Who's Worthy?

The current thinking is that the EPL is going to get five spots in the Champions League this year.  Based on this week's results, maybe they should just get one.  Most of the top ten sides dropped points.   To wit:

Bournemouth - 6 points, losing to Wolves and Brighton

Arsenal - 5 points, losing to West Ham and drawing with Nottingham Forest

Nottingham Forest - 5 points losing to Newcastle and drawing with Arsenal

Man City - 3 points losing to Liverpool

Chelsea - 3 points losing to Aston Villa

Newcastle - 3 points losing to Liverpool

Fulham - 3 points losing to Crystal Palace

Aston Villa - 3 points losing to Crystal Palace

Of the top ten, only Liverpool and Brighton came away unscathed.  It's fair to point out that some of those losses don't seem too bad.  I mean, just about everybody loses to Liverpool.  On the other hand, it's not like everybody behind them hasn't been exposed at least to some degree.

Exhibit A - Newcastle

Two more for Isak

Does this say Magpies or what?  Even as they were improving their position in the table they were demonstrating that they are probably not Champions League material.  They came out strong against Nottingham Forest and of course ceded a goal against the run of play.  Properly refocused, they proceeded to pour in four goals in 11 minutes.  Ah, but you know what they say about three goal leads. Newcastle spent the second half trying to give away the three points and were a bit lucky to come away with the 4-3 win.  So basically, Newcastle exposed Forest in the first half and Forest returned the favor in the second half.  

Hardly a surprise then that Newcastle offered nothing in a 2-0 loss to Liverpool at Anfield on Wednesday.  An xG of .31 says most of what you need to know.  It's not like they were blown out of the water but it's also true they could have played through this weekend and the Magpies would not have scored.  Certainly not having Isak (groin injury) didn't help.

And yet, there they sit sixth in the table, within four points of third, three out of fourth and two behind Chelsea in fifth.

Exhibit B - Aston Villa

Just as I was negotiating with myself that a 1-1 draw with Chelsea was just fine, Marco Asensio got the game winner in the 89th minute.  As you can see in this week's YouTubeableMoment, it was partly a great volley by Asensio and partly a howler by Chelsea keeper Jorgensen.  Note that Marcus Rashford had two assists.  Villa then went to Selhurst Park and absolutely stunk up the joint, losing 4-1.  They managed two shots on target and an xG of .55.  They sit 10th in the table but it's so packed they are just six points out of third.  

Exhibit C - Arsenal

The Gunners were in theory the strong number two side in the EPL.  They proceeded to lose 0-1 at home to West Ham and could only manage a 0-0 draw at Nottingham Forest.  Okay, they were down a man from 73 minutes on versus West Ham but they were already losing.  At Forest, they managed just one shot on target - Gunners my butt.  They are still solidly in second place but that was some shaky stuff from them.

And the rest

Yes, we've been speculating about their possible imminent demise of Nottingham Forest for a few weeks now and certainly the first half against Newcastle looked like the stroke of midnight for Cinderella.  That they didn't give up and made that match uncomfortably close and they played Arsenal tough suggests they may be made of sterner stuff.  Man City has had flashes of brilliance but they were totally undone by Liverpool and hardly sparkled in a narrow 1-0 win over Tottenham (sorry, Spurs).  This is the fourth best club in the EPL?  And then there's Chelsea, who's inconsistency this season is matched only by Newcastle.  They would get that new fifth spot if the season ended today.

The bad news is that the title race is over.  The "good" news is that, in the absence of quality, the fight for the other three or four Champions League spots could be interesting.

Wolves Pulling Away?

With their 1-0 win over Bournemouth, Wolves are now five points clear of relegation.  The other three clubs - Ipswich, Leicester and Southampton - lost both of their respective matches by a collective 3-21.  

The Wrong Dive 

De Ligt's pull not penalized

In stoppage time at Goodison Park in a 2-2 match, Andy Madley signaled for PK for a foul against
Ashley Young.  You can see the play here (sorry I had to use the highlights again but didn't find a good video of just the incident).  Much to unpack and much wasn't really made clear until after the fact.  I was focused on de Ligt's shirt pull but that wasn't what Madley called - he had the foul on Maguire instead.  So the VAR review has to start there.  I think they got that right.  Maguire didn't really do anything.  The shirt pull is not ignored but it is now reviewed in a completely different context.  Was it a clear and obvious error that the shirt pull was not called on the field?  My rule is that if the shirt is pulled away from the body, I call it but that's just me.  There have been several instances where the shirt pull has been waved away as "fleeting."  If Madley had whistled De Ligt for the foul, I doubt VAR would have overturned it but that was not the situation here. ESPN has a helpful explanation of the whole thing here.

Frankly, I blame Young.  He opted for the dive to sell the Maguire contact but he should have fallen backwards to sell the de Ligt shirt pull. Gotta know your audience.

Did You Wonder Where the Yellow Went?

It's not Daylight Saving Time yet but the balls are white again

I did.  I thought the yellow balls were supposed to used until they moved to daylight saving time.  I remember in last Wednesday's Aston Villa - Liverpool match that the balls were white.  Then all the balls were white this weekend.  There is some explanation of the change here, but it doesn't tell us why they moved away from the high visibility ball while it was still winter (i.e. dark).  There may be a hint in the article.  Apparently, the EPL doesn't want Nike's balls anymore and is switching to Puma.  If I were Nike, what would I do?  Introduce one more official EPL ball before our contract expires to spur retail sales.  Kinda obvious, right?

Union Undefeated

Didn't get to see more than the highlights so I can't say much about the Union's 4-1 win over Orlando.  Good to see the names Baribo, Gazdag and Uhre on the scoresheet.  Mixed feeling about seeing Blake with six saves.  Good that he makes them, bad that he has to make that many.  Orlando were predicted for an upper table finish so maybe this is good.

FA Cup Again

We are into the fifth round with eight matches.  Fixture list is here.  Newcastle have a tricky match up with Brighton but at least it's at home.  Aston Villa are home versus Cardiff City (a Friday match).  Liverpool, Arsenal and Chelsea are already out so I'd make Man City the prohibitive favorite at this point, especially given that there opponent this weekend is the lowest rank side left in the competition - Plymouth.  

Laura and I will be at Subaru Park for the Union home opener against FC Cincinnati.  Figures to be a tough one plus it looks like the temperature will drop about 15 degrees over the course of the match.  

Oh man, more mid-week football as Champions League, Europa Cup and Europa Conference League all get down to the serious business of the Round of 16.  Champions League fixtures are spread over Tuesday and Wednesday.  Europa Cup and Conference League are all crammed into Thursday.  Check your local listings as they say.

Also, do not miss Dennis's travelogue piece on his trip to the Midlands.  So much stuff we had to make a separate post.  

Score Like An Egyptian

Apologies to The Bangles

Marmoush: Salah's got nothing on me
AP/Martin Rickett/PA via AP

Newcastle were completely and quickly undone by a 14 minute hat trick by Man City's latest acquisition Omar Marmoush.  He comes to Man City by way of Egypt and Eintracht Frankfurt.  Marmoush netted goals at 19, 24 and 33 minutes and the match was effectively over at that point.  They added a late goal to make the final 4-0.  The Magpies generated an xG of a whopping .4, giving you an idea of how interesting this one was to watch.

History told us this would be rough.  Newcastle's last win there was a League Cup victory in October 2014; the last Premier League win was September 2000.  But there have been a lot of draws, right? No, just a pair in November 2006 and December 2005.  The record back to September 2000 is 2-2-20.

