Premier League and Carabao Cup: 10 Talking Points From the Weekend
Sports
The Guardian Sport
1) City vastly superior … now for killer instinct As Manchester City went through the gears in the first half, their play resembled the 2019 FA Cup final, a glorious 6-0 dissolution of Watford. But first-half goals never came and doubts descended. City were better than last week at Wembley when Chelsea ended hopes of a quadruple but their problems were similar. They lack a true finisher, with Sergio Agüero departing and Gabriel Jesus, who scored twice two years ago against Watford, no longer trusted by Pep Guardiola. Raheem Sterling’s poor form has also been unhelpful. A team hoping to reach the club’s first ever Champions League final when they meet PSG this week and next lack the killer instinct in attack that recent winners like Liverpool, with Mohamed Salah, and Bayern Munich, with Robert Lewandowski, could lean on. Patience and quality eventually told but Guardiola would surely rather not rely on set-piece headers from defenders to win matches that should have been out of sight. John Brewin 2) Klopp turns his anger towards players “Really close to being unacceptable.” Jürgen Klopp’s patience snapped in all directions last week as a consequence of his owners’ greed but it was simply, and significantly, his players’ performance against Newcastle that tipped him towards the edge as a football manager. The protection he gave them throughout the six-game losing run at Anfield is no longer available. Liverpool had more shots on target than when beating Crystal Palace 7-0 on 19 December – a result that moved the champions five points clear at the top – yet were indebted to the ludicrous handball rule for a point. Given the scale of the downturn, Klopp was asked: is it too simplistic to believe Liverpool will be rejuvenated once the injured cavalry return? “No,” he replied. “The long-term solutions are fine, but the short term we have to work on. We have nothing to lose anymore. We want to deserve the Champions League. We don’t want to be cheeky and come in somehow. We want to earn it and with these results you don’t earn it.” Andy Hunter 3) Form of Son was taken for granted In October 2017, Pep Guardiola described Tottenham as “Harry Kane Team”. Son-Heung min has served Guardiola several helpings of his own words. Son, not Kanehas been the common denominator in Spurs’ victories over Guardiola’s City. He has scored six times against them, including three in the heart-stopping Champions League quarter-final of 2019. At Wembley, he was a long way from his best. Son ended the match on his haunches, in tears, being consoled by Phil Foden and Ilkay Gündoğan. They were tears of disappointment, probably also of frustration at his own performance. Son is usually such a dynamic, decisive player, but took the safe option throughout and seemed especially reluctant to run at Kyle Walker.Earlier in the season, it was said ad nauseum that José Mourinho had a chance of winning trophies at Spurs if Kane and Son stayed fit. We took their form for granted. Rob Smyth 4) Fernandes’s slump cannot last much longer Bruno Fernandes has scored just once in Manchester United’s last 10 games – a late penalty against Granada – and he scuffed a gilded chance to break the deadlock at Elland Road. It is the mark of the Portuguese playmaker’s class that he is still the club’s top scorer this season with 24, four ahead of Marcus Rashford. His drought surely cannot continue much longer, which may be bad news for Roma as they travel to Old Trafford for Thursday’s Europa League semi-final first leg. Fernandes’ recent lack of potency also shows up an encouraging development for Solskjær’s side – a sign of less reliance on the midfielder. This draw was a first stumble after five consecutive league wins and United are finishing the campaign as strongly as they were weak at the start. Now, the hope is that Fernandes can relocate his finishing. Jamie Jackson 5) Arteta feels heat as paths to Europe narrow Mikel Arteta was raging after Arsenal’s defeat to Everton and, taking the subject of his ire at face value, nobody could really blame him. VAR is testing the patience of most who love football and the Premier League would be better off without its overbearing presence. But it did seem a convenient vent for wider frustration: like almost everyone in the sport who is not an absentee billionaire Arteta was rocked hard by the Super League fiasco, so the fans’ audible protests outside the Emirates as the match progressed must have hurt. There is also the inconvenient truth of what Friday night’s result meant. Arsenal can forget about earning European football via the domestic route now, so everything hangs on a Europa League double-header with Villarreal, managed by Arteta’s predecessor, Unai Emery. It is a winnable tie, but the alternative would make things distinctly awkward before a summer where Arsenal require changes from top to bottom. Can he afford to get it wrong? Nick Ames 