Jonathan Liew's Blog, page 100
December 18, 2020
Nathaniel Clyne: 'Klopp taught me to keep fighting and play with confidence'
Crystal Palace full-back is happy to be back where he started and back in action after his injury-plagued spell with Liverpool
Eventually, Nathaniel Clyne began to get irritated by all the questions. How’s the injury? How long left? When are you going to be back? He knew people meant well. But when you are trying to fight your way back, the last thing you want or need is pity. What you need, above all, is time and space.
The time wasn’t a problem. As he watched most of Liverpool’s 2019-20 title-winning season from the sidelines, recovering from an anterior