At Least We Were Supposed to Lose

Dennis and Brenna face the Birmingham press after
Ipswich held Villa to a 1-1 draw

Things weren't much better south in Birmingham, where Dennis and Brenna were on hand to see Aston Villa drop two points to 18th place Ipswich.  Actually, it's a little worse than that.  Ipswich played down a man from the 40th minute on and were actually up 1-0 until Ollie Watkins rescued a point for the Villans with a goal in the 69th minute.  

The kids were able to score tickets for the midweek match versus Liverpool and saw a much better contest.  Though the home side couldn't hold the lead, the 2-2 draw against the league leaders was very satisfying.  Too bad about the gift goal in the first half and Malen's near miss right at the whistle.

We'll get more travelogue from Dennis for next week's post.

El Crapico

Or the Dysfunctional Derby. Whichever.  Two of the more enigmatic disappointing sides of this season - Tottenham and Manchester United - met in London.  On the positive side, it was a tense, close match that Spurs won 1-0 on a decent early goal from James Maddison.  But don't confuse close with quality.  This did indeed look like two lower mid-table teams; to paraphase George Costanza it was like two old men fighting over soup at a deli.  Both Postecoglou and Amorim are still employed so we can say that no managers were sacked in the making of this match.

Damage to Champions League Cred

Newcastle weren't the only side to with a result that leads one to question their Champions League ambitions.  Chelsea lost to Brighton for the second time in 10 days.  The 2-1 loss in the FA Cup was bad enough but this one was a 3-0 thrashing that looked about right.  Both the Magpies and the Blues were passed by Bournemouth in the table after the Cherries got their 3-1 win at Southampton.  Nottingham Forest lost 2-1 away to Fulham but do retain 3rd place for the moment.  

Right now, only Liverpool and Arsenal (2-0 winners over Leicester) look worthy of Champions League berths.  Man City's win over Newcastle isn't enough for us to start talking them up, especially after a second loss to Real Madrid in this year's version of that competition.

The View at the Bottom

Ipswich was the only side in the bottom four to grab a point this weekend.  It's looking more and more like three sides vying for two spots.  Southampton, at 9 points look like toast.  Wolves are at 19 points,  while Ipswich and Leicester have 17; Wolves do have an advantage on goal differential right now too.  Those three still have matches against each other in April and May.

A Vote in Favor of New Champions League and Europa Cup Format

Those two-legged ties to earn a place in the final 16 of both Champions League and Europa Cup produced some good viewing.  Not PSG-Brest (10-0) obviously but how about Bayern - Celtic?  The Germans were expected to bury the Scots except stout defending (some of it from ex-Union player Austin Trusty) from Celtic left that match 2-2 on aggregate until Alphonso Davies got the game winner at 90+4.  Atalanta were expected to rally from a 1-2 deficit at home except Club Brugge made it 5-1 by halftime.  PSV trailed Juventus late but rallied to send the match into extra time, then got the game winner eight minutes into extra time.

We knew him when - Carranza nets the game winner 
for Feyenoord (AP Photo/Luca Bruno)

The best was Milan - Feyenoord.  Milan came home trailing 0-1 but were expected to show the Dutch how to play this game.  Indeed, they scored within the first minute.  That was it though.  Part of the problem was that Theo Hernandez got a second yellow at 51 minutes, which did us all a favor by making the final 40+ minutes a blast.  Feyenoord got the game winner on a picture perfect header by Julian Carranza, this week's YouTubeableMoment.  Yeah, that's the same Julian Carranza the Philadelphia Union will be seeking to replace this season.

The Europa Cup had some fun stuff too, like Roma - Porto (4-3 on aggregate for Roma) and Ajax versus Union Saint-Gilloise.  Check out this bicycle kick from Porto's Samuel Aghehowa.  [Side note: finding specific videos from Champions League and Europa Cup has been difficult so I've had to go to game highlights and have the video start from the particular play I want to feature.]

The round of 16 draws for both competitions are Friday at 6 am, which means that by the time you sit down to read this, the fixtures will be known.

What If They Had A League and Nobody Came?

Another season of the Apple Major League Soccer kicks off on Saturday and I am struggling to get interested.  No doubt some of this is due to the poor condition of our home side, the Phladelphia Union.  In my defense, I will note that I religiously followed Newcastle through some very lean years, including one in the Championship Division.  Perhaps a bigger part is that watching the games is difficult and/or impossible.  If Saturday night's home opener at Orlando was on any medium on which I could watch a replay of the match without seeing the final score, I would get to it later on Saturday night.  Thanks to MLS Season Pass, this can't happen.

Then there is the team.  The Union finished 12th last year.  Until this week, there had been no roster moves of any consequence.  Isn't 12th place a likely finish again?  Well, the MLS Experts had them 12th and Sports Illustrated 14th.  This week they did add Uruguayan striker Bruno Damiani, who does look like a promising addition.  But of course, the acquisition comes after the pre-season so Damiani will not have spent any meaningful time with the team before the season starts.  No word on whether there are visa issues.

We did re-up our season tickets so I will be at the home opener a week from Saturday. At least it won't be the hope that kills me.

Two For One

As if we haven't had enough mid-week football, this is a double match week so Monday again is our only off day.

Newcastle have Nottingham Forest at Saint James' Park on Sunday at 9 am and travel to Anfield to face Liverpool on Wednesday at 3:15.  Newcastle are big favorites versus Forest and that makes sense but recent form has been spotty enough to make me nervous about that one.  Zero expectations for the trip to Liverpool.  

Two best matches of the weekend are Aston Villa - Chelsea in the Saturday NBC feature match at 12:30 and Man City hosting Liverpool on Sunday at 11:30 on Peacock (oh yeah, they are definitely putting more of the big ones on Peacock).  Everton - Man United has interesting context in that they are 14/15 in the table and, as might be expected, Opta has that one as a tight match, with Everton slightly favored.

The midweek fixtures don't look all that enticing.  Tuesday I expect we'll go with Crystal Palace - Aston Villa, though the Brighton - Bournemouth match could be good.   If I wasn't watching Newcastle - Liverpool, I might look in to see how Nottingham Forest fare against Arsenal.  Thursday the only choice is West Ham - Leicester.  

Weather is threatening to break into the mid 50s next week but we'll get our outdoor activities in early.

  

In Praise of B Teams

Premier League teams often use these early round FA Cup matches as a chance to give their regulars a rest and we see some of the bench players.  A tipoff that this might be happening is when one of the midfielders wears #67 and is 18 years old.  With many teams dealing with league play and European competitions, this strategy makes sense but it can be risky.  Cursory analysis suggests that six teams tried it for this "weekend's" 4th round matches and though there were close calls, most got away with.

Joe Willock's brace was the difference for Newcastle

Exhibit A is Newcastle, who switched out nine starters for their away match at Birmingham (1st place in League One).  They fell behind in 44 seconds.  Though momentarily stunned, the Magpies did rally for two quick scraggly goals at 21 and 26 minutes.  Alas, a screamer from Iwata (seen here) leveled the match before halftime.  As the teams went back and forth in the second half, I kept telling myself that a loss to Birmingham would be embarrassing but not a bad thing.  Joe Willock rendered the issue moot with his second goal of the day on a shot that went between the keeper's wickets; not a pretty YouTubeableMoment but it did send Newcastle to the next round.  

