taking over. His former club, Borussia Dortmund tweeted:


Arsenal - Manchester United was exciting for about 19 minutes, or as long as it took the Gunners to fire three past David DeGea.  The goals, especially the two by Sanchez, were of the highest quality (YouTubeable quality in fact) but we were left with 70+ minutes of non-descript "action."  Best match of the weekend for me was Chelsea-Southampton.  Willian put in a free kick of even higher quality than his strike last week against Newcastle to give Chelsea the early lead.  But the Saints leveled things just before half-time, then added two in the second half to stun the reeling Blues 3-1.  Didn't see the Swansea-Tottenham 2-2 draw but sounded like a decent match; Michael B seemed happy enough, both with the result and the overall trend of his Spurs.  Luke P simply said "f Spurs."


Back Up Plans

With our respective sides currently residing in 20th and 18th, Dennis and I have been scouting replacement sides should Aston Villa and Newcastle be in the Championship Division next year.  Dennis has always had an affinity for Leicester's style of play since they were promoted last year and their recent form suggests they'll be around for awhile.  Me, I've been developing a growing attachment to Crystal Palace and have seen most of their matches this season.  I realize it looks like I'm following Pardew around and maybe there is something to that.  While's the jury's still out on whether he's in the top echelon of managers, he has clearly demonstrated that he is not woeful, as many Newcastle fans still suggest.  The best way to get me backing somebody is to trash him unfairly.  But it's more than that.  I always liked Cabaye and hope that other EPL talents take to heart his cautionary tale about chasing the money.  And there are other exciting players as well, like Yannick Bolasie, Wilfried Zaha, and Dwight "Crystal" Gayle.  Maybe backups won't be necessary but it never hurts to be prepared.


EPL Sack Race

When we last checked in, Dick Advocaat and Brendan Rogers were 1-2 on the list.  Gone and gone.  Top spots now belong to Newcastle's Steve McClaren (15 to 8) and Chelsea's Jose Mourinho (11 to 4).  Tim Sherwood (Aston Villa) has worked his way up to number three at 6 to 1.  The deadly accuracy of the oddmakers so far this year should make all three very afraid for their jobs.


Playoffs? Playoffs?

Finally the mathematics caught up with reality and the Union are officially out of the playoffs after a 1-3 loss to Toronto.  They are also out of a CEO as Nick Sakiewicz was removed from the position this week.  In a letter to fans explaining the change, Chairman Jay Sugarman also indicated that they are still trying to identify the right person to fill the role of Sporting Director; this would be someone "with significant experience to add to the MLS knowledge of Jim Curtin and Chris Albright and help us materially improve our player acquisition processes, player evaluation methods and player development capabilities."  That does sound like someone who might have had a more organized approach to personnel moves and wouldn't have ended up with 12 goalkeepers but not enough scoring punch.

Up the turnpike, the MLS New Jersey franchise d/b/a (doing business as) the New York Red Bulls gave themselves some breathing space with a pair of 2-1 wins over Columbus and Montreal.  One point in their final three matches gives them the Eastern Conference; the Supporters Shield race is a little tighter and right now they need six to lock it away.


How Many Countries in This Country?

Four, and three look to be advancing to the Euro Championships next spring.  England and Northern Ireland are already in and Wales look to be a lock as well.  Only Scotland, after a draw with Poland on Thursday won't be in moving ahead.  Ireland are at least in the playoffs of third place finishers after a 1-0 win over Germany on a cracking goal by Shane Long.  They play Poland on Sunday (2:30 ESPN) but will need to win since they trail in the tie breaker.  Maybe the most interesting stuff is the Netherlands fighting to even get into the third place playoffs.  They trail Turkey by two points but the Turks have to play Iceland and the Czech Republic so they have no easy points left while the Dutch a golden opportunity to snag three against Kazakhstan before facing the Czech Republic.

BFS favorite Belgium are in pretty good shape, especially with Andorra as their next opponent. With all their talent, this is a side that should challenge for the championship next spring.

Aside from Euro qualifying, this international break also features CONMEBOL World Cup qualifying matches.  CONMEBOL is the incredibly intuitive acronym for the South American soccer federation (derived from CONfedercion  SudaMEricana de futBOL - now how hard was that?).  Upsets in the first round of games include Ecuador stunning a Messi-less (and eventually Aquero-less) Argentina and Chile besting Brazil (maybe not that much of an upset).  Five of the ten members get spots in the World Cup - well really four and one gets to play a side from another federation in a play-in match.

Here at home, we have the US-Mexico playoff for a spot in the Confederations Cup (9:30 pm kickoff on Saturday night on FS1).  Mexico are in disarray over their coaching situation but the US aren't exactly poised for the kill after their weak showing in the Gold Cup.  Klinsmann has gone with a veteran-heavy roster (though without Omar Gonzalez, likely based on poor recent form?) so maybe we'll see a better performance.  But, this does not have the dos a cero feel of recent encounters.

Hey, we can sleep in this weekend!