Jonathan Wilson's Blog, page 118
December 17, 2018
Even a José Mourinho gripped by defensive dogma was better than this | Jonathan Wilson
Some time, this purgatory must end. Some time, even a board as laissez-faire as Manchester United’s must decide enough is enough. Some time, José Mourinho will be relieved of his position as manager at Old Trafford, everybody can relax and start to regroup and United can look to salvage something from this most miserable of seasons. Even fourth place may be out of reach now – Chelsea are 11 points clear – but United are still in the Champions League, still in the FA Cup. Even a temporary appointment would bring some respite: no season should be over in December. This cannot go on, and yet it goes on and Mourinho continues to measure out his life in Liverpools.
Related: With football this dire you have to wonder if José Mourinho is enjoying it | Barney Ronay
Related: Liverpool back on top after Shaqiri double floors Manchester United
Continue reading...
December 15, 2018
Alisson’s heroics underpin subtle shift in balance for steadier Liverpool | Jonathan Wilson
The goalkeeper’s form has been vital for Jürgen Klopp’s team but is part of a tweaked approach that could pay rich dividends
A cross from the right. Two defenders jump and can’t quite connect. Dejan Lovren, startled that the ball has got as far as the back post, realises too late that Arkadiusz Milik has stolen behind him; he cannot get to the forward in time. Time slows. Milik is in form; he has the best goals‑per‑minute ratio in Serie A this season. Eight yards out with just the goalkeeper to beat, it seems he must score the goal that will put Napoli through.
But Milik doesn’t score. He jabs without conviction. Alisson does everything he can, springing from his line, spreading himself towards the ball, which hits his body and cannons to safety. Liverpool have survived.
Related: The Joy of Six: great Liverpool v Manchester United games | Scott Murray
Related: Klopp and Liverpool sense chance to inflict killer blow on Mourinho | Barney Ronay
Continue reading...December 7, 2018
Ederson leads the way as a ball-playing Premier League midfielder in gloves
Rules may have stayed the same since 1992 but modern football’s best teams tend to have 11 outfield players, one of whom can use his hands
In January 1912, two members of the Football Association’s Rules Review committee went to White Hart Lane to watch Tottenham’s Division One match against Sunderland. The game finished 0-0, but the clean sheet wasn’t the aspect of the away goalkeeper Leigh Richmond Roose’s performance that caught the eye. At every opportunity, he had bounced the ball from his goal to the halfway line and launched it long into the Tottenham box. This, the rules men decided, wouldn’t do.
For Roose, this was nothing out of the ordinary. This was just what he did. The laws allowed him to handle the ball to halfway, although not to run with the ball, and he was prepared to dodge the barges of opponents to take advantage of that. It was only when he did it in London, where FA officials might take note, that it became an issue.
Related: Hazard finally has Chelsea manager who wants to attack, says Kompany
Related: Premier League: 10 things to look out for this weekend
Continue reading...December 6, 2018
Manchester United are crumbling, so why the lack of fan fury? | Jonathan Wilson
Drip, drip, drip.
Watching Manchester United these days has taken on a strangely repetitive quality. Usually when giants flounder there is a grim fascination in seeing them fail, in watching players raised on success having to deal with defeat and misfortune. But not now, not any more. United grind on. They pick up some points, they drop some points. Nothing much changes. The narrative seems to have stalled. They have good players who can get them goals but they have a propensity for chaos that means 15 games into the season they have a negative goal difference. The slow erosion of everything Manchester United have been goes on.
Related: José Mourinho gets some mad dog spirit but Manchester United remain a puzzle | Jamie Jackson
Related: José Mourinho ‘not under siege’ after Manchester United draw again
Continue reading...December 3, 2018
Small is beautiful for Arsenal as Lucas Torreira finally fills Gilberto gap | Jonathan Wilson
So it turns out what Arsenal had been missing all this time has been an energetic deep-lying midfielder. Who knew? It was entirely fitting that it should be Lucas Torreira who rounded off their 4-2 victory in the north London derby on Sunday; he had been the key player in the game, not just for what he did with the ball, and without it, but because of what he embodies.
In the days of the debilitating niceness, Arsenal would probably not have come back from conceding two goals in quick succession just after the half-hour. Late-period Arsène Wenger would have bemoaned his luck, made arch comments about the disputed penalty, and everybody would have wondered just how Arsenal could end up losing so disappointingly having started so well.