Several others escaped but just barely.  Man City needed a late goal from substitute Kevin DeBruyne to snatch a 2-1 win over League One Leyton Orient.  Fulham barely edged League One Wigan 2-1 and Crystal Palace worked their butts off to defeat League Two Doncaster 2-0.  Nottingham Forest were nearly turned into a pumpkin by another Cinderella side, Exeter City (League Two).  Their match ended 2-2 in regular time and even up a man, Forest could not score in extra time.  They advanced only after going 4-2 on PKs.

Elliott's handball was Liverpool's undoing
Photo:Getty Images Sport

First place Liverpool were not so lucky against Plymouth (last in the Championship).  Manager Arne
Slot's gamble was bit riskier.  Often the manager will leave key players out of the starting lineup but bring them on as necessary to save the day.  Slot left Salah, Van Dijk, Gakpo, MacAllister and others at home.  Still, realistically, they had the horses to beat Plymouth.  But Elliott got called for handling in the box and the PK was converted.  Meanwhile, Liverpool did not take advantage of their chances (xG was 1.74) and the final was 1-0.

FA Cup By the Numbers

Records by division:

EPL 11-6

Championship 5-4

League One 0-5

League Two 0-1

So the "magical" aspect of the FA Cup is basically over with only teams from the top two divisions left.  Plymouth will be the lowest placed team going into the fifth round.

Biggest mismatches:

Doncaster - Crystal Palace (59 places)

Exeter - Nottingham Forest (59)

Leyton Orient - MCI (48)

Plymouth - Liverpool (43)

Birmingham - Newcastle (42)

Upsets

I count five upsets but four were pretty tame.  Certainly Plymouth over Liverpool was big.  Brighton 2-1 over Chelsea?  They are both top ten in the EPL.  Millwall 2-0 over Leeds?  Two Championship division sides separated by just 13 places.  Burnley's 1-0 win over Southampton?  Even though they are in different divisions, they're only separated by three places - Southampton last in EPL, Burnley third in Championship; in fact there's a high probability the two sides will switch divisions next year.  Lastly, Cardiff City (19th in the Championship) beat Stoke (18th in the Championship) on PKs.

With Liverpool and Chelsea bowing out, Nottingham Forest are the top side remaining.  Other top ten EPL sides still in the competition are Man City, Newcastle, Bournemouth, AstonVilla, Fulham and Brighton.

About That VAR

Because so many matches in the fourth round are at the smaller venues, VAR is not available.  Neither is goal line technology.  It takes some getting used to watching a goal that looks offside and then realizing there will be no wait for review - it's a goal.  Some think this is a good thing but others maybe not so much.

Harry Maguire (in red at the top) is clearly offside

Take Man United's stoppage time goal to lift them past Leicester 2-1.  Real time I was pretty sure Maguire was well offside.  The replay confirmed it (see picture left).  With VAR, the goal certainly would have been ruled out.  Leicester manager Ruud Van Nistelrooy was incensed, though interestingly he didn't moan about the lack of VAR just the poor judgment of the AR.  His quote:

VAR wasn't necessary.  That deals with centimetres and inches; this was half a metre.

I get his drift but apparently VAR was necessary.

The ball looks over the line in this picture

Newcastle may or may not have benefitted as well.  In real time, Joe Willock's shot was maybe stopped by the keeper just before it crossed the line.  The players acted as if it had been saved.  Assistant referee Nigel Lugg immediately waved his flag to indicate the ball had completely crossed the line.  See the picture right.  Two thoughts here.  Many suggest the picture shows the ball did not completely cross the line.  My eyes tell me it shows space between the back of the post and the front of the ball, indicating it's a goal. However, I will concede the picture was not taken right at the goal line and that it's possible that, after correcting for parallax error, the picture might show it had not completely crossed.  BUT... Note that Lugg had not reached the goal line when he had to make his call.  If he signalled goal because he saw space between the post and the ball, parallax error means the ball was even farther across the line than what his eyes told him.

This article at skysports identifies a couple other possible calls for which VAR might have yielded a different decision.

Ange's Bad Awful Week

Tottenham manager Ange Postecoglou has probably had better days.  Recall that Spurs were unceremoniously bounced from the Carabao Cup after a 4-0 loss at Anfield.  Sunday in an FA Cup tie with Aston Villa, Spurs were absolutely awful in the first half and were lucky to only be down 1-0 at the break.  They were marginally better in the second half but gave up another goal.  Only a stoppage time tally from new guy Mathys Tel made the score look a little better.  Eliminated from two cups in five days.  Not a good look.

Conversation That Could Never Have Taken Place

Dennis: Why do you keep comparing Villa Park to a cheap motel?

Steve: Because clean sheets are in short supply at both.

Heard at Halftime

I don't know who said it but Dennis reported when they cut to the studio after the turgid 0-0 first half between Plymouth and Liverpool somebody on the ESPN team led with:

This is where we normally bring you the highlights of the first half but there aren't any.  Literally nothing happened.

That'll leave a mark.

Boys Behaving Badly

Remember the reported dustup at halftime of the Newcastle - Aston Villa Boxing Day fixture?  That was the one where Duran got a red card and both sides were hot  - Newcastle because they thought Duran could have hurt Schar and Aston Villa because they thought Schar had "bought" the red card with his histrionics.  Also there was bad blood between Emery and Newcastle assistant Jason Tindall.  There was enough substance to the halftime mess that the FA had to investigate the particulars.  Their report is discussed here and here  Mostly the FA seems to be upset the both clubs saw at least some of their officials lose control and fined each of them.  Villa's fine was slightly higher and one of their personnel got a two match ban.

More Boys Behaving Badly

He started it. No, he started it first

Wednesday was the final Merseyside Derby to be held at Goodison Park.  It had everything, good and bad.  Back and forth action, lead changes, a lot of snarl.  In the end, it was a stoppage time goal from James Tarkowski that brought the match to a 2-2 "conclusion."  Except that wasn't quite the end.  Abdoulaye Doucoure decided to head over to the traveling Liverpool fan section and taunt the visitors.  Curtis Jones took exception.  Things deteriorated and it was a while before order was restored.  Doucoure and Jones both got yellows, the second for each that day, so they got red cards as well.  A Liverpool assistant got  red carded, as did head coach Arne Slot.

There were some complaints about Michael Oliver's refereeing from Liverpool, including how much extra time was played.  I watched and would say Oliver was maybe too quick with the whistle at times but was consistently so.  As for the added time to the added time, there was one goal kick over which Liverpool keeper Alisson took his sweet time and you could clearly see Oliver point to his watch indicating he would be adding more time.  Tough day for Oliver in his first match back after the Wolves - Arsenal match which saw him get death threats for issuing a red card.  I include the full highlights package of the match here and suggest it's worth the 12 minutes.

A statistical note - all-time, Everton and Liverpool conclude their time at Goodison Park completely even.  Each has won 41 times and there have been 38 draws.  Given that this is Everton's home park, that may not be entirely satsifying to Toffee fans, though snatching this draw will take some of the sting away. 

A Break in Sight

Well, for one day anyway.  Four Matchweek 25 fixtures catch our eye.  Of course there's the Man City - Newcastle match on Saturday at 10 (Peacock). Historically not a good fixture for the Magpies though City's recent form (including twice coughing up leads on Tuesday against Real Madrid before losing 2-3) does offer some hope.  I'd be thrilled with a point.

Second most intriguing is a "Managerial Sack Special" featuring Spurs and Man United Sunday at 11:30 on Peacock.  Both Postecoglou and Amiron are under the microscope, seemingly one or two more bad results away from a sacking.  Opta has this bascially dead even.  Do you suppose that a wretched 0-0 draw would be enough to get both fired?

