If they can avoid dropping too many points between now and December, still Liverpool. They were way better than Chelsea today.
Really? I didn't see that. I thought there were periods of play when Liverpool was better but other periods when Chelsea was.
I watched most of the match and thought Chelski was much better on the whole. That said, I was legitimately surprised when I saw xG was 0.88 Chelski to 1.93 for ‘Pool. It’s amusing to see how a week can flip all the narratives on team cultures, squads, and club management.
Sophomore jinx for Slot? I hope so. They will go into the Man Utd game panicking a little just at a time Man Utd are playing a bit better, Sesko getting more goals. A lot of Isak's goals at Newcastle came on the break. Now he has to get used to playing against low bloWahck sides or having a lot of possession where his pace and open field runs aren't a factor. What does Chelsea look like with injured players back and in their current form? Right now looks like we will drop points against them. But I will go into that game when it happens with more confidence the had in a while. We have a damn good squad. Perhaps the most under reported story in the Prem this season is how well Xhaka is doing. We were right to sell him at the time but while he was with us, he had the respect of the team as well as playing a key role.
looking at Goal difference as a proxy City do seem to be one of the better sides. Still early of course.
City are imbalanced as a squad and will lean a lot on Haaland, Donnarumma, Reijnders, Dias and Silva and the concern is that if Rodri doesn't get back to near the level he was at you are relying a lot in that list on 2 guys who haven't played a lot in the EPL. Maybe Doku improves or Foden gets back into form but City will drop points this season, the BHA game was a good example of that. They have some interesting fixtures coming up too. Brentford away could be dropped points, then post International break they have Everton at home which is likely a win, then Villa away which is also likely a win, but then Bournemouth and Liverpool at home and Newcastle away. City definitely have the players to go the distance but it feels like they will have a year like we did last season. Their best is excellent but injuries and inconsistent play at the worst time will cost them points.
It's an American sports trope that after an amazing rookie season, a player will often find his second season more difficult as opponents have now sussed him out, etc., etc. He's saying maybe Slot as a manager is experiencing that.
Another I know this sounds crazy thing is that Newcastle may end up with a goals against better than anyone else except us maybe. Only two teams have scored on them in the league so far, us and Liverpool. Everyone else has been shut out. Amazing. (they haven't been scoring either but that's besides the point) They could end up with a better goals against than us as crazy as that sounds if their current trend continues (half joking) It seems like it takes a very good attack to break them down.
Newcastle is a dirty ass team, especially Joelinton and Bruno. Watching them play Forest and they are openly looking for contact instead of playing the ball. Bruno just scored because he "won the ball" just before taking out Gibbs-White. Winning the ball was the same way Pope won the ball on our disallowed PK and it was very obvious that Bruno was playing the body first and the ball second.
While keeping an eye on NUFC-NFFC, I noticed a yellow card dished out to Neco Williams which sure looked to me to be misguided and unfair. Surely it was devious simulation by Tonali that led to the ref deeming it a foul AND a yellow. Williams actually pulled back to avoid the contact but because Tonali stuck is leg out in the most unnatural way, by maybe and extra 12", he "manufactured" the contact. So I was wondering if/when VAR will be allowed to get involved in erroneous decisions like that, i.e ones that lead to yellow/red cards, which of course can have huge impact on game outcome. Seems to me that if they have VAR they should use it to clean up as much blatant cheating as possible. p.s. Had VAR gotten involved in this particular case, I don't think it would've paused/slowed the game much, if at all.
Earlier in the match, Gibbs-White was trying to keep the ball from going out as his ream was the last to touch it. Joelinton hip/shoulder checked him out of bounds. Extremely obviously playing the man. No chance to play the ball. No foul, Newcastle throw.
Birds of a feather. Forest were always going to struggle this season because of the added burden of Europa League and because they weren’t actually good, but they couldn’t have handled the off-season any worse.
Happy about both frankly. As for Grealish, I always love to see players blossom, or rediscover old brilliance, after leaving a coach who has suppressed them in some way. And when that coach is Pep, well then...
Happy for Moyes that he has Everton doing well. He was so unfairly maligned at West Ham. Man won them a European trophy and they treated him like complete shit. I’m excited for their relegation comeuppance this season.
He was always the wrong choice, I was absolutely staggered they brought him in. Before managing Spurs always thought Ange would do very well at BHA because they already play similar to how Ange set up his teams in Japan/Aus/Scotland. But he just doesn't know how to play defensive teams, its why mate-ball was so bad at Spurs. And Forest is a hyper defensive team. Just on the last match, which is Brentford v Man City, I completely forgot about Jordan Henderson and am shocked he is at the Bees. I remember him going to Saudi then Ajax and I assumed he retired.