Related: Arsenal’s Aubameyang seizes moment with all-action display against Spurs
Continue reading...November 30, 2018
Mesut Özil dilemma remains for Unai Emery in his Spurs derby plans | Jonathan Wilson
Tell me what you think about Mesut Özil, and I will tell you who you are. Or at least that is the way the endless debate around the Arsenal playmaker often seems to be framed. Are you somebody who loves beauty and grace and is prepared to accept occasional indolence as a price worth paying, or are you some sort of utilitarian box-ticker, demanding constant effort at all times? Are you a continental sophisticate, or a blunt English football man who prizes industry above imagination? But it is, of course, much more complicated than that.
Related: Aaron Ramsey scores in stroll against Vorskla as Arsenal win group
Related: Unai Emery’s tough tactics bear fruit in victory over Bournemouth
Continue reading...Mesut Özil dilemma remains as Unai Emery plots derby plans for Spurs | Jonathan Wilson
German enigma continues to divide opinion at the Emirates and beyond but if his manager can’t trust him then Arsenal have a problem, and an expensive one at that
Tell me what you think about Mesut Özil, and I will tell you who you are. Or at least that is the way the endless debate around the Arsenal playmaker often seems to be framed. Are you somebody who loves beauty and grace and is prepared to accept occasional indolence as a price worth paying, or are you some sort of utilitarian box-ticker, demanding constant effort at all times? Are you a continental sophisticate, or a blunt English football man who prizes industry above imagination? But it is, of course, much more complicated than that.
Related: Aaron Ramsey scores in stroll against Vorskla as Arsenal win group
Related: Unai Emery’s tough tactics bear fruit in victory over Bournemouth
Continue reading...November 26, 2018
A Pochettino masterclass, a mess in Buenos Aires and Alan Hutton – Football Weekly
Max Rushden is joined by Barry Glendenning, Barney Ronay and Suzy Wrack to discuss Mauricio Pochettino, Claudio Ranieri’s flying start, spectacular own goals, the Copa Libertadores chaos and Alan Hutton
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We look back at the weekend of football, starting with Tottenham’s evisceration of a Chelsea side who not so much fell apart as were just never in one piece to start with. Claudio Ranieri got off to a good start, his Fulham side beating Southampton for his first win at the club to match the number of games Mark Hughes has won all season long.
Continue reading...How Argentinian football had the chance to prove it had changed – and blew it
At around 6pm on Sunday evening, an hour after the second leg of the Copa Libertadores final had been due to kick off, four hours after the game had, yet again, been postponed, a group of River Plate fans on the Subte [Buenos Aires’ underground trains] started up a slow, melancholic song, talking of attacks and pepper spray. Already the events of Saturday, what the Conmebol president, Alejandro Domínguez, described as “a disgrace”, have passed into legend: the game that wasn’t and, depending on the outcome of a meeting in Asunción, Paraguay on Tuesday, might never be.
Related: Copa Libertadores: second leg of final called off again hours before kick-off
Related: River fans attack on Boca bus halts Copa Libertadores final for 24 hours
Conmebol, also, must be the subject of scrutiny if it really did try to coerce Boca to play the game on Saturday
Continue reading...Argentinian football had the chance to prove it had changed – and blew it
Talk before Copa Libertadores final was of putting on a new face to the world but River Plate fans’ attack on Boca Juniors changed all that
At around 6pm on Sunday evening, an hour after the second leg of the Copa Libertadores final had been due to kick off, four hours after the game had, yet again, been abandoned, a group of River Plate fans on the Subte [Buenos Aires’ underground trains] started up a slow, melancholic song, talking of attacks and pepper spray. Already the events of Saturday, what the Conmebol president Alejandro Domínguez described as “a disgrace”, have passed into legend: the game that wasn’t and, depending on the outcome of a meeting in Asunción, Paraguay on Tuesday, might never be.
Related: Copa Libertadores: second leg of final called off again hours before kick-off
Conmebol, also, must be the subject of scrutiny if it really did try to coerce Boca to play the game on Saturday
Related: River fans attack on Boca bus halts Copa Libertadores final for 24 hours
Continue reading...Jonathan Wilson's Blog
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