Scum or Manure?! [R]

[Highbury]

I'm really not sure about this. I would much rather see Chelsea win the title over Manure (anyone else really), so I am in no way hoping they get a victory today. Problem is not only are the scum awful...I can't root for them either.

What is a gunner to do?

[Rewinder]

Have to think slightly more long term. Manure go on to win today - crush sp*rs hope of making a challenge for the CL, and win the title.

Excruciating for a while, but would probably cause a chelsea implosion assuming they dont win the CL.

[Publius]

It's like asking whether you would rather die by drowning or in a fire. I couldn't really care less who wins between the two, although I do understand the feelings of some who don't want Chelsea to join the ranks of those teams who have won the league three years in a row.

[GoonerMan]

pen for manure
scored 1-0, ronaldo

[Rewinder]

Scum getting rocked.

We are a better team than manutd, but they are just the luckiest team on the planet currently.

Not a single major injury, and most bad calls in games go their way.

[Shibby13]

gotta go with united...id much rather them win than chelsea this year and i can't see myself cheering for spurs unless its an extreme circumstance

[Charleysurf]

Scum getting rocked.

We are a better team than manutd, but they are just the luckiest team on the planet currently.

Not a single major injury, and most bad calls in games go their way.
17 points better, all down to luck?

[Cannon]

17 points better, all down to luck?
It is a combination of things. ManU's lead is largely down to Purseboy's dives/antics, intimidated and biased refs, and the lowest injury rate in the Prem.

Today's win over Spurs was typical of ManU this season. First, ManU has a rare call go against them (balanced by the clear rugby tackle by your captain on chimbonda in the box). ManU players spend the next 20-30 minutes intimidating the weak ref who promptly rewards them with a bogus pk from C.Ronaldo dive. The ref also refuses to even book Scholes despite him making so many bad tackles that he easily could have been sent off twice for double yellows. Scholes then score. Combine that with some decent football and no injuries and...shock, ManU are your next Prem champs. :rolleyes:

Don't get me wrong ManU would have beaten that poor Spurs side anyway but its that kind of biased/intimidated ref that has gone a long way to giving you the big point lead. I find it interesting that Arsenal despite having the lowest foul count in the Prem and being close to the top of the fair play standings have one of the highest numbers of cards. We get away with fewer fouls per yellow than any other team. ManU is allowed nearly 40% more fouls per yellow card as Arsenal. Bias? Of course. Arsenal are treated worse than Blackeyed Rovers and the Bolton Thugs. Take that away and move us from second worst number of injuries in the league to ManU's lowest position on the injury table and you'd have no point lead.

I guess it is better to be lucky (and get some biased refs) than good. The good news is that, while I expect you to continue to get treated better by the refs next season and beyond, there is no chance that you'll be this injury free forever.

[thebigman]

pretty biased look on things cannon

id simply say man utd have been better consistantly than arsenal

they get results at the places we should win at and dont, simple as

when the young stars mature we will dominate i think, but their lack of experience shows atm

[shincan]

id simply say man utd have been better consistantly than arsenal

they get results at the places we should win at and dont, simple as

first, by way of wordplay, ManU do not get results at the places we should win! Consider the Emirates!

but seriously, the call that gave ManU the penalty was a bit questionable in my mind--looked like no real contact to me. I feel that Ronaldo dove, as did Ferdinand (later) and overall, Manu's victory is dirty, in my opinion.

And Viduka's yellow yesterday, vs. Senderos' red, furthers any argument made for this weekend's play that ManU is lucky, Arsenal not. Had Viduka been sent off for intentional elbow, any chance of us drawing 1-1? Never.

but you're right, they have been more consistent against teams mid and low table.

[Cannon]

What part of my post was biased exactly? The fact that they get away with more fouls, the fact that they've been at or near the bottom of the injury table, etc? :confused: I could go on with stats that show C.Ronaldo to be the most "fouled" Prem player...up there with such admited divers as Diouf. I think the stats make the situation pretty clear with no need for bias.

Don't get me wrong. Arsenal have made it easier for ManU to get that point advantage and should be closer but that doesn't change the fact that ManU get better treatment from refs (something that has been going for years and backed up by stat after stat. Some great articles have looked at the ManU/OT advantage when it comes to cards and pks.) and have been very lucky with injuries this season. Do you really think ManU would lead the league if they were missing 9 players and got the same treatment from refs that we get? Not a chance. Although our poor early form would probably mean that it would go to Chelski then instead of us.

[Gooner_for_Life]

Well bias or not the scummies got crushed today 4-0. I didnt watch the match but i was hoping to wake up today and find they had lost so we would have made up a point on them (looking at the bright side). Instead this just crushed any faint title hope i had, not that i had much anyhow because i was one on here that declared it dead awhile ago. Oh well things are just falling for manure currently, nothing we can really do about it.

