The rate of injuries has slowed in recent weeks (everyone's injured already??), but a greater incidence of fatigue, nerves, perhaps occasional complacency or dipping in motivation, and the mounting distraction of other competitions (the FA Cup and EUROPE!!), mean that already over the past few gameweeks we've seen more and more bizarre swings in form and unexpected results. The tail-end of the season becomes even more of a lottery than usual. Eccentric coaching decisions and incompetent refereeing may add even more to these uncertainties.... Will they this week? Let's see.
Nico Jackson broke his long goal drought with an absolute cracker from just outside the box - which, hopefully, should boost his confidence, and help him to improve over the remaining games. Alas, his anticipation, timing, positional play - which had been so vastly improved in the early part of this season - seem to have reverted to the cluelessness which brought so much derision on him last year. There were a few collisions and bits of wrestling in the box here which looked as if they should have merited a bit more attention than VAR apparently gave them - especially Caicedo's clattering into the back of Beto. But otherwise, there was fairly litttle of note in this game, either in the football or the officiating - apart from a couple of outstanding saves each from Sanchez and Pickford. (Two further observations, though.... First, there was an awful lot of 'faking injuries' etc. to waste time by Chelsea in this game. Yes, everyone does that these days. But Chelsea were really doing it conspicuously more than most here - to the point where you have to wonder if it is actually an official club policy, a tactic sanctioned by the manager. I do hope not. Second, Maresca served his touchline ban directly behind the dugout - where he obviously could have some 'emotional contact' with his players and staff, could easily overhear most of what they were saying, and could have spoken directly to them himself [though, admittedly, the cameras didn't catch him doing so] through the metal railing separating them. The terms of the ban may only state that he's not allowed in the dugout [or the changing-room, or on pitch during warm-ups]; but clearly the intent is that there should be a substantial physical separation between him and the dugout - and here, there wasn't! I hope he got permission from the League to watch the game from that position - in which case, it's their fault; they should have said NO. But if he didn't, he was plainly violating the spirit of his ban, and he ought to be made to serve the original ban again - as well as a substantial additional one.)
Brighton and West Ham are two strangers to consistency: they both have significant attacking threat, but most of the time can't defend to save their lives. Brighton have a much stronger overall squad and a better manager, which is why they're still in the hunt for a European place while West Ham are only spared the threat of relegation by the three promoted sides all being so exceptionally poor this season. The home side were much the better team in the first half, but failed to make it count; West Ham produced more danger after they brought on Fullkrug as a target-man for the second-half, but they likewise failed to produce many big chances... Brighton needed a couple of pingers from outside the box to clinch the result in a dull game.
Newcastle still aren't quite firing at their best - although Trippier is starting to show signs of his old greatness again at last. Here the Geordies were dominating possession and creating huge numbers of openings - but the quality of their crossing mostly wasn't too good, and their finishing was poor. Ipswich were playing with a lot of guts and resilience (Woolfenden's headed clearance over the bar, from his own goal-line, was little short of miraculous), and one suspects that - but for the contentious sending off of Ben Johnson in the first half - they might have been able to hang on for an unexpected goalless draw here. For me, although Johnson was stupid to hold back Isak when already on a yellow, that first card should not have been given; it wasn't absolutely clear - from any of the camera angles shown on TV - that Burn hadn't made some contact with his knee or shin; and even if he hadn't, Johnson's going down wasn't 'simulation', but a legitimate attempt to evade what looked like it was going to be a crunching trip. (And, by rights, Bruno Guimaraes should also have been booked for flourishing an imaginary card at the unfortunate Johnson behind the ref's back.) The penalty was also a worrying piece of VAR intervention for me; there have been so many far more obvious fouls in the box this season that apparently did not meet the 'clear and obvious error' threshold required for VAR to whisper in the referee's ear about a possible mistake; but once that whispering begins, the referee obviously feels bound to reverse his original decision, regardless of what he sees on the TV monitor. And the problem here, even more than with the Dan Burn 'trip' on Johnson on the edge of the area, was that the TV pictures just weren't good enough to enable a definitive view to be reached: rather bizarrely, the VAR playbacks of Enciso's apparent arm-tug on Murphy only showed two angles - both from extreme distance, and both from the 'wrong side', with the attacking player's body obscuring the supposed point of contact (the defender's hand on the inside of the attacker's elbow); even more bizarrely, there was a third - much better angle - shown later on TV, much closer, and from the right-hand touchline where you had a clear line of sight to Enciso's hand reaching for the arm.... but even on that, the resolution wasn't anywhere near good enough to show if there had in fact been contact, or if it had been any more than fleeting and unsubstantial. (I'm not saying it wasn't a foul; just that the TV pictures weren't good enough to allow a definitive decision on the incident - and therefore VAR should not have been getting involved.)
