English football 2023-24

[Gingerfinch]

4-2 now.

[mikesiva]

Nottingham forest 2-1 Manchester United

[Durhamfootman]

Arsenal lose again

I've come to the conclusion that this is going to be Liverpool's season

All the other contenders are either in the middle of a bad patch or have had lean spells. Arsenal have begun losing at a time when they could be taking charge at the top. Man City have had a poor month in the Prem, whilst frying other fish abroad. Spurs had a poor spell that knocked them off the pace; Newcastle are having the month from hell, whilst Man Utd and Chelsea are having the season from hell. Villa and West Ham are quietly in the mix, but who knows whether they can maintain it. The only team with pedigree that isn't really having any sticky patches is Liverpool. It's their's to throw away, I think

[sussexpob]

I've come to the conclusion that this is going to be Liverpool's season

And even if they can't put the ball in the net, the referees are damn well going to make sure they win the league.

No one will be shocked that on New Years Day Liverpool get two generous penalty calls, one a totally outrageous and clear dive, while the rules about contact and penalties at the other end dont seemingly apply, as Longstaff gets bundled over when he has a clear chance to score what could be the winner, and Endo just shoves him over from behind. Then Gakpo's third goal looks clearly offside, VAR decides he is not, but conspicuously we get no replay with the lines on as usual. PGMOL two days later decided to release the images of the goal, but the image released for some reason has been clearly manipulated, as its the same still shot shown on TV that shows Gakpo is passed all the defensive line and is offside, but for some reason has been turned on its axis to a slightly different angle which manipulates where the line is plotted, and has been CLEARLY doctored to show its onside..... I have NEVER seen a VAR offside where the TV camera angle has been changed to plot the lines for offside.

To cap it all off, Jota's nonsense penalty starts with him getting a ball about 5 meters behind the nearest defender and looking very offside..... but apparently PGMOL say VAR didn't have an appropriate angle of the moment..... so I guess the camera that ruled Isak was offside pointing at that exact same spot of the pitch must have disappeared? Or maybe that camera shot had some images that the Liverpool fans in the booth didn't want to see.

[sussexpob]

Still, the press in the UK just close ranks about it. Rather than demanding an explanation about why one team had two penalties against them based on small contact in the area, and the other was not given one for the same reason, the UK press lead with Howe "embarrassing" post-match interview lighting up social media rage. The BBC helpfully picked out 3 Liverpool fans from a social media thread that included 3000 comments about how Newcastle had been robbed as justification for this, so I think that tells you all you need to know about how selective the narrative is in protecting clubs.

One only has to compare the narrative outside of the UK, where the French/Dutch and Belgian press have commented on the refereeing farce in the game against Newcastle, to see what's going on.

I guess we cant expect balance when Sky's assessment of Liverpool games comes from a guy who played for them for 20 years..... Carragher's assessment of why Longstaff wasn't given the penalty was "well, he didn't really appeal or argue with the referee"....

Well yeah, he was face down in the mud 40 yards from the referee, and Liverpool scored 10 seconds later.... But enlightening none the less.... I didnt realise you needed to appeal for decisions like in Cricket, that must be a rule change I missed.

[Durhamfootman]

start of December and Newcastle had just beaten Arsenal and Chelsea and been robbed by VAR in Paris and were sitting comfortably in 5th place, possibly in a CL position. 4 weeks later and if they don't win their next game (Man City) will probably be in the bottom half of the table. Yes there have been a lot of questionable decisions, but I'm sanguine that they haven't really deserved to win the games they've lost. They've been poor the last few games, had one of their fairly common lean spells in front of goal, but (unlike last year) have conceded a lot of very poor goals. Yes they had an extraordinary number of matches, but those matches included 4 teams in the bottom quarter of the league and they lost to 3 of them. The sheer number of injuries have shown the lightness of squad depth, but that can only change very gradually, so January becomes a key month... 3 matches only, unless they make it to round 4 of the cup and the first opportunity in weeks for the squad to get a little bit of rest and to actually work on things in training instead of just the match, recovery, match, recovery cycle they've been on for about 2 months. The lack of training ground work has been very obvious in the last 4 weeks. They need a striker in this window....desperately, but then they needed one desperately in the summer and didn't secure one, because the policy is to only sign the right players and they won't splash out on over-priced players

I'm certain that the club won't suddenly panic after a short bad spell at the end of a 2 year period of over-achievement, but it's well known that the owners have long been admirers of bloody Mourinho, and I have this nagging fear that Howe's position may come under threat. I like the way Howe plays football (even if it is a bit naive at times) and i hate the desperately negative way Mourinho plays it. Still... Howe must have a lot of credit in the bank, but they do need to start winning matches again, sharpish

[Durhamfootman]

I watched two matches yesterday, Sunderland/Newcastle and M'Boro/Villa. No VAR in either match. It was lovely not having interruptions in the games. Both were allowed to flow and both were pretty enjoyable games.

I've not been of the anti VAR opinion up to now, but I confess that after yesterday I'm coming around to it a bit.

Could Villa have had a penalty? VAR would have got involved and it would have seen Villa probably get a pen and the Boro player possibly sent off. Would it have made it a better game? Probably not. Would it have changed the result? No.

Maybe, just maybe, the standard of officiating was better for the absence of somebody else 'correcting' any errors. Both matches were better for the absence of continual interruption

[Durhamfootman]

another week, another defeat for Newcastle. Not unexpected against Man City, but they lost it in stoppage time when a draw might have been just the tonic they needed. 3rd home defeat at fortress SJP and 2 defeats in the last two

It's a horror run... I think it's their 6th defeat in the last 7 league matches. Villa next....... away from home, so no respite there. By the time that match is played they'll be in the bottom half.

Just to underline how much of an awful 5 or 6 weeks it's been...... Man Utd and Chelsea are both 2 points ahead of Newcastle and they are having horror season's. Looking back at the victory over Arsenal followed by the complete dismantling of Chelsea in the PL, it was almost impossible to imagine what would happen in the six weeks after

Hey ho..... got to keep the faith

[mikesiva]

Toney is back!

Brentford 3-2 Nottingham

[andy]

Brutal performance from Chelsea last night! Their fans will be wondering where that's been all season!! Boro was shocking though

[Durhamfootman]

they were in the first leg, I believe. Chelsea had an awful lot of chances to score, but just couldn't. They made up for it last night.

Could have been Newcastle getting a battering off Liverpool in the final

[andy]

Jürgen Klopp has announced he is leaving Liverpool at the end of the season!

[Gingerfinch]

Weird Timing. Be sad to see him go but I guess he has a big job lined up somewhere?

[Durhamfootman]

That's made my morning, tbh.

hopefully his next job will be a million miles away from the PL

[Gingerfinch]

That's made my morning, tbh.

hopefully his next job will be a million miles away from the PL

Not a fan?

I like him. he has been a tad grumpy of late but on the whole gave us a team which was as good as anything that we have had to watch in this country.