Arsenal have stumbled on a new Olivier Giroud but one star should pack it in now after victory over Leicester.
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Dismal Sterling
Well we can expect a lot more Merino at CF in the next month or so then – much more dangerous when he came on, two goals nonwithstanding.
Really wanted to give Sterling the benefit of the doubt and don’t believe he has deserved all the stick so far this season, but this was a dismal outing.
Can’t beat a man, can’t stay onside, won’t make a run, can’t pick a pass.
A real shame, but such is life.
Tom (so do we now look for a CM free agent…), Leyton
Hopeless Sterling
First things first. Very important win against Leicester. Ground it out and that’s all we can ask for at the moment. There will be tougher games ahead though.
But, can we talk about former football player, Raheem Sterling? I keep seeing/hearing phrases like ‘out of sorts’, ‘not his day today’ and ‘he struggled to get into the game’. That’s because he is so far past his prime! He is hopeless.
I’m not knocking his career. He’s done brilliantly. But time waits for no man. Him in particular it would seem; No pace, no cohesion with his teammates and can’t even keep onside. Maybe his eyes are going too…?
Chelsea have a good track record in giving us rubbish. Willian is another that springs to mind. I know Sterling was a loan deal, but the quicker we send him back to Chelsea the better.
Nwaneri though? The kid is gonna be brilliant (if he isn’t already!).
Stu – Gunner in France (I’m 52 and reckon I’d take Sterling in a race).
READ MORE: Disastrous Raheem Sterling inspires unlikely Arsenal striker solution Mikel Fellaini
Welcome back, Giroud
I could say it’s sad to see Sterling’s demise but on his salary and taking into consideration i’m 57 I would love to have his savings so I could retire now but I think he should and goodbye and good riddance!
Can Arsenal do it? That really depends on Liverpool and their nerve. People call Arsenal ‘bottlers’ but only one team can ‘bottle’ the league this season.
Last point: both goals were immaculate poachers goals today and It could have been Giroud playing. Come on Arsenal.
I think i’ll put my feet up tonight with a nice glass of wine and listen to the Psychedelic Furs. Happy Days
Chris, Croydon
ATP blame game
Whilst I’m sure the tribalistic, knee-jerk, reaction will be a pile-on onto City, can I just point out the following? When the Prem announced it was introducing APT rules, City warned them that they were unlawful. The PL went ahead anyway (fair enough at this point I suppose) and City duly went to tribunal.
This tribunal (eventually) ruled in City’s favour. Richard Masters response? To write to all PL clubs claiming that the result meant merely minor and ‘discreet’ points had been won whilst City wrote to same stating that this was untrue and the ruling meant nothing less than that the APT rules were, in fact, both unlawful and unenforceable.
The Prem then went on to tweak the APT rules, whilst again warned by City that they, again, were unlawful and would be challenged. Guess what the Prem did?
And here we are. The PL has a potential legal bill of £20 million+. Oh, and not to mention the entirely realistic possibility that a number of PL clubs will now sue the ruling body for compensation. And whose fault is that?
Mark (It’s not City’s) MCFC.
READ MORE: Man City crush Newcastle in APT Derby as Bournemouth eye Champions League – it’s the 3pm Blackout
Chelsea’s ‘sorry season’
As the latest ludicrous statement from the Italian tactical genius regarding having to play on transfer deadline day, so that he didn’t have time to buy replacements for his two injured forwards, is digested we are left asking what about the month of January? The laughable demise of the bloated squad to a threadbare collection of wingers and reserve goalkeepers sums up the sorry season unfolding. They used to say “West Ham” when the question was posed “what comes down with the Christmas decorations in January?” but we can now change it to Chelsea. Garnacho would have been such a perfect signing to add to the current list of inconsistent, go-missing wingers.
The only positive from the season is the profit to be made in backing whoever Chelsea are playing, the bookies still haven’t cottoned on to how bad the Blues are. 55 points looks about the likely final points total, so it could all depend on beating Real Betis in the last 16 of the Conference League as to whether Maresca makes it to the end of March.
Keith Miller, Victoria, Australia
READ MORE: Overhyped £200m Chelsea duo outshone (again) by brilliant Brighton bargain
Maresca doing a Martinez
Safe to assume at this point that most people who visit this site are of a certain age demographic.
Anyway, think we can safely assign Enzo Maresca’s body of work for the first 4 months of the season to the ‘mostly just living off the methods of the previous guy’ method that Roberto Martinez made a career out of at Everton.
Spoiler alert, it doesn’t get any better. Reasonable to assume, counter to the wishcasting of a certain f365 writer that no, Enzo Maresca will not be manager of the year nor will this team be winning a title that isn’t the Conference League any time soon.