Seeing if Nottingman Forest's fairy tale continues is the story for their 10 am match on Saturday (USA) away to Fulham. This looks like a tough but not impossible fixture for Forest.

We'll put Friday's 3 pm clash between Brighton and Chelsea on the list because 1) it's Friday! 2) both are in the top 10 and 3) Chelsea were dumped out of the FA Cup last weekend by the Seagulls.

Saturday's early 7:30 match with Leicester hosting Arsenal doesn't promise much reward for getting up early.  Competing for attention in the Saturday 10 am slot are Aston Villa - Ipswich, Southampton - Bournemouth and West Ham - Brentford.  I'd say go with one of my earlier recommendations.

The Saturday feature 12:30 on NBC is Crystal Palace - Everton.  Sunday at 9 you can check in on Liverpool - Wolves on USA.  

Monday you can take the day off - the first in almost two weeks.

But then we're right back at it with the second leg of both Champions League (Tuesday and Wednesday) and Europa Cup (Thursday) playoff action.

Also, there's a random EPL fixture thrown in the mix with Aston Villa hosting Liverpool at 2:30 on Wednesday on USA.  Villa are certainly underdogs here but they have a knack for making matches like this fun.  

I'm sure I forgot something but it's not my fault.

On the One Hand...

Newcastle don't look like a Champions League candidate. On the other hand, neither do most other teams as well.

D'oh - Newcastle snatch defeat from jaws of victory

Newcastle dropped a second straight home match against an upper mid-table side.  Fulham are not a bad team but the 1-2 loss says a lot.  This is not the formula for a top four finish.  The Mapgies were not awful. They did have 1-0 lead for much of the match.  But, there were plenty of holes in their game.  The two biggest for me is how easily they get dispossessed and sloppiness in passing -either directly to the opponent or soft enough that it's easily intercepted.  The stats across the board were fairly even - possession 47/53, shots 11/15, shots on target 4/4 and xG 1.02/1.60.  Okay, they do shade Fulham's way, especially the xG.  They weren't unlucky, just not good enough.

No Sun Farther South Either

Aston Villa were in fact more disappointing than Newcastle in a 2-0 loss to Wolves.  More possession and more shots did not help the Villans.  Actually a pretty dismal affair for the NBC feature match.  As we will discuss below under Turning Over the Inventory, the Aston Villa line up may be in for a significant shakeup.

Reports of Nottingham Forest's Death Are Greatly Exaggerated

Chris Wood on the way to a hat trick
Photo:Getty

Or at least premature.  They pounded Brighton 7-0, in stark contrast to get mauled by Bournemouth last week.  The xG of 3.50 - .94 seems really light to me; this felt every bit of a 7-0 blowout.  They had a two goal lead by 25 minutes.  Then Chris Wood put up a natural hat trick with goals at 32, 64 and 69; he's tied with Isak for third best in the EPL at 17 goals (no bonus points for knowing that Salah and Haaland are 1-2).  Two late goals just served to put on exclamation point on the win.  Even with Chelsea's 2-1 win over West Ham on Monday, Forest sit in third with a four point cushion.  Arsenal crushing Man City 5-1 helped on that front as well.  

Streaks Ending

Bournemouth's 11 game unbeaten streak came to a close with an 0-2 loss to Liverpool.  Southampton got their first win in 13 matches, a streak running back to a 1-0 win over Everton on November 2. And Spurs got their first win in seven matches with a 2-0 result at Brentford.   We note that xG was 1.93-.89 favor the Bees so this might have been a touch lucky; given that xG says Spurs have been exceedingly unlucky this season, maybe it is starting to even out.

Turning Over the Inventory

By my count, Aston Villa were the most active player in the January transfer window.  I count 21 loan or transfer deals - six in and fifteen out.  And this wasn't just rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic.  Big names out include Diego Carlos, Jhon Duran and Emi Buendia.  Notable incoming players are Donyell Malen (F), Marco Asensio (F), Andres Garcia (RB), Axel Disasi (CB) and Marcus Rashford (cue dramatics).  Garcia and Disasi might start on Sunday in the FA Cup match against Spurs and expect Rashford to make an appearance.

Newcastle, in stark contrast, made eight moves, every one of them a transfer or loan out.  This is not necessarily a bad thing.  I would rather them find out what they have versus making risky signings in a chase for a Champions League berth.  Not that they really have financial room to do that right now anyway.

Conversation That Could Have Taken Place and Sort of Did

Dennis:  I heard that Arsenal will not celebrate Easter this year?

Steve: Yes, because Jesus will not be returning.

Now We Really Carabao It

Bouncing back nicely from Saturday's defeat against Fulham, Newcastle completely stymied Arsenal in the second leg of the Carabao Cup semi-final and walked away with a 4-0 aggregate win.  Jacoby Murphy and Anthony Gordon got the goals in the second leg and the three man back line (Schar, Botman and Burn) was well-organized.  The Murphy goal (seen here as this week's YouTubeableMoment and again here from the Toon Army perspective) at 19 minutes was key to putting this tie to bed.  At 3-0, the Gunners had an incredibly difficult road back into the match.

Spur were less successful holding their first leg 1-0 lead.  Though they held Liverpool at bay for over half an hour, once the dam was broken, the goals poured in.  The 4-0 final looked about right.  Tottenham didn't manage a shot on target.  

So Liverpool and Newcastle will meet on Sunday March 16 at Wembley.  Yes it's the least prestigious of the competitions but it's a chance for Newcastle to earn some hardware.

We Don't Have Jack

Hard to be happy that McGlynn is leaving, even if
it was a lot of money

In a move that might seem surprising but really isn't, the Union sold midfielder Jack McGlynn to the Houston Dynamo.  After all the highlights he's provided over the last several years, most are sorry to see him go.  Normally, you would think clubs would like to hang on to talented 21 year-olds but this isn't quite as nuts as it sounds.  First, for over a year now, they have been actively shopping McGlynn to European clubs but never found the right deal.  The Houston offer was $2.1 million up front with up to $1.3 million more depending on performance bonuses.  They were highly unlikely to get anything like this from a European club.  Second, his two shortcomings - lack of speed and limited defensive skills - stand out more in the system that the Union play.  Fair enough.  But selling popular players is risky business and all eyes will be on management to see how the money is spent.  As usual, we can count on Jonathan Tannenwald to give us the facts and in-depth analysis, which can be found here.

 

Another FA Cup Weekend

This extended weekend sees the 16 fourth round matches for the FA Cup.  Newcastle will travel to England's Second City to face Birmingham Saturday at 12:45; that must be considered some kind of feature match because it's the only fixture in that time slot.  Most interesting match up for me is Tottenham-Aston Villa at 12:35 on Sunday.  Both sides are coming off of disappointing performances.  One wonders if Postecoglou survives a loss here; that would mean Spurs had been bounced from two cups in four days.

Nice of the schedulers to give us some weekday action.  Friday at 3 we have Man United - Leicester.  Monday we can watch Crystal Palace - Doncaster (the lowest ranked side still in the competition).  There's even a Tuesday fixture with Exeter City hosting Nottingham Forest.  Thanks guys.

Except...your better choice on Tuesday is Man City - Real Madrid in the first leg of their playoff tie to advance to the Champions League Round of 16.  A shock that these two didn't make the top eight and now one of them is going home early.  There are seven other Champions League matches spread over Tuesday and Wednesday.  Add in Europa League playoff fixtures on Thursday and there's a complete viewing week for you. 

After the day off on Tuesday, we'll have 12 straight days of football.  Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow.

