Official Premier League 2015-2016 Season (Page 6 for 2015)

[Sload Soap]

No, he's staying last I heard. United didn't get the paperwork to Madrid on time.

Lulz.

[Blu]

I heard it the other way around, that Madrid balked or dropped the ball. Regardless, I think Manchester United is pretty sound in defense thanks to Schneiderlin. He should've been who we went after for a DM. Coquelin does great things but I'm not convinced that Santi Cazorla is who we want in that second spot.

Newcastle is evidence for us though that we needed a strong, powerful forward. That or Wenger needs to alter his tactics. Play a 4-4-2 or a 4-1-3-2 and use Walcott and Giroud as a tandem attack. Because we're not firing on offense and the link from defense to attack is feeling quite troublesome to say the least.

Man City are cruising their way to another championship if they keep this form. You signed De Bruyn and that's a wrap if he hits form. You'll win the Treble at this rate.

[Sload Soap]

Bloody pissing Champions League bollocks.

[Thierry Henry]

What on earth is happening with Chelsea this season?!

And that post-match rant by Mourinho.

[Blu]

If there's one man and one club I cannot stand, it's Mourinho and Chelsea. Put Costa and Mourinho out on a deserted island together, they are insufferable. I'm still bitter about the match three weeks ago, but how naive can you be to not witness the bullshit your own players do and then claim the refs don't go in your favor.

So'ton outplayed Chelsea and that's that. Pelle knocked the crap out of them.

Rodgers is out Advocaat is gone, I think Mourinho is next.

In other news, Ozil was a maestro, Sanchez caught fire and Walcott played the best I've seen him play in nearly three or four years. #COYG

[Sload Soap]

Mourinho is increasingly bizarre this season but I'd take him over the wanky pandering the media do for Tactical Genius (TM) Louis Van Gaal any day. Obvious bias but Mourinho's breakdowns are at least entertaining. Van Gaal is just a creepy uncle in a sharp suit. And he looks like grown-up Butthead.

So, as far as the weekend's action goes, the City/Newcastle game is perhaps the clearest and correctest use of the old "game of two halves" idiom you'll ever see. Newcastle were very good in the first half, got a goal, almost got two more. Then they came out for the second half, let Sergio Aguero devour them with five goals in 20 minutes and basically fell apart faster than a Fox News report confronted with facts. It was like Pellegrini knocked down the difficulty from "professional" to "amateur". Also Ginger Magic got a goal that idiots on the telly thought was a fluke. It was not. Double cheers to Aguero for saving my fantasy team from mid-table obscurity.

Arsenal blitzed United which is the latest in a long lineage of important wins what paper over the obvious cracks in Wenger's plan at the Emirates. Queue up the "are Arsenal back in it?", "No one can count them out" paper talk that will last until the next game their lack of a strong defensively minded midfielder costs them 3 points and journo's return to pegging them for a comfortable 4th placed finish.

Similarly, Spurs were Spurs again. Win comfortably (though with the benefit of some awful officiating) against title contenders, then go away to a struggling Swansea and scrape a draw. Never change, Spurs, never change.

Actually I'm being harsh there, Spurs have only lost once so far and that was against United. With Chelsea suffering they could actually offer a genuine tilt for a CL spot.

What else happened? Leicester are still good value mostly down to a combination of Riyad Mahrez's class and Jamie Vardy's industry. Sunderland were so bad they brought a nice old man to tears and Villa are still a football team, apparently. Hipsters choice Crystal Palace continue to vie for top place in the coveted, but sadly made-up, "Neutrals Favourite" league cup (along with Swansea and Southampton) by winning at nobodies favourite, West Brom. As a side note due to a combination of heart surgery and NHS strength morphine I once had a brief bout of synaesthesia and can confirm West Brom smell like brown and taste like pity.

To the big news of the weekend though as Brendan "Brenda" Rodgers has been relived of his post as Liverpool's manager. Honestly I think it's a strange time to do it, although I've heard some rumblings that it has been done now so they can snatch Klopp up before he is tempted to commit the Bayern seat which seems like it will be increasingly empty in the summer. Don't ask me why Pep seems destined to leave a team that've just won their last 3 game by 5 goals, I guess standards of success are different in Germany. World domination or death!

But yes, the timing is odd although nobody can say totally unexpected. I would say Brenda's days were probably numbered when they staggered home after a woefully uninspiring loss to United a few weeks ago. They were fucking dreadful that day. Then you add in the lulzfest that was the 6-1 at Stoke in Stevie G's last game, some drab draws against fairly mediocre opponents in the Europa League and no real sign of the team gelling into the sort of force that propelled them to an unlikely championship push two seasons ago and the writing was kind of on the wall. I would ask, and ask again of so many clubs, why he was allowed to spend big again in the summer only to be sacked fewer than ten games in but that's football.

