Dear Arsenal,
Thanks for making sure Spurs weren’t the worst show on turf this weekend.
Ouch.
Haha that was pure class. Now what Wenger?
lol45
Sheesh. As a Gooner I’m usually just pissed off that they can’t win any hardware. The way this season is going I’m wondering if we’re going to have to fight to avoid relegation. And I’m only half joking.
Fernando who?
Well if Liverpool have to be a one man team I’m happy that man’s Suarez but for the first time in a long time LFC don’t just look like a bunch of uninterested journeymen plus Gerrard, Carragher and Torres trying to drag something out of them.
I’ll hold my hands up that I was unconvinced about Dalglish’s return and still wasn’t sure how well they’d start this season but I’m happy to be proved wrong. My biggest fear when he took over was that nothing would improve and he’d burn his reputation with the fans but he looks 20 years younger since he took over. 4th before the season start was looking like a realistic challenge, but on current form I think we can give Chelsea a run for their money for third but I think we’re still some way off both Manchester teams at the moment and despite some pretty heft bankrolling from the new owners the gulf between City/United and everyone else unless Chelsea decide to open the purse strings again is going to be hard to match.
With no European involvement I’d hope we put up a better show in the domestic cups this season.
Another suggestion for getting matches outside the UK is from the clubs’ websites, a lot of them show their own club matches 24-48 hours after they’ve been played, but there’s a subscription fee.
Transfer day madness!
From what I can tell other than Mata Chelsea aren’t managing to get any of our first picks and we’re making a mad scramble to get a midfielder, any midfielder.
Watching the last three games it’s our defense I’m most concerned with, perhaps the thinking is a good midfielder would help with that(?).
I agree with you Nellie, watching the Manchester teams play is worlds different from any other team I’ve watched so far.
I’d really like to be watching the games live, I did go out to a soccer pub at 7am last weekend. The other alternative seems to be getting a satellite dish and dumping comcast. Foxsoccer.tv doesn’t even show many of the games live.
Utterly bonkers. Bellamy back at Liverpool, Chelsea tapping up more of our players, hopefully we’ll get a decent wedge again or stick him in the reserves until January.
Crouch and Wright-Phillips on the move again which perhaps isn’t much of a surprise anymore.
I’m a sysadmin. So, being an American fan of someone that’s not in the top 4, you get used to installing some wacky software and going to sites you wouldn’t point any of your users to is just how we roll. At least I got an English feed this time.
If you want a definition of “a game of two halves”, just look at the Everton-Villa game today. That camo goalkeepers shirt Howard wore must have hidden him from Stan’s ‘I can pull this off once every couple of years’ shot on goal, and we were lucky to pull off a draw. HEY GABBY, WE AREN’T PLAYING SHIRTS AND SKINS THIS GAME!
Also: United are going to walk the league this year. Putting 8 past a very weakened Arsenal is one thing (although hearing Piers Morgan cuss two shades of shit about the best manager Arsenal’s had since Herbert Chapman is lulz worthy), but putting 5 past a pretty decent, about full strength Bolton side is another.
piers morgan is a cunt.
You do realize Man City plays in the same league, right?
“Walk the league” is a bit of a stretch for even the biggest of Man U fans, and I don’t recall you being a Man U fan.
We’ll see what happens, but my money is still on Man City to win the Premiership this year. Easily. And possibly some other hardware.
Well aware, and no, I’m not a United fan. I do realize that it’s very early (the ball’s not even changed color yet) and that Chelsea looked damn-near unbeatable this time last year as well, so keep that in mind.
I think it’s early days but it looks pretty clear that yet again it’s a two horse race at best for the premiership. Neither City or Utd have had to face any opposition of note yet this season and I’m not reading too much into the Charity shield but I think it’s early days to claim that Utd will walk it. I’m not entirely writing Chelsea off and there’s always a chance that Abramovich might want to go wallet to wallet with Etihad in the winter. If I were to point to a team that might walk the league then I think it’s city rather than Utd who’ve got the depth in squad to do it. A couple of injuries to key players and I think utd could struggle while city have more players than they know what to do with in all areas though their challenge might be more keeping people happy.
I’m psyched for the Champions league games this week, after not being able to see the Chelsea game last week I splurged on foxsoccer.tv. Not that they carried the game, but the desire to purchase knew no logic. Too bad the resolution is so sub-HD.
I’m looking forward to seeing Barcelona and Madrid play, are there other non-English teams that are serious contenders for the Champions league? Munich?
After the games I’ve seen I would have written off Chelsea this year, but I realized there are quite a few highly regarded players who haven’t even been seen on the field yet like Sturridge (who did play, and well I hear) and David Luiz. Too bad Torres is seeming like such a sulky dud.
Just watched Barcelona-AC Milan and…wow. That’s the kind of finish that has made me destroy many a controller playing FIFA games on Playstation. Almost total domination by Barcelona, then they give up the equalizer in stoppage time off a corner kick. I think Barca probably had over 70% of the possession and they outshot Milan 20-5 before that corner. Must be gutting to their fans.
Barca drew in the league as well. Early season rustiness I guess, especially given that La Liga was on strike for a while.
Chelsea just look fairly poor. Still some great players, but Malouda & Mikel are pretty much rubbish these days. Ashley Cole just can’t cross. By and large the new boys did pretty well (Torres can’t control the ball but he’s always working hard) and Lampard was a good sub.
Can’t compare to the Manchester sides at the moment.
What I saw yesterday, and what I read about the match with Sociedad, matches something I noticed in FCB last season: when they have a lead, they tend to rein in their play a bit, at times to their detriment.
After going 2-1 up against Milan, they spent a lot more time playing pretty little triangles hoping for an opportunity to appear, rather than actively trying to carve out opportunities like they had been doing to that point in the game. Against a side that’s become unorganized (“OMG! We’re down a goal to Barca! MUST SCORE AT ALL COSTS”) this can be good, but Milan managed to keep a solid organized defense, and capitalize on an opportunity at the death.
FCB have the talent to grind any team into the ground, they just need to keep applying it against teams that provide them resistance.
My favorite “well whaddaya know” of the night: Milan went 90 minutes without scoring, and still managed to draw 2-2.
Agreed, Torres can’t seem to keep possession of the ball longer than 2 seconds and he spends the entire 2 seconds staring at the ball. And there are a lot of other players like you mention who look somewhat hopeless. The game against Leverkusen got the job done but was ugly as usual. Our only hope is that a massive loss against United this weekend will convince Abramovich to spend ridiculous money in the winter. Or possibly some other hope. I think the recent trades were generally good ones, but not enough to be real competition to the top.
What did you see Lampard doing that made you feel he was a good sub (genuine question)?
Miereles was useful - provided plenty of energy and attacking verve - but he doesn’t have quite the same range of passing. When he got subbed for Lampard, Mata remained the creative hub of the team which meant that Lampard could sit back and prod play around the pitch. He was also fairly useful in defence as well. With Mata operating higher up the pitch, Lampard didn’t have to cover so much ground and the pressure of dictating play wasn’t entirely on him.
It was kind of the Andrea Pirlo role, and it suited him. Chelsea have done this before but without someone of Mata’s class on the pitch, and this could work in future. Still gets in the box on occasions too.
Meanwhile Benfica has taken a 1-0 lead over Man U.
Totally deserved so far, United haven’t turned up for the game at all. Strange team selection from Ferguson as well.