As for the disallowed Newcastle goal, I think that was a fair call - although it was disappointing to see Ipswich keeper Alex Palmer going down like a bowling-pin. Yes, Guimaraes backed into him, and that's not allowed - but the contact was pretty light; he should have stayed on his feet and done his job of collecting the ball, rather than toppling backwards and looking for the foul to be given (he was taking a completely unnecessary - small, but non-zero - chance that the referee wouldn't find in his favour!). Goalkeepers should be made of granite: if an attacking player backs into you, they should be the ones hitting the ground - with bruises and regrets. As soon as an opposing team gets wind of the possibility your keeper may be physically and/or mentally intimidatable, they will target him for crowding and blocking at set-pieces (looking at you, Vicario...) - and you don't want to be inviting that kind of attention, Mr Palmer; it won't be to your or your team's advantage. Moreover, everyone surely now feels that goalkeepers are ridiculously over-protected by current refereeing practices; and having keepers 'play the system' like this, appealing for fouls to be given in their favour for the slightest contact, is only going to increase that general dissatisfaction. And maybe that will eventually lead to another tweak in the rules, or their 'interpretation guidelines' - wouldn't be a bad thing. So, I'd suggest Alex Palmer probably hasn't done his fellow goalkeepers any favours with this display of chronic lightweight-ism and play-acting; next season, we might perhaps see attacking sides starting to get away with a lot more in terms of crowding and jostling the keeper in the six-yard box - as a reaction to his piece of silliness here.
Southampton actually looked much the better side against a lacklustre Fulham in the first half, with only a couple of smart efforts from Willian (a curler drifting inches side, and a firm drive smacking against a post), getting a rare start, causing any excitement for the travelling fans. But Marco Silva made multiple tweaks at half-time, and the visitors immediately started to get on top, though they didn't finally apply any sustained pressure in front of goal until the last ten minutes or so. The Cottagers still look, for me, much the weakest of the six or seven teams chasing the other European places this year - though they have been punching a bit above their weight even to be in the middle of the pack, and their rivals all have their own flaws.
Wolves produced a predictably straightfoward demolition of Leicester - the only relegation team not to have produced even a glimmer of improvement so far in their fight to salvage some pride from a dismal season. Cunha/Strand Larsen/Ait-Nouri was a points-for-everyone FPL selection this week! Jamie Vardy's penalty probably shouldn't have been awarded in the first place (it was more a case of him running into Sa than Sa 'bringing him down'); and justice was done when he telegraphed which side he was going to put his spot-kick, didn't hit it that hard... and Sa gratefully saved it. But those were probably the two largest slices of FPL 'luck' in Saturday's games.
A fairly dull game at Bournemouth was salvaged for United by a late goal, deep in injury time. We'd seen a great early goal from Semenyo (his second in three games; or his second in eleven, if you're more of the 'glass half-empty' mindset!), and Ouattara curling a free-kick against an upright (Zabarnyi then putting a follow-up effort only just wide), and late in the game Bruno Fernandes put a 25-yard screamer just inches wide; but apart from these isolated moments of excitement, only the ever-lively Garnacho looked likely to create any danger, and he didn't do so very often. The game would probably have limped on to a 1-0 win for the home side, but for Evanilson's sending-off with 20-odd minutes left. That was fair enough, a good use of VAR to direct the referee to take a second look. The Brazilian was perhaps slightly unlucky: he took a wild high swish at the ball, reckless, but not deliberately targetting his opponent; but he lost his footing, and what had been his standing foot crunched into Mazraoui's leg just above the ankle; I'd say there was no intent there, but the impact was serious, and thus the sending-off could perhaps be justified; although it would be harsh to characterise such an obviously accidental collision as 'violent conduct'. It probably didn't help Evanilson's case that Tyler Adams had got away with a similar rash challenge early in the game on Garnacho, also reviewed by VAR but apparently deemed to be only 'borderline' for a red card; that one again was accidental, Adams losing his footing on the slippery surface as he flew into a full-blooded tackle - but his second foot never got anywhere near the United player, and although the tackling foot caught Garnacho hard, he had got a touch on the ball first, and looked to be trying to pull out slightly, keeping his foot low and turning it sideways so that the impact was with the inside of the instep more than the studs. The referee and VAR getting two tough calls right in the same game?? Maybe things are slowly improving with our officiating! The BPS, alas, is still a complete shambles: Hojlund, thanks to claiming the 'decisive' goal in an uneventful game, gets the maximum bonus, despite doing absolutely bugger-all in the game - even the goal was a somewhat fortuitous touch on Ugarte's already goal-bound effort. (I really don't see why it's any more 'decisive' than Semenyo's.... which was also a much better goal. But he only got 1 extra point! BPS is broken.)