I'm sure he'll get another job, probably quite soon, probably Newcastle, and do all right there. Is Klopp the man for the Kop? Err, yeah why not. Honestly I wouldn't know, I've seen Klopp's Dortmund play on maybe 7 occasions in recent years and they always seemed good. He's known for being very passionate, quite intelligent (you know, for football) and builds a strong rapport with the fans, something seen as crucial for a club of Liverpool's storied history. I don't think the problem necessarily all boils down to the fact Brenda wasn't getting results though. There's a lot of dead weight players at Liverpool and they keep losing their best men, either to retirement (Gerrard, Carragher) or sales (Alonso, Suarez, Sterling). The things is, fans of Liverpool are a pretty entitled bunch and so Klopp won't be allowed to merely do well. They want to be challenging for honours every year and I honestly can't see that happening until they either bump up Anfield's capacity or finally move to Stanley Park. They are run in the more American and practical business model of spending money made from tickets sales and merchandise revenue. The problem is, Anfield, at 46,000 capacity, is kinda of small in comparison to the other big names of world football. Then there's the somewhat hazy nature of how transfers are actually conducted at the club and how much of a say the manager gets on them and, yeah. Klopp's good but Liverpool are kind of stagnating I feel.

Which is fine as I personall rank Liverpool fans just behind United as my least favourite with their almost feverish persecution complex and inability to recognise that they have been muscled out of the top tier by the spending power of City and Chelsea, and the continued consistency to place highly of United and Arsenal. I've lived in Liverpool and it's a city that basically runs on nostalgia but harping on about past glories while you're playing some very humdrum football and finishing 25 points off the leaders just seems like the worst kind of hubris. My advice: reassess your current standing before you look forwards, just a little bit?

Now to enjoy the relaxing banality of the international break. Fingers crossed that Wales and Northern Ireland qualify and double crossed Scotland don't.

[Blu]

This thread was absolutely entertaining to read, Sload. Thanks for that.

I for one have been keeping the faith about Aguero, despite him blanking in my captaincy each week in Fantasy. Well Saturday was enough reason for joy, I'll tell you that. I skyrocketed in my rankings and everyone else missed that train. Sanchez bagging 5 goals in two games doesn't hurt either.

I keep my perspective though that LVG's United have been grossly overinflated and it was only a matter of time before that veneer was cracked. Cue Schneiderlin's arrival on the bench. Seriously, what the hell was LVG doing benching a world class DM like Schneiderlin and putting Carrick and Schneiderlin, both on the bad side of their 30's against a pacy Arsenal side. The Gunners took one look at that squad and saw they could play the fast tempo they've been wanting to (and struggled to) play. Combined with Rooney's decrepit pace and reluctance to play up high and shoot, they had no offense, no buildup.

I really can't criticize too much, given our CL's woes. But at least those past two matches were swift kicks in the ass and hopefully a wake-up call that they're better than this and you need to not play down to the same level of the club you're facing.

Lol at neutral league cup, seriously, those sentences were literary works of art.

[Thierry Henry]

Sherwood has just being sacked by Villa. Not much of a surprise there.

Mourinho's job at Chelsea doesn't look too safe either. Judging from some of his recent antics- it's almost as if he's intentionally giving the club every reason to sack him.

Looking forward to the Manchester derby later this afternoon.

[Blu]

I cannot wait for the Mourinho fallout to begin. He's really brought it on himself this time. His days are certainly numbered.

In other news, what a boring Manchester Derby.

[Sload Soap]

International break, ahoy!

Quite happy City qualified from the Champions League early this year. Gives us some breathing space with regards squad selection in the PL. North London derby was pretty good, Arsenal did well to regroup after an absolute mauling in Munich. God damn are Bayern an OP team. I've been keeping up with the Bundesliga this year and they just bulldoze other teams.

Chelsea keep losing which is now officially full of lulz. Poor old Jose had to manage the game from his phone in a dank hotel room in Stoke on saturday. Thankfully for him it sounds like he's too expensive to sack...at least at the moment. There's an amusing rumour that Brenda Rodgers will come back to his former employers for the rest of the season before Chelsea attempt, along with half the teams in the PL, to poach Pep Guardiola. Odds are now on Swansea manager Garry Monk to be the next to lose his job which is pretty incredible considering how fucking awful Newcastle still are. Swansea would do well to be mindful of the lessons learnt by teams like Charlton and Middlesbrough with regards sacking managers when you're clearly already punching above your weight to begin with.

In other news Jamie Vardy is legit, Rooney plays like he's pushing 40 not 30 and Ighalo is the secret weapon that keeps me top of my fantasy league. Oh, and Stevie G came back to watch the game against Palace which obviously meant Liverpool instantly lost. Pretty sure a coven of Everton supporting witches have cursed him.

Just watching the Spain V England friendly now. Pointless but kind of fun, like that BB-8 toy. Not as cute though. Well, maybe Lallana is.

Edit: Ugh, during the France/Germany game you could audibly hear the bomb detonated in the cafe across the street. Senseless waste of life.