[feej92]

Well bias or not the scummies got crushed today 4-0.

it's always nice to see that. someone get Jol another doughnut :D

[billyireland]

It is a combination of things. ManU's lead is largely down to Purseboy's dives/antics, I am not calling Ronaldo's diving acceptable nor anything but wrong, but he has also been playing some spectacular football.

intimidated and biased refs,It's called the luck of champions - I am not saying we will definitely win the title, but it is quite rare for a team to win the league while getting more calls against them than for them.

and the lowest injury rate in the Prem. After the last two seasons, we were more than due.

Today's win over Spurs was typical of ManU this season. First, ManU has a rare call go against them (balanced by the clear rugby tackle by your captain on chimbonda in the box). ManU players spend the next 20-30 minutes intimidating the weak ref who promptly rewards them with a bogus pk from C.Ronaldo dive. The ref also refuses to even book Scholes despite him making so many bad tackles that he easily could have been sent off twice for double yellows. Scholes then score. Combine that with some decent football and no injuries and...shock, ManU are your next Prem champs. :rolleyes: Sometimes the calls go in your favour (as with us today) and sometimes they don't (as when we had 2 perfectly good goals disallowed against Portsmouth last week). When Spurs had the goal that never was against us there was absolute uproar over, where were all the cries for poor officiating throughout this week? Media bias?

Don't get me wrong ManU would have beaten that poor Spurs side anyway but its that kind of biased/intimidated ref that has gone a long way to giving you the big point lead. I find it interesting that Arsenal despite having the lowest foul count in the Prem and being close to the top of the fair play standings have one of the highest numbers of cards. We get away with fewer fouls per yellow than any other team. ManU is allowed nearly 40% more fouls per yellow card as Arsenal. Bias? Of course. Arsenal are treated worse than Blackeyed Rovers and the Bolton Thugs. Take that away and move us from second worst number of injuries in the league to ManU's lowest position on the injury table and you'd have no point lead.Again, the luck of the champions and us being due some injury relief after the last two seasons.

And fyi, Rovers have been playing some nice football over the last year or so.

I guess it is better to be lucky (and get some biased refs) than good. The good news is that, while I expect you to continue to get treated better by the refs next season and beyond, there is no chance that you'll be this injury free forever.No, we won't be this injury free forever; hopefully we won't be forever re-enacting the last supper around the injury table either. We have had Vidic, Park, Smith, Heinze and Solskjaer out for decent spells though, hardly anything to cry about but still far from entirely injury free.

And if you want to consider the refs as treating us 'better' then the treatment we get from the FA relative to other clubs would be 'worse', to be mild.

[CRASH 4 ARSENAL]

I'd much rather United win.

The only way I'd want Scum to win is if it helped us for United to drop points, and this year, it doesn't really matter.

[Shen-O]

After the last two seasons, we were more than due.

Not more than us =[. Our players drop like flies, every season since 03-04.

[billyireland]

Just out of interest (and not to act the boll*cks) but over the last 2 years we have lost the following for several (3+) months: Neville, Heinze, Brown, Giggs, Park, Scholes, Saha, van Nistlerooy (before he left, of course), Solskjaer and Smith. We have also had pretty much every outfield player pick up a handful of injuries that have had them out for a few weeks at a time. I know your list is quite extensive as well, fancy listing the names out for a comparison?

It is funny that Chelsea consider themselves in an injury 'crisis' given the size and cost of their squad, when we (and at times yourselves) have had far longer injury lists at times since Mourinho took over at the Bridge. :)

[Rewinder]

Just out of interest (and not to act the boll*cks) but over the last 2 years we have lost the following for several (3+) months: Neville, Heinze, Brown, Giggs, Park, Scholes, Saha, van Nistlerooy (before he left, of course), Solskjaer and Smith.

Every outfielder except cesc and toure have been out for 1 month+

Most notable:
Henry has missed over a month each this season and last season.
RVP out till about the end of the season.
Hleb - 1 month.
Gallas out for close to 3 months.
Ljungberg out for the better half of the calendar year.
Lauren for the full year - then he left.
Diaby for a whole year.
Clichy only returned a few games into this season after being out for the bulk of last season.
Baptista for almost a cumulative 2 months this season alone.

And that is just getting things started.

Our injured list included 9 players last week.

[Shen-O]

Dude, we've lost like everyone over the last two seasons. I can't remember a time for a while now when we could say we had our strongest XI healthy. Of course today, our "strongest" XI isn't probably even our strongest...

[Miles Brasher]

17 points better, all down to luck?

I think you'll find it's 6 points between us ;)