Whatever It Takes

With several key matches on Peacock, a short Saturday schedule and an extended Sunday schedule bumping up against the Eagles, catching all the important action required some serious planning and watching matches on replay long after everybody else went to bed.  It's a tough job but somebody's got to do it.  

A Professional Win

I don't know who said it but it is an apt description of Newcastle's 3-1 victory at Southampton.  They fell behind early, kept their poise, got maybe a favorable VAR decision (see This Week in Refereeing below) and then pulled away for a 3-1 win.  Isak got two of the goals - one a PK and the other, this week's YouTubeableMoment; the precision pass from Jacob Murphy is almost as good as Isak's touch and finish.  Tonali also got on the board with an early second half goal that allowed the Magpies some breathing room.

This was in no sense a great performance and they never did quite enough to put the win completely to bed.  In fact, things could have gotten a touch dicey had a 85th minute tally from Southampton not been ruled out for offside.  Rather, they sort of coasted, content that they could protect the two goal lead against a weaker team.  Southampton have not seen a new manager bounce under Ivan Juric, losing their first six league matches of his reign (they do have an FA Cup win over Swansea).  

Walking Through Treacle

Thus Jon Champion described the first half of Fulham versus Man United.  Though hardly an improvement, Champion said play was a little better in the second half but was still "pallid."  Those of us who went the dvr route "missed" the first 18 minutes as the Duquesne - Fordham basketball game ran over time. The score was 0-0 at point.  It remained that way until Lisandro Martinez got a lucky deflection off a Fulham defender that looped its way over the head of keeper Bernd Leno in the 78th minute.  That was Man United's only shot on goal. Fulham managed just three of their own.  In all, not a great use of 90 72 minutes.

Another Relegation Six Pointer for Spurs?

Fraid so.  This time it was a 1-2 loss at home to Leicester.  The stats say this probably should have been a draw.  Possession was 60/40, shots 15/12 and shots on target 6/3, all in favor of Spurs.  But xG was 1.19-1.50 for the Foxes so a draw feels about right.  That's what it seemed like watching too.

The pressure to sack Postecoglou is intense.  Seven league contests without a win will do that.  Certainly injuries haven't helped.  That's an issue for everybody, right?  Maybe, but you could field a respectable first team Premier side with Tottenham's injury table.  On the other hand, this article suggests that the injury problem may be at least partly Postecoglou's fault.  I'm guessing he gets to stay at least through next week's League Cup semi-final second leg against Liverpool.  Spurs are up 1-0 heading to Anfield; lose that one and he may be done.

Did The Clock Struck Midnight for Nottingham Forest?

Get Outta Here: Dango Ouattara goes vertical
Glyn Kirk/AFP/Getty Images

Last week we looked at expected goals data and suggested that maybe Forest have been extremely
lucky this year and that some decline might be inevitable.  Not sure we meant this much this fast but they got absolutely steamrollered by Bournemouth 5-0.  The Cherries, while maybe not dominant, were clearly the better side in the first half, though the lead was just 1-0.  Then Dango Ouattara unleashed a natural hat trick, scoring at 55, 61 and 87 minutes.  That was some leap on the first one (see picture right).

Of course it is just one result so we shouldn't be thinking they've been turned back into a pumpkin yet.

Conversation That Could Have Taken Place and Did

Dennis: How did Forest get both Wood and Anderson from Newcastle and make both of them not suck?

Steve: I thought Wood had bad luck at Newcastle and Anderson was decent and was only let go because of financial reasons.

Dennis: I don't think Wood was "bad luck" away from scoring 15 goals, was he?

Steve: Fair point.  He was bad luck away from not looking like he sucked.

 

Other Stuff

Villa did not distinguish themselves in a 1-1 draw with West Ham; Dennis actually warned me away from this one, indicating it was probably a waste of time.  Man City conceded an early goal against Chelsea but answered with three of their own and looked clearly the superior side.  First and second place Liverpool and Arsenal got wins against relegation sides.  Liverpool piled more misery on Ipswich with a 4-1 win while Arsenal squeaked out a 1-0 win at Wolves.  The Gunners were down a man (see This Week in Refereeing) but survived until Wolves got a player sent off too, then scored the game winner.  And Brentford slowed Crystal Palace's roll with a 2-1 win at Selhurst Park.

This Week in Refereeing

Some interesing decisions on Saturday.  Initially I felt all three were bad use of VAR but have subsequently downgraded my assessment to only one was bad.  In the Newcastle match, Isak was maybe fouled in the box; you can see the play here. Real time I didn't think it was a foul.  First few replays still left me skeptical.  But if you follow the tackle all the way through, it sure looks to me like the defender hooks his leg around Isak.  I think it's a foul.  As to the use of VAR, well, the fact that it took so long to make a decision does indicate it wasn't the clearest and most obvious error of the year.  I would not have been outraged if Sam Barrott had declined to change his call.  On the other hand, it didn't even get mentioned in this week's ESPN review of VAR decisions so maybe we can move on.

Next up was a handling call against Brighton's Veltman, seen here.  Again, real time the on-field call of a corner seemed okay.  Though not necessariy obvious in the first few views, replays showed that Veltman actually took a swipe at the ball with his arm and it was not a result of the attacker pushing him.  Still on the fringes of clear and obvious error for me but probably a good use of VAR. That was the only goal in Everton's 1-0 win.

Which brings us to the more problemmatic play.  As he was breaking out of the Wolves penalty area, Matt Doherty was fouled by Myles Lewis-Skelly.  You can see the play here.  Real time I thought reckless maybe, tactical certainly.  Obvious yellow card.  Nope, Michael Oliver went for straight red for serious foul play.  VAR Darren England confirmed the call, feeling there was no clear and obvious error.  Yikes. Though I think the call was wrong, I'm not too down on Michael Oliver here.  With only one look at it in real time, full speed, he thought Lewis-Skelly raked his studs down Doherty's achilles heel.  That isn't what happened but it was close enough that you can see what Oliver thought he saw.  My issue is why didn't England send Oliver to the monitor.  The conversation should have gone something like this:

Oliver: The defender raked his studs down the attacker's achilles heel - that's serious foul play

England:  Michael, on the replays, I'm not seeing contact with the achilles and I'm not 100% sure this wasn't just tripping.  You should go to the monitor.

Hard to believe Oliver wouldn't have changed the call if had looked at it again. As Dennis pointed out, this is exactly why we have VAR and they blew it.  Not finding much (any?) support for Oliver or England on this one except for some tepid excuses by Michael Dean.  By Tuesday, Arsenal had already successfully appealed the red card and Lewis-Skelly won't face a three-match ban.  Unfortunately, it has brought the worst in some fans, with Oliver and his family subjected to threats and abuse. Neanderthals.  Your team still won 1-0.

Just Another Manic Wednesday - and Thursday (apologies to The Bangles)

Count me in as a supporter of the new format for Champions League and Europa Cup.  As each competition wrapped up their first rounds, we were treated to teams moving back and forth between automatic qualifiers to the next round, the playoffs for the next round or tickets home.  Aston Villa were a prime example.  They were up on Celtic 2-0 in five minutes thanks to a quick brace from Morgan Rogers and looking like a lock for top eight.  Then, they were were sitting in ninth before halftime thanks to an equally quick brace from Adam Idah.  Ollie Watkins put them back in the top eight with a goal at 60 minutes and Rogers added insurance, completing his hat trick in stoppage time.  But even then Villa weren't safe because Lille were passing them on goal differential and another goal from Atalanta against Barca would have dropped them back to ninth.  Barca held and Villa are in.