Liverpool, as expected, cruised to the title, as Spurs just couldn't live with them. FPL managers who'd pinned their hopes on huge points from Salah and other Liverpool players will no doubt feel frustrated that the clean-sheet slipped away from them so easily, and that the final scoreline wasn't even greater.... and that Mo didn't get a hattrick (he somehow just failed to get on the end of Gakpo's hugely unselfish layoff to him, and then had Udogie take a second off him - putting the ball into his own net). The only minor refereeing controversy concerned Konate's heavy challenge on Tel in the box - but it was fairly clear that he'd played the ball cleanly and only clattered the Tottenham man with his follow-through, so that was never going to be a penalty.
Forest are faltering slightly on the run-in. They appeared to dominate possession - which is not usually how they like to play! - in the Thursday night game at the City Ground, but were unable to create many decent chances from it. Chris Wood, so often deadly this season, had only one effort on goal, and headed it extravagantly wide. And then two uncharacteristic defensive errors, from Aina and Milenkovic (and arguably Sels, too, who in both cases could have come out more quickly to mop up the danger created by his defenders allowing an attacker to get goal-side of them), gifted the visitors a pair of goals either side of half-time. Referee Darren England was a bit card-happy, booking a total of 8 players, and manager Nuno Espirito Santo; yet Keane Lewis-Potter and Christian Nørgaard were both extremely lucky to escape sendings-off for particularly blatant second yellow offences. And Brentford keeper Mark Flekken somehow claimed maximum bonus points under the bizarre BPS ratings, despite making only ONE - not particularly demanding - save on the highlights I saw.
There continue to be doubts about the application of VAR, but there weren't too many controversial moments in the weekend's games, and only Ben Johnson's first yellow card (leading to a later sending-off) seemed obviously unjust; although Evanilson's might have been slightly harsh too. And the refereeing in the Thursday night game was probably the worst of the entire week. The only big surprise with the 'Team of the Week' is that there are so many defenders - and so few strikers! - in it; well, and that Sa was the top keeper thanks to a penalty save, though later replaced by Flekken, who was even less worthy of dominating the bonus points in his game; while Brighton's Baleba and Ayari (and the not entirely unexpected, but still not super high-owned Macallister and Semenyo) were edging out the likes of Salah and Diaz and Barnes and Murphy and Bowen and Mitoma and Iwobi in midfield; but most of the 'big names' came up with something - unlike in many recent weeks! The big points-spread this week - unlike in the last two weeks, where it was down to a lot of randomness in the returns! - can mainly be attributed to a lot of people having left themselves without either the Free Hit or Wildcard chips to get around the problem of the Blank Gameweek and thus putting out very short teams; most decent players, using a chip wisely to optimise for the week, seemed to be scoring in the 70s and 80s (with the Forest v Brentford game still to play), while the global average was a paltry 38 points (on Monday; it did somehow rise to 47 by the end of the week - again, WTF???)!
This has been one of the least unpredictable gameweeks of the season so far; and also one of the best for the standard of the refereeing (compromised a bit by the Thursday game). Hence, it's barely looking a 3 out of 10 on the 'Luck-o-Meter'. If only this weren't such a rarity!!!
DON'T FORGET The Boycott. Most people will have played the dratted 'Assistant Manager' chip by now; but if you haven't.... it's not too late to refuse to do so! I took the high road by quitting playing the game for the rest of the season when it was introduced in GW23. [I worry that, if people don't protest vociferously about it, the new chip may become a permanent feature of the game - and it will completely ruin it.] If you didn't feel able to join me in such an emphatic gesture, I hope you at least thought about refusing to use the Assistant Manager chip (and still might refuse, if you've kept it till the last few gameweeks of the season).
Please also criticise and complain about it online as much as possible. And raise objections to it with any football or media figures you know how to contact, and - if possible - try to find a way to protest about it directly to the FPL hierarchy (and let me know how, if you manage that!).
#QuitFPLinGW23 #DownWithTheNewChip