Luck-o-Meter 26-27 - Gameweek 10

 

Continuing with the (slightly) more concise format I trialled last week....  (This week, I'm a bit late to get the first instalment of the summary out because some drone at the Beeb carelessly mislabelled the Scottish football highlights as the Premier League 'Match of the Day' programme and uploaded the wrong file to the streaming platform - and hence the traditional Saturday evening highlights show remained unavailable to view on the BBC i-Player until late on Sunday afternoon!)

Only bangers allowed at the City Ground on Saturday afternoon! Liam Delap hit two absolute pingers from outside the box, but Cherki's thumping volley was even better. Jacob Murphy's 25-yard curler was a peach as well (it was only a few days ago that I reposted Conor McAinsh's video on the extraordinary prevalence of long-distance goals in the Premier League this season). The best goal of the day, though, might have been Sean Longstaff's neat control, sharp swivel-turn and fierce half-volley - that was somehow fingertipped over the bar by Kinsky. Leno also made a very good save right on his goal-line from Harvey Barnes.

Diego Gomez's cracking 25-yard drive looks like it might win him a second successive 'Goal of the Month'! It was a dreadful mistake from Cristian Walton, allowing himself to be caught in possession by Evanilson to gift Bournemouth their breakthrough goal. But how the heck did James Hill put a header over the bar from half a yard out (which would have given Bournemouth their deserved 3-0 margin, and further boosted the recently prolific Evanilson's haul with an assist)?  Liverpool were under the cosh for most of the game at Selhurst Park, with Pino crashing an early shot against the bar, and Alisson having to make smart saves from Kamada and Wharton, and from Pino again and then Lerma in the second-half. Suzuki made a good flying save from Cunha's long-distance curler in the first-half at Old Trafford; and then substitute Mount cracked a volley against the crossbar just before United's crazy injury-time fightback.

There were three major refereeing clangers on Saturday (and three more on Friday night!),... and then a bunch more on Sunday too. Falai Haram and his VAR team were apparently unaware of the rule that being in an offside position does not invalidate a foul by the opponent, because no actual offside offence has occurred until the player attempts to play the ball - and thus Havertz should have been awarded a penalty for the shirt-holding by Mendy (although it's hard to feel that this was any great injustice, since Arsenal catch more than their fair share of breaks from the referees; and they still managed to scrape a win anyway). It was quite unfathomable that Jayden Bogle didn't receive a straight red card for jumping on to the back Mathys Tel's leg ('accidental' it may have been, but it was certainly 'endangering' the opponent, and indeed Tel was unable to continue; the contact was in fact rather similar to Mateta's last week, only much, much worse - and the Palace forward did get a straight red for that challenge); John Brooks somehow didn't even award a yellow card - and his VAR crew unfathomably ruled that there had been 'no force' in the contact. Dan Burn's near-post headed goal which would have given Newcastle the lead - and probably secured a win against the lacklustre home side - was ruled out for a non-existent foul by one of his teammates. And Stuart Attwell's failure to send off James Tarkowski for a not-very-hard-but-utterly-blatant-and-clearcut hair-pull on Caleb Yirenkyi was also inexplicable (and yet again, VAR declined to intervene to correct a very obvious oversight from the on-pitch official). A little later, Awoniyi was barged over in the box by Mykolenko, and again neither Attwell nor the VAR team thought anything of it (the 'official justification' was, bizarrely, that the contact had started outside the box; there might have been a case to be made that it was a bit of 50/50 shoving, but the decisive part of the interaction clearly happened over or inside the white line).

Marcos Senesi was also a bit lucky to get away without conceding a penalty early on against Leeds. It really wasn't very clear where the ball hit his arm (I thought probably initially near his shoulder, but it might then have bounced or rolled down his arm a fair distance, and maybe even grazed his lower arm); but, for me, he didn't deserve any leniency because he was so blatantly trying to intercept the ball with his arm, diving at full length towards the ball with his hand stretched out in front of him.