Simon, London
Imposter Syndrome FC
It seems really odd that Chelsea are in the champions league spots after another loss to Brighton , then they are in my eyes an odd football club. Like Imposter-syndrome FC . It is hard to say what will happen to them in the near future but I suppose the owners need to ‘build the value’ so outgoings & incomings assured .
There is a lot to like about Newcastle United‘s on pitch team and manager though, if not their backers , no matter how much I’d like to see them win at Wembley, Liverpool are the best team in England this season and would have to have a bad day to not lift the cup and also win the league ( a point and a skirmish away in the local derby will look run of the mill at season’s end). Then to properly piss on the geordies chips, nick their star striker in the summer who’ll then possibly turn out to be the next Ryan Babbel.
Another odd club Bournemouth are really likeable too so I’d love for them to have a day out at Wembley in the FA Cup final .
All in all it has been a strange season where only Liverpool and Arsenal have done okay out of the so called big six .
Villa have a negative goal difference currently but have to be pretty happy I’d say.
Although I have’nt been keeping abreast of City’s off pitch tussles , there seems to be something moving . Mostly getting away with it would be my prediction and then continuing to wind Wenger up with more financial doping . So unless Liverpool invest heavily in their squad I see City as favourites for next season’s league .
With all the great players and good manager at Barca they ought to win the European Cup though they are not so solid that I’d bet any money on them . Still, Pedri , Gavi, Yamal and other young ‘uns from their farmyard mean they have a huge wealth of talent if not quite equivalent to the sum of their absolutely bonkers debt .
Changes that need to be made but won’t : premier league total teams 16-18 , anyone in Europe don’t play in the league cup.
Peter ( refs should dress as Darth Vaders) Andalucia .
The RVN discourse
As of now, not sure who’s on comms on the American telecast of this match against Leicester on USA Network – but Mediawatch could not have been more on point yesterday.
Not even 5 minutes in there’s a 30 second discussion playing all the hits: 20 years ago RVN missed a pen, Keown did a thing, Manchester United and Arsenal used to have fierce matches…btw, did I mention that Arsenal used to play Manchester United in really big matches?
And apparently Van Nistelrooy still MUST feel some type of way about the rivalry – as the camera pans over him calmly living in the present…
MAW, LA Gooner
Big Six delusions
You can take Spurs out of the headline, but you can’t keep Tickner from being so one eyes as to be basically blind.
Of course the focus in the Spurs part of the article (which is first obviously) is how wacky and kooky it is that Spurs haven’t won a trophy in forever. Its not wacky or kooky, they are just historically a spineless bunch of bottlers. Every time the situation requires character, soul or spirit, Spurs are found wanting. It is easily demonstrated and proved. And as is absolutely typical for Spurs fans, they ignore every available fact and just continue to loudly claim that they are far more important and relevant than they really are. Impossible not to laugh out loud when Tickner says “Spurs are not the only big club with a long trophy drought, but they are the only club in the ‘Big Six’ to have a long trophy drought”. “Big Six”! Delusions of grandeur as always. You are 15th! You can tell that Tickner thinks that if he says it over and over again we will all believe it. It has always been like this, which is why everyone who actively supports their team (by actually going to games), whoever they support, laughs at Spurs fans. They have no self awareness whatsoever. Of course his article, which for every other team took the piss, which is absolutely the right and most entertaining way to approach things by the way, was an exercise in excusing Spurs as being misunderstood somehow. Like maybe they should have won a trophy in his lifetime. Or maybe that by saying it over and over again we will all believe that Spurs are somehow an important part of the fabric of English football (like, inarguably, Pool and Utd) and that we should give them more respect than we do. Ha!! No!!!
In the very same article, he delights in ripping on “West Ham United and the West Ham Way”. Here’s the thing Dave. On the whole, West Ham fans love their club, are proud to support them and are incredibly loyal, but none of us have any delusions whatsoever of being more important than we are. In fact, in my 45 years of supporting the team, we have been up and down and consistently awful for so long that I don’t know ANY West Ham fans who go around claiming that we are a better team than anyone else. That was how, when we are in the second tier many times, we still sold out our tickets home and away. There are no Big Time Charlie West Ham fans, which defines almost every Spurs fan. Every thing West Ham fans say will invariably be massively self-deprecating (look it up Dave). We are just there over land and sea (and Tottenham), year in, year out, whatever is produced. Leaving aside the discussions around the World Cup (to be fair, Bobby Moore, Geoff Hurst….. as if Spurs wouldn’t LOVE to have claim to that!) and the academy (again, whatever, but it was founded on fact back in the day, even in your time Dave). As for our more recent past, our owners are a joke, our signings have been awful, and our managerial selections have been depressing (until now, we believe in you Graham!!). And yet our stadium is bigger than Spurs’ new mausoleum, our fans don’t take ourselves too seriously at all, and we are almost always the first to laugh at ourselves.