Man City were on the roller coaster too.  Down 0-1 at halftime, they were looking at being bounced from the competition altogether.  Three unanswered goals gave them a 3-1 victory, 22nd place and a spot in the playoffs.

Liverpool lost but Barca's draw meant the Reds held onto first place.  Arsenal bested Girona and nabbed third place.  So the final tally was three EPL sides in the top eight and all four move on. 

Mr. Scarlett with the header in the box
Dave Shopland/AP

A bit of the same thing in Europa Cup.  Facing Swedish side Elfsborg, Tottenham were locked in a 0-0 duel.  By itself that wasn't a problem but one slip up could have dropped them to ninth.  Enter a trio of academy products (Dane Scarlett, Oyindamola Ajayi and Mikey Moore) who proceeded to each get their first senior goals for Spurs and they coasted to a 3-0 final and fourth place.  Man United also won and finished third.

Add Chelsea who had already qualified for the knockout stage of Europa Conference League and you have all seven EPL sides advancing.

We Definitely Caraboa It Now

Holding a 2-0 lead over Arsenal, heading to St. James' Park for the second leg, Newcastle are close to a second trip to the Carabao League Cup final in three years.  That will be Wednesday at 3 pm.  We do make fun of the competition regularly but not when we might make the final.  Spurs, up 1-0 on Liverpool, are in the other semi on Thursday at 3 pm at Anfield.

In the interim, we have Matchweek 24 running Saturday - Monday.  There is a 7:30 match and it's worth getting up for - Nottingham Forest hosting Brighton.  This is a chance for Forest to show they are not turning into a pumpkin but the Seagulls are no pushover and Opta sees this one as very close. Four 10 am matches to choose from and I can give you a reason to go with any one of them.  We of course have to watch Newcastle - Fulham; while the Magpies are solid favorites, this still could be a good watch.  Bournemouth put their 11-game unbeaten streak on the line at home versus Liverpool; the Cherries are decided underdogs here but we'll be curious how they fare against the league leaders.  Or you could go with one of the two relegation specials - Ipswich vs Southampton or Everton vs Leicester.  The former is pretty close to a must win for both.  The latter could be the difference between Everton finally breaking free of the relegation zone gravity or being drawn back into the fray.  USA is going with Bournemouth - Liverpool; Peacock for the rest.

The 12:30 feature match, back on NBC, is Wolves - Aston Villa.  Homefield advantage might make this a bit closer but Villa really should have the resources to get all three here.

Sunday has good stuff too, with Arsenal hosting Man City at 11:30.  Peacock is definitely trying to flex its muscles by keeping some the better fixtures off TV and this is one of them.  At 9 am you can do Brentford - Tottenham (on USA) or Man United - Crystal Palace (Peacock).  Reflecting the recent hard times, Brentford are prohibitive favorites (44% win, 24% draw) over Spurs; still shocking to see that.

The matchweek concludes Monday with a London derby featuring Chelsea - West Ham at 3 pm.

You can take Tuesday off, then proceed to the Carabao semis on Wednesday and Thursday.  Next weekend's FA Cup 4th round will feature matches Friday through Tuesday so that will be your only day off for a while. 

Back Down to Earth

A huge pile of results to go through and a very mixed set of results it is.

You Can't Win Them All

For several reasons, I'm way less disheartened by Newcastle's 1-4 loss at home to Bournemouth than one might expect.  First, while the Magpies were in form, Bournemouth came in even hotter, unbeaten in their last 10 (now 11).  Second, over the course of their own nine match undefeated run, Newcastle were on the lucky side.  And lastly, the final score overstates the magnitude of the loss; this was 1-2 until stoppage time.

Isak considers basketball after a bad afternoon vs Bournemouth

On the glass is 3/4 empty side, late goals or not, Bournemouth were clearly the better side. There were too many soft takeaways in midfield (looking at you Bruno) and too many gifted misplaced passes. Overall, where they had been doing an excellent job at anticpating opponents' play, this time they were mostly reactive.  Not that they had been perfect during the streak but Bournemouth punished them for the mistakes that previous sides had failed to capitalize on.  No reason to panic at this point, just that the result was a reminder not to overestimate this team's capabilities.

Villa Validate Confidence

While we are typically overly pessimistic about Newcastle, we have been the opposite with Aston Villa.  Last week, despite Opta's prediction of Arsenal as a heavy favorite, we were confident that Villa would make a match of it.  And, after a slow start, they did just that.  I will confess some doubts after Arsenal went up 2-0 at 55 minutes.  Tielemans goal just five minutes later quickly restored a positive attitude, which was rewarded with Ollie Watkins' equalizer at 68 minutes. Even with the slight stumble in his goal celebration slide, we make Watkins' goal this week's YouTubeableMoment.  The 2-2 final seemed about right, though the stats generally favored the Gunners.  However, xG was only 1.51 - 1.10 so a draw isn't that crazy a result.  

Misery Loves Company

Already mentioned Newcastle and Arsenal but they were not alone.  Not sure which result was worse but Man United fell 1-3 at Old Trafford to Brighton while Tottenham were beaten 3-2 by Everton at Goodison Park.  All United could manage was a soft PK, that being their only shot on target.  That sounds bad until you realize that at one point, Spurs were down 0-3 to Everton.  It's sad to think that Everton - Tottenham was a borderline relegation six-pointer.

Another one for Nottingham Forest's Chris Wood
Andrew Boyers/Action Images/Reuters

Brentford looked to have pulled off a 0-0 draw with Liverpool only to concede two stoppage time goals.  Ipswich were buried by MCI 0-6 and Leicester were held scoreless again, 0-2 to Fulham.  

Not miserable were Nottingham Forest (3-2 over Southampton), Chelsea (3-1 over Wolves) and Crystal Palace (2-0) over West Ham.  Palace have 11 points in the last five matches and have clearly removed themselves from the relegation fight.  

It Hasn't Struck Midnight for Cinderella

Once upon a time there was this wonky blogger who wondered how Nottingham Forest (even their name sounds like it's from a fairy tale) got to be level on points with second place Arsenal.  So he looked at expected goals to see whether they might shed any light on whether Forest is going to be turned back into a pumpkin soon.  The table below is taken from the xGscore website.  

Green numbers are good, red are bad.  Nottingham Forest has the biggest green number in Expected Points at 11.2;  the next closest are Newcastle and West Ham at 2.7.  There are two basic explanations for green numbers in these tables - either you've been lucky or for some reason your skills are that much better than the others.  That is, Forest may have just been lucky in scoring 3.1 more goals than expected or they are just better at finishing than the average team.  I don't mean to cast aspersions on Forest lineup but I'm leaning more toward the luck explanation than a highly skilled team.  Though highly anecdotal I know, I remember thinking Chris Wood's scoring woes at Newcastle were simply down to a run of bad luck.  Maybe this season is making up for that.  But I fear they may not live happily ever after.

Super Wonk

There was something else in the table that puzzled me no end.  Tottenham have scored 5.5 goals more than expected and allowed 2.5 fewer than expected and yet their expected points are 8 worse than expected.  That doesn't make sense; wouldn't we guess that their point total was much higher than expected?  What's going on here?  This must be due to a third factor - your distribution of goals and expected goals across games.  Maybe Spurs have great positive numbers for expected goals in a lot of matches where it doesn't make a difference but a few days when it goes against them.  Take 12/15/24 when Spurs mauled Southampton 5-0.  The xG for that game was 2.84 - .96.  So they got 2.16 more than expected and conceded .96 less but the gain on expected points was probably negligible.  Compare that to 9/15 when they lost 0-1 to Arsenal and xG was .79 - .88.  They were .79 worse in scoring and just .12 worse in conceding; this was probably expected points of around 1 and they got 0.  So if the luck evens out on expected goals we would say they could get worse but if their luck improves on timing, maybe they'll get better.  Love it when a data dive leaves you with more questions than when you started.  Oh look, we're out of time for any more wonkiness.