Thiago's sending-off against Brighton was ridiculous: he shouldn't have shoved his assailant away like that, but the contact was minimal, there was no 'force' in it - as Michael Oliver ludicrously proclaimed (I would have sent off Chema Andres: yellow card for his initial foul, and an immediate second for the blatant simulation of injury). Ipswich's penalty award was also absurd: Abdoul Ouattara fouled Lewis Cook, not the other way around! VAR was somehow asleep all weekend!! Cole Palmer had yet another penalty appeal turned down (it's getting beyond a joke!). Jarred Gillett didn't even initially award a foul when the midfielder was unceremoniously bundled over on the edge of the box by two Sunderland players; and then VAR again ruled that the contact had occurred 'outside the box' - but it really looked as if it was directly on the line. The penalty then awarded against Colwill was ridiculous; there was some mutual pushing and tugging between him and Brobbey (again, starting well outside the area), but about 60%-70% was being done by Brobbey - who clearly had a handful of the armpit of the defender's shirt and was pulling him off-balance. Why did VAR not overrule this?? The penalty award against Kerkez in the final minute at Selhurst Park was widely viewed as contentious, an 'accidental coming-together' when both players were trying to head a ball that wasn't actually there; but I sympathise with the referee's call on this one - Kerkez had a better view of the flight of the ball, and really was very, very late going into the challenge. It was a dreadful error from Zion Suzuki to flap at and miss that corner in the dying seconds at Old Trafford; but he was clearly barged by Lammens, so.... the goal really shouldn't have been allowed to stand. (And VAR didn't even seem to look at the incident??)

I'm not sure how Rodrigo Muniz claimed the equaliser against Newcastle. The scruffy goal clearly pinged in off three Newcastle defenders, but the BBC pictures didn't show any clear touch from the Brazilian in the middle of all that. I have no idea how Jamie Trafford earned even 1 bonus point, let alone the maximum 3 points (though I shouldn't complain, since I started him). And Barry's 16-point haul not only came out of nowhere (his form hasn't been that great, and Everton were poor for most of this game), but didn't seem fully deserved: the second goal appeared to be fumbled in by a combination of Rushworth and one of his defenders - I've no idea how that can be credited to the striker. In fact, a better camera-angle showed that Barry's final touch had been with the back of his left-hand - so, it shouldn't have been a goal at all. (To be fair, though, his through-ball to Dewsbury-Hall for the third goal was an absolute peach.)  

And how the hell did Harry Wilson not get the assist for Okafor's decisive goal against Spurs? Yes, his square ball deflected off a defender, but not substantially. The guidelines on this were supposedly tweaked last year so that the 'benefit of the doubt' would always be given to the attacking player. And we've seen a number of goals this season and last where clear 'interceptions' by a defender (which this wasn't) didn't stop the assist being awarded. (Nobody owns Harry in FPL this year because he's been starting so irregularly; but it's still an injustice!)

Narrow wins for Arsenal and Leeds and a drab draw between Fulham and Newcastle were to have been expected (although Newcastle were robbed), but recently woeful Forest pulling off such a convincing win against a very, very out-of-sorts City was a big turn-up for the books. And although Coventry have been pretty dreadful at the back, and Everton much more freescoring so far this season than for many years, no-one was expecting Thierno Barry to claim the 'Player of the Week' mantle (although Villa's new winger Alysson subsequently matched his 16-point haul)! And, frankly, Coventry were absolutely robbed in that game too, with a pair of crucial refereeing decisions going against them before either side had scored. Chelsea were pretty dreadful; but they didn't deserve to lose the game - that wasn't a penalty. Liverpool got absolutely battered by bottom-of-the-table Palace for most of the game and were extremely fortunate to come away with the points; the final scoreline flattered them immensely, and the home side actually outdid them on 'expected' goals, but just couldn't convert their chances. And crikey - what a ding-dong at Old Trafford! Both teams committed some shocking defensive errors, and the final equaliser probably shouldn't have been allowed to stand - there was really no way United should have got anywhere near a point from that game!

The 'Team of the Week' looks especially odd this week: only Cherki, and maybe Odegaard and Trafford and one or two of the Leeds defenders, are likely to have had any kind of ownership at all. The global average from the first 5 games was a pretty wretched 25 points , and only just climbed to a still mediocre 55 points after Sunday's tranche of games. A major flub by City (and perennial captaincy favourite Haaland), while Liverpool and Villa were also fairly poor, and Chelsea frankly terrible, that all messed heavily with expected FPL returns; and there were so many conspicuously awful refereeing blunders - which affected the results of matches - that I'm afraid this must be the season's first (and, hopefully, last!) 10 out of 10 on the 'Luck-o-Meter'. In fact, this was perhaps the worst weekend I can ever remember in the game; certainly the worst for a good few years. The refereeing was so bad this week, I'd really like to call it an 11 or 12!!