And if that’s not enough, here’s a difference for you Dave…
Mike (1 year since last trophy!!!!!!!) WHU
Chris Kavanagh!!
Wow, just wow, WTAF!!!! You couldn’t make it up.
Brighton v Chelsea, minute 35 and a cross comes in, a Chelsea player puts a hand on a Brighton defender and gives him the gentlest of nudges before heading the ball home. The on field official blows his whistle and awards a free kick to Brighton ruling the goal out. He does this in real time, with a split second to make a decision and without the aid of slow motion and views from alternative angles. I assume it is checked by VAR and ratified although this isn’t mentioned on commentary.
The on field official is, wait for it…………………Greater Manchester’s very own Chris Kavanagh!! The same man who failed to overturn Everton’s equaliser for a far more blatant push on Konate and was able to slow things down, look at different angles and take time to reach his decision.
Now convince me that Chris Kavanagh doesn’t have at best a subconscious bias against Liverpool and at worst is a friend of David Coote, you can’t. A third explanation could be that on Wednesday he “managed the situation” or put another way, ignored the laws of the game feared as to what the outcome may be.
Howard (he’s bent, full stop) Jones
Referee incompetence
Like any other premier league fan I’ve criticised the refs plenty.
I’ve even accused one or two of bias towards southern teams.
The truth is I’ve seen United get fucked over. Chelsea. Arsenal. Forest. And everton all get fucked over by refs. And it always seems to be the same refs , which implies the problem is we have really shit refs.
We do.
Do refs make bad calls in other leagues? I can only speak for serie A and bundesliga but yeah they do. But not anywhere near as often and not on the same Benny hill comical scale as ours.
The only team who seem immune from ref blinders and in fact often benefit from them is man city. If I’m wrong feel free to correct me on that.
I felt a draw was a fair result. I felt the ref was dogshit throughout the whole game. Mersey derbys need good refs because even when the teams field barely any English players (Liverpool started with none for the first time ever) there is still a hostile and aggressive energy about this fixture at all times. Oliver is not the man for that fixture.
Problem is I can’t name a ref who I think is competent enough to do it. Whatever happened to Sian Massey? She seemed like a good ref and I don’t recall her making any big mistakes either.
I thought van dijk saying after he knew it was their cup final while meme worthy was very classless and disappointing. I would expect anyone to celebrate a last gasp equaliser against the best team in the league in the final derby in that stadium who also happen to be your rivals to celebrate that way. Ridiculous to imply they shouldn’t. It was good to see that in blues fans as they’ve been very doom and gloom for a long time.
Generally speaking , on a fan level, it isn’t a vicious derby. It’s quite often a derby where half a family wears blue and the other red. My dad was a blue, I’m a red. There’s ribbing and insults sure, but it’s not the vitriolic derby of say rangers and Celtic or arsenal and united which are often more about rage than anything else.
Maybe that’s just my family. But regardless I was fine with them celebrating, I wouldn’t have even carded either player.
Finally slot was an idiot for reacting. Not only has he now shown he can be goaded (and people will do it often) he has also made two games in a potential trophy season harder for no reason.
Lee
Merseyside derby karma
Enough has probably been said, but….
Can I just say as a Liverpool fan, I’m embarrassed by the weird reaction to Everton celebrating that goal. they’ve just scored a 97th minute equalizer in their last ever derby at Goodison, what do you want them to do?
Like do you actually want a sport where all the Everton fans respond with “well, steady on there chap, we’re still only 14th and they’re top of the league”. The whole fucking point of a derby is the local rivarly – we’d just been singing about winning the league at Goodison. There’s basically only five teams that win trophies, City have won almost 50% of all trophies in the last five years – what do you want other teams to celebrate?
That was painful to watch but that’s the entire point. Leave the entitled to win every game crap to Arsenal fans, and get on with it. We should be more worried that they have created a good blueprint to play against us – stand off the back four, target Gravenberch and bypass the midfield with a focus on winning second balls and being direct.
Anyway , we kind of owed them an insane last minute ‘winner’ after that ridiculous Origi goal – football karma is a….
RH, NYC
A haywire Premier League season
Can anyone explain these results to me?
Liverpool 2 – Bournemouth 0
Bournemouth 5 – Nottingham Forest 0
Nottingham Forest 7 – Brighton 0
Brighton 3 – Chelsea 0.
Chelsea? – Liverpool?
What should I expect when Chelsea plays Liverpool?
Oh, the beauty of the Premier League!
Yiembe (This season is haywire), Mombasa.