Sacre Bleu

A pair of French sides rained on some EPL sides prospects in the Champions League.  On Tuesday Aston Villa stumbled through an 0-1 loss to Monaco.  It's not like the home side were any great shakes, but Villa couldn't break through.  The loss did put their chances of an automatic qualifier in jeopardy but they'll at least get a spot in the playoffs.  Way more shocking was Man City's collapse in Paris.  Up 2-0 on PSG, they eventually lost 4-2.  City are now in 25th place and not even assured of a spot in the playoff round.  Liverpool (a sloppy 2-1 win over Lilles) and Arsenal (easy 3-0 victory over Dinamo Zagreb) had a better time of it.  Liverpool are guaranteed advancement to the knockout phase; Arsenal aren't quite assured of a top eight finish but their massive goal differential probably means they'll get an automatic berth too.

In Europa Cup, Spurs did their Spurs thing and managed to turn a 2-0 lead into close 3-2 final. Man United had a wild one with Rangers, winning in stoppage time on a Fernandes goal seen here.  Both Spurs and United will be playing for an automatic berth to the knockout round but are already assured of at least making the playoff round.

Conversation That Could Have Taken Place But Didn't

Dennis: Did you say Thomas Tuchel was going to the MLS?

Steve: No, I said he was the new England manager.

Champions League Free-for-all

Matchweek 23 for the EPL but the big action will be the final games in the first round of Champions League and Europa Cup.

There is no 7:30 Saturday contest and we are fine with that.  However, it does mean a crowded 10 am slot.  We'll be watching Newcastle at Southampton because we have to.  This is a no-win fixture for the Magpies; that is, no win would be a minor disaster.  For the neutrals, the easy choice is Bournemouth hosting Nottingham Forest.  This is another serious test for Cinderella as the Cherries are solid favorites here (46% for the win, 25% for a draw).  Also, it's the TV game.  Wolves - Arsenal doesn't sound too good and Ipswich at Liverpool looks like a train wreck.  Brighton - Everton might be okay.  The feature 12:30 match is worthy of the slot - Man City hosting Chelsea.  Except note that it's a feature match for Peacock, not NBC.  Displaced by skiing, auto racing and figure skating?  Ouch. Probably just a money play to boost Peacock subscriptions. 

Sunday has four matches nicely spread out except the last on might run into the Eagles - Rams NFC Championship game.  At 9 am you can do Crystal Palace - Brentford, an unlikely sounding London Derby or Tottenham - Leicester, which may offer the Spurs at chance to regain their balance.  Opta projections suggest you go with Palace - Brentford but USA went with Spurs.  Aston Villa - West Ham is the 11:30 match; we fully expect the Villans to recover from their mid-week Champions League stumble.  The matchweek ends with Fulham - Man United at 2 pm.  Who knows what to think there, though Opta have made the Cottagers a solid favorite (43% win, 26% draw).

The Champions League first round concludes with all 16 matches kicking off at 3 pm on Wednesday.  Permutations are simply too numerous to assess completely.  Liverpool are already advancing to the knockout phase and will probably finish first - they play at PSV.  Arsenal are sitting pretty and only need a draw at Girona to clinch an automatic berth.  Even with a win over Celtic, Aston Villa would still need one of the clubs in reach above them to drop points to get a top eight finish. Assuming I read everything right, if Man City defeat Club Brugge, they squeeze into the top 24 and at least get to the playoffs for a knockout berth.

We'll turn around and do the same thing with the Europa Cup on Thursday at 3 pm.  Man United and Spurs will guarantee themselves advancement to the knockout phase with wins over FCSB and IF Elfsborg respectively.  Draws would leave them vulnerable to results from sides below them in the standings.  I'm sure they would both prefer to avoid the playoffs as that means two more midweek matches in an already crowded schedule.  

I think I caught a break as a board meeting will likely be moved from Wednesday at 2 pm to the following week.  Also, appointments Thursday morning but the afternoon looks clear. Getting the hang of this.

Scary Minnows

The 3rd round of the FA Cup is notorious for lower division teams (aka minnows) knocking off teams from the first and second tiers.  This year not so much, but there were still some scary moments.  Also, some interesting results from Matchweek 21 fixtures.

Almost Choking on the Bones

An own goal in extra time saved Spurs' butts
Reuters/Jason Cairnduff 

The biggest mismatch of the 3rd round was Tamworth (National League, ie 5th tier) versus Tottenham, a spread of 96 places across English football.  If all you saw was the final score - 3-0 favor Spurs - you might think all went as planned there.  Not exactly.  Tamworth are as small a fish in the pond as you can get but Spurs could barely swallow this minnow.  Though Tottenham fairly well dominated play, they could not score and normal time expired with the score 0-0.  It took another 10 minutes of extra time before Spurs finally got on the board and even that was an own goal.  Two more followed in the second half of extra time, making the final look all cushy but this was a hard ride for Tottenham.  Note also that in years past, a 0-0 result at 90 minutes would have resulted in a big pay day for Tamworth as there would have been a replay a few weeks later as opposed to continuing to extra time.  The replay would have been at the massive Tottenham Hotspur Stadium and Tamworth would have shared in the gate receipts.  

Newcastle also had a little trouble with their minnow - League Two's Bromley.  The Magpies fell behind early and were only 1-1 at halftime.  Second half goals from Gordon and Osula made the viewing comfortable enough.  

FA Cup 3rd Round By the Numbers

I count 11 upsets out of the 32 matches.  Some barely qualify as upsets - see Blackburn (7th in Championship) over Middlesborough (5th in Championship) and there were three other cases of Championship sides beating teams higher than them in the table.  The two biggest in terms of "ranking difference" were Brentford (11th in EPL) losing to Plymouth (last in the Championship) and Doncaster (League Two) beating Hull City (Championship) - both matches were a spread of 33 places.  Here's the winning goal from Plymouth's upset.

Results by division are as follows:

EPL 17-3

Championship 9-15

League One 5-7

League Two 1-5

National League 0-2

Two of the three EPL losses were to other EPL sides - West Ham to Aston Villa and Arsenal to Man United. The latter was a wild one that United won on penalties.  Brentford was the only EPL side to lose to a lower division club (Plymouth).

The only real minnow left is Doncaster.  League One sides still in the competition are Birmingham, Exeter, Leyton Orient, Wigan and Wycombe; bigger than minnows but still in danger.  Should we call them sunfish?

Ball Don't Lie

 

That Arsenal - Man United FA Cup tie was a wild one.  United had gone down a man at 61 minutes and ceded the equalizer two minutes later.  A few minutes later,  Maguire "fouled" Havertz in the box.  Watching live, Dennis was sure that if there had been VAR, the penalty would have been overturned and Havertz shown the yellow for diving.  I didn't see it live but the replay here suggests he was probably right.  Odegaard missed the PK and somewhere Rasheed Wallace was smiling.  Also, funny how everybody says plays like this are why VAR is needed.  Bookmark those quotes for later.

You May Ask Yourself, How Did We Get Here?  (apologies to The Talking Heads)

Anthony Gordon - the model of attacking intent

Newcastle spent most of December in 12th place.  After Wednesday's 3-0 win over Wolves, the Magpies are now 4th in the table.  That was their sixth straight league win, a stretch in which they've outscored the opposition 18-1.  This is my beautiful team. So many things are going right.  Isak got two more goals against Wolves, has scored in eight straight, and is the third leading scorer behind only Salah and Haaland. We make his second goal this week's YouTubeableMoment; the pass from Guimaraes was perfect.  Anthony Gordon has a goal or an assist in each of those six wins.  Barnes and Murphy can create offense too.  The midfield trio of Guimaraes, Joelinton and Tonali are equally skilled at starting attacks and destroying other teams' attacks.   Hall and Livramento have the fullback spots covered.  Fabian Schar was out sick Wednesday but with Sven Botman back from injury, we were okay. Dan Burn is still not the fastest out there but at center back with the others around him, he's doing fine too.

Trying to remain clear-eyed about this resurgence.  Sure, the final was 3-0 but with some more clinical finishing by Wolves, this could have been a close match.  We've gone through patches where the finishing was awful so who knows if that will return.  We've been on the lucky side with injuries so far this year and that might not continue.  I'm also thinking that the Financial Fair Play rules might work to our benefit right now.  Contending for a Champions League berth, they might be tempted to overspend in the transfer market; they simply don't have that much to work with under the profit and sustainability regulations.

What Amad Ending

Amad to teammates: Guys, this is how you do it

Through 81 minutes, Man United trailed cellar dweller Southampton 0-1 and the Old Trafford crowd was more than restless.  Then, Amad Diallo decided enough is enough.  In the next 13 minutes he rescued the day for the Red Devils with a hat trick that doubled his goal output for the year.  Sure, the last one was a pure gift from Southampton defender Harwood-Bellis but the other two were legit, especially the game winner seen here; note the nice chip from Erickson to send him on goal.  With the bottom part of the mid-table so tight, the turnaround took United from 15th to 12th.  But mostly, it saved them from embarrassment.  Amad does appear to be the antidote to Antony and some of the other disappointments on the United squad.  

Dropped Points

There were some dropped points at the top of the table.  Liverpool could only manage a 1-1 draw against Nottingham Forest.  This was not the thriller we had hoped for - both Dennis and I will admit to napping during portions of the match.  Chelsea dropped two points as well, held to a 2-2 draw by Bournemouth and needing a 95th minute stoppage time goal to get even that.  Man City also dropped two points but in a different way; they coughed up a 2-0 lead to Brentford, surrendering goals at 82 and 92 minutes.   

Dropped points aside, of the top 10 only Fulham lost (2-3 to West Ham).  Arsenal got a 2-1 win over Spurs in what looked like a tepid North London derby.  I only saw the last 25 minutes but it didn't seem all that intense.  Villa got a serviceable 1-0 win over Everton in David Moyes' second debut as manager for the Toffees.  And Brighton took their time but eventually worked out a 2-0 win over Ipswich.

Life at the bottom of the table was tough, as all five - Everton, Wolves, Ipswich, Leicester and Southampton - lost.  The biggest gap in the table is now the seven points between 15th place Crystal Palace and 16th Everton.  

A Man For All Excuses

You may recall Mikel Arteta's explosion when Newcastle beat the Gunners on a goal in which "everybody in the stadium knew the ball had gone out" except when they saw photographic evidence after the match showing it was still in (details in this old BFS post).  Mikel was at it again this week, not with a rant but a novel explanation as to why Arsenal fell 0-2 to the Magpies at the Emirates last week in the first leg of the Carabao Cup semi-final.  The problem Arteta said was the ball.  I am not making this up.   Money quote:

'No, it's just different. It's very different to the Premier League ball and you have to adapt to that. It flies different... when you touch it, the grip is very different as well so you have to adapt to that.'

Arteta is appropriately being trolled on the internet for this.

Talkin' Union

 The wind chill is 13 degrees and there's a thin coating of snow on the ground, which means the MLS season is just around the corner.  Opening day is February 22nd at Orlando.

Can't say the news is encouraging.  First, the U got hit with a registration ban because they failed to pay a youth club a percentage of the transfer fee when they obtained Jose Riasco in March 2022.  The full story is here.  Note the amount of the missed payment is $700.  Given that the payment has been made, the consensus is that the ban will be lifted quickly.  However, this is the type of administrative screw-up that Union are famous for, like always having visa problems with foreign signings.  Doesn't instill the greatest of confidence in the front office.

Less encouraging is the state of the roster.  See this analysis from The Inquirer's Jonathan Tannenwald.  There's really not been much activity for a club that finished 12th out of 15 in the Eastern Conference.  Not clear to me why we would expect any kind of meaningful improvement in the standings without some important additions.  Fortunately, it does sound like they haven't been ruled out.

Out of the Mouths of Babes

BFS Artistic Director Laura O sends along this Instagram clip in which one of the Tottenham mascots (the kids who accompany the players on the pitch for the introductions) makes a brutally honest observation.  This must have been just before Spurs squared off against Liverpool in last week's EFL Cup semi-final.  

Champions League Is Back

In addition to Matchweek 22, we get the seventh round of first round play in the European competitions, which means you'll have something to do as mid-week temperatures plummet into the teens single digits (without taking into account windchill).  

The EPL schedule is nicely spread out over three days so we won't have the situation we had on Wednesday when Newcastle, Aston Villa and Spurs were all on at the same time.  Newcastle have the early Saturday match so we'll be up at 7:30 to see them face Bournemouth; it is on USA so you could cheat a little and get up at maybe 8 instead.  The Magpies are in form, at home and heavily favored; what could go wrong?

Three choices at 10 am.  USA has West Ham versus Crystal Palace and this looks to be the best choice for a competitive match.  Brentford - Liverpool and Leicester - Fulham don't sound as exciting.  We're pumped about the feature 12:30 match on NBC as Aston Villa travel to London to face Arsenal.  Opta has the Gunners has huge favorites (61% win, 21% draw) but we see a closer match than that; the Villans are rarely blown out and usually give teams like this a hard time.

Sunday at 9 am is a bit crowded.  The TV game is Everton - Spurs but you could do Man United - Brighton or Nottingham Forest - Southampton on Peacock.  I can come up with reasons to watch each. The first two could be more competitive than you think but it's also fun to watch Nottingham Forest continue their Cinderella run in the top four.  The 11:30 match, on USA, looks like a car crash, with Ipswich hosting Man City.  The week concludes with Chelsea - Wolves at 3 pm on Monday.

The Champions League gets to the business end of the first round with the seventh of eight first round matches.  Teams will be looking to seal up places for automatic advancement to the knockout stage (top 8) or at least the playoffs to get to the knockout stage (9th through 24th).  Tuesday we can watch Monaco - Aston Villa at 12:45, then Liverpool - LOSC at 3 pm.  Wednesday we'll have to choose been Arsenal - Dinamo Zagreb or PSG - Man City, both at 3 pm.  We're going with the latter as both are fighting for a place in the top 24, with PSG currently on the outside looking at 25th and MCI barely in at 22.

Europa League is in a similar situation.  Most of their matches are Thursday.  Tottenham face Hoffenheim on the road at 12:45 while Man United host Rangers at 3 pm.  Both are likely to at least advance to the playoff rounds but wins for each could put them in good shape for automatic advancement to the knockout phase.

Just checked the forecast again.  Wind chills below zero on Tuesday and Wednesday.  Just stay inside and watch Champions League.