6) Werner is not another forward flop for Chelsea Timo Werner is having a very odd season. In one sense the German has been a disappointment since joining Chelsea from RB Leipzig. Werner’s brilliantly-worked goal in the crucial 1-0 win at West Ham was only his third in his last 32 appearances and he still managed to conjure a comical miss during the second half, underlining his capacity to lurch from the sublime to the ridiculous in the space of 90 minutes. Yet the striker’s erratic finishing does not tell the story in full. Although Werner is a puzzle in front of goal, he is a nightmare to mark. He has more to his game than goals, which is why Thomas Tuchel picks him. Werner is quick, his movement is good and he makes things happen. He created Hakim Ziyech’s winner against Manchester City in the FA Cup and has been far more effective than previous flops like Álvaro Morata and Fernando Torres. Jacob Steinberg 7) Bielsa reveals his pragmatic side At this time of year, games can emit a stench of close-season, and this was one such. But the way Marcelo Bielsa adapted his tactics was significant; his method is characterized by its implacability, but Leeds’ man-to-man marking system being torn apart when the teams met at Old Trafford forced a rethink. So Bielsa made the brave decision to have Kalvin Phillips follow Bruno Fernandes about, effectively sacrificing his most important player to subdue his opponents’ – rather like West Germany and Germany did in the 1966 and 1990 World Cup finals, putting Franz Beckenbauer and Lothar Matthäus on Bobby Charlton and Diego Maradona respectively. This was a bold call, and he didn’t know that Paul Pogba, their other creator, would remain on the bench for 76 minutes. But it showed that Bielsa is willing to compromise when circumstances demand it, embroidering his idealism with just a touch of pragmatism. It augurs well for his team’s progression. Daniel Harris 8) Maupay miss sums up Brighton’s problem “The challenge is not to think about what has just happened,” said Graham Potter. The problem for Neal Maupay is that his miss at Bramall Lane was so memorable it may be unforgettable: three yards out, he skied a shot way over the bar. Were he a defender, it would have been a brilliant clearance from the most perilous of positions. Instead, he is a profligate forward, the personification of Brighton’s wastefulness. Only Timo Werner and Roberto Firmino have underperformed their expected goals by more than Maupay; this chance, according to the metric, would be a goal 87% of the time. According to xG, Brighton “ought” to have outscored Arsenal and Tottenham this season; instead they only average a goal a game, with none in their last 347 minutes. It is to Maupay’s credit that as an eager runner, he gets into the positions to miss; it is a worry that he keeps on doing so. Richard Jolly 9) Burnley offer Wolves a lesson in team spirit It was difficult to watch Wolves’ lifeless display at Molineux and not link it to the way the team has been put together. Jorge Mendes’ influence at the club has been documented at length and, on the face of it, has served the team well: successive seventh-place finishes attest to a squad with a serious (and seriously pricey) array of talent. But perhaps the pitfall of allowing a super-agent to curate your squad is that factors like attitude, togetherness and commitment to the project fall by the wayside. Wolves’ players may not all be laissez-faire mercenaries but they were certainly made to look that way by a fearsome Burnley side who offset their limitations with tenacity and endeavor. The task of Nuno Espírito Santo, if he is to avoid any whispers about his job, is to galvanize a depleted and indifferent squad with nothing to play for. Perhaps he should remind them that’s it’s not just his reputation at stake, but theirs too. Alex Hess 10) Will Allardyce stay with Baggies after drop? West Brom look to be relegated, after Keinan Davis’s late equalizer snatched what would have been a life raft to cling on to. When the almost inevitable occurs, what happens afterward to Sam Allardyce and his squad? Of those he is working with, Matheus Pereira, the best player on the park against Villa, appears someone many a Premier League club would fancy taking a chance on. The goalkeeper, Sam Johnstone, excellent in being overworked at Villa Park, has had a solid season. Okay Yokuslu, a 6’ 3” midfielder loaned from Celta Vigo, was a typically adept Allardyce January signing. And Conor Gallagher, loaned from Chelsea, gives his all in the heart of midfield and would be one of the classiest players in the Championship should he stay on next season. The main question, though is whether Allardyce himself stays on. What is his appetite for managing in a division he last visited with West Ham in 2012? JB
from Asharq AL-awsat https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/2941916/premier-league-and-carabao-cup-10-talking-points-weekend
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