Premier League Weekend Afterthought
The story of the weekend has to be Arsenal’s surprising win at Stamford Bridge. Chelsea who had gone over four years without a Premier League home defeat lost their second home game in recent weeks under dramatic circumstances. Arsenal, however, started the match very shakily and did not look comfortable as Chelsea seemingly dominated the possession and dictated the pace of the match. This was compounded by Djorou who put into his own net to give Chelsea a 1-0 half time lead.
Chelsea deserved their lead and looked good for it until a terrible referreeing decision allowed Arsenal to level midway through the second half. Denilson’s flick fell to Van Persie, who was visably a yard or two offside, no flag was raised and Van Persie slotted home.
A shell shocked Chelsea were outraged by the assistant referees mistake and were further made to pay when a sluggish Chelsea defence failed to clear allowing for Van Persie to turn on the ball and fire home the winner past a helpless Petr Cech a couple of minutes later. Chelsea never looked like scoring and again failed to come from a goal behind against strong opposition.
The Blues can look back on the match as an unlucky defeat but in truth Chelsea did not have enough spark at the Bridge to deserve anything from the match.
Scolari was surprisingly critical of the refereeing after the game. The Brazilian’s cool, calm and colleted reputation is quickly disappearing. The pressure may be getting to Big Phil, Chelsea are not looking they force they did at the start of the season. As the injury list grows and following the annoucement that Chelsea will not be buying players in January it is difficult to see how the home forn will be turned around.
As for Arsenal this result may have saved their season. They now are within 8 points of the top of the league and although it will be an uphill struggle the league title can still be theirs. Arsenal still lack a clear cutting edge but this result is sure to boost their confidence. Hopefully they will spend in January as the board have made it clear they have the funds to. Chelsea have now played all of the other three so called ‘big four’ at home this season and have only taken one point from those games not exactly title winning form.
Perhaps the fiercest derby in English Football went the way of Manchester United this weekend. United dominated the match and were good value for their win. Manchester City could not find the magic of last season to oust their rivals. Rooney scored a rebound tap in to seal the win for the Red Devils.
All did not end well for United, Cristiano Ronaldo was sent off for a needless handball late in the second half. The win has meant United have closed the gap significantly at the top and are starting to look like the team of last season again. City are now hovering dangerously close to the relegation zone. People at City will be starting to wonder how much longer their ridiculously rich owners will stand for the poor league position.
Liverpool claimed top spot despite failing to capitalise on Chelsea’s loss and could only draw in a drab match at home to West Ham. The Reds were booed off at full time and the Anfield crowd were less than impressed with another goaless home draw against weaker opposition.
It was the same result at Villa Park as a gutsy Fulham earned a good point. Villa missed out on the chance to consolidate their position in the top four and have now fallen to fifth. The league has tightened even more this week and no one at the top is taking control over their rivals.
Towards the foot of the table things are so close that a win can take some teams up six or seven places.
West Brom lost again despite leading away to Wigan and look like the real certainties to go down at the moment.
The other team on a downward spiral are Sunderland, hammered at home 4-1 by Bolton of all teams. An embarressing result and it looks as though Roy Keane has become disillusioned with life in the North-East. He will not sign a new contract and has admitted he may leave the club which is hardly reassuring to the players and fans. It is difficult to see how they can turn their fortunes around under such a fickle manager. Maybe Keane should just leave now so that the club can appoint a new manager and raise the spirits on the club before it is too late.
There were also good wins for Everton away at Spurs and Portsmouth at home to Blackburn. Stoke and Hull managed a draw as did Middlesborough and Newcastle.
1 | Liverpool | 15 | 13 | 34 | ||||||||||
2 | Chelsea | 15 | 27 | 33 | ||||||||||
3 | Man Utd | 14 | 16 | 28 | ||||||||||
4 | Arsenal | 15 | 8 | 26 | ||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||
5 | Aston Villa | 15 | 6 | 25 | ||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||
6 | Hull | 15 | -2 | 23 | ||||||||||
7 | Everton | 15 | -2 | 22 | ||||||||||
8 | Portsmouth | 15 | -4 | 22 | ||||||||||
9 | Bolton | 15 | 1 | 20 | ||||||||||
10 | Fulham | 14 | 1 | 19 | ||||||||||
11 | Wigan | 15 | -1 | 19 | ||||||||||
12 | Middlesbrough | 15 | -6 | 19 | ||||||||||
13 | West Ham | 15 | -5 | 18 | ||||||||||
14 | Stoke | 15 | -10 | 18 | ||||||||||
15 | Man City | 15 | 6 | 17 | ||||||||||
16 | Tottenham | 15 | -4 | 15 | ||||||||||
17 | Newcastle | 15 | -5 | 15 | ||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||
18 | Sunderland | 15 | -11 | 15 | ||||||||||
19 | Blackburn | 15 | -12 | 13 | ||||||||||
20 | West Brom | 15 | -16 | 11 | ||||||||||
-
Recent
- England Vs Germany The Verdict
- Manchester United – life after Ronaldo
- The verdict on Ancelotti’s first game for Chelsea
- Serie A and La Liga Preview
- Premier League Preview: Tottenham Hotspur-Wolves
- Norwich City: The laughing stock of the football league!
- Premier League Preview: Manchester United-Sunderland
- Premier League Preview: Fulham-ManCity
- Premier League Preview: Bolton-Everton
- Premier League Preview: Arsenal-Blackburn
- Madrid the Real deal?
- Has the football league ever had it so good?
-
Links
-
Archives
- June 2010 (1)
- August 2009 (12)
- March 2009 (2)
- December 2008 (6)
- November 2008 (1)
-
Categories
- AC Milan
- Arsenal
- Aston Villa
- Barcelona
- Bayern Munich
- Birmingham City
- Blackburn
- Bolton
- Bristol City
- Burnley
- Charlton
- Chelsea
- Derby
- England
- Everton
- Fulham
- Germany
- Hull City
- Inter Milan
- Ipswich Town
- Leeds United
- Leicester
- Liverpool
- Man City
- Manchester United
- Middlesborough
- Newcastle
- Norwich City
- Nottingham Forest
- Notts County
- Porto
- Portsmouth
- Real Madrid
- Sheffield Wednesday
- Southampton
- Stoke City
- Sunderland
- Tottenham Hotspur
- West Brom
- West Ham
- Wigan Athletic
- Wolverhampton Wanderers
-
RSS
Entries RSS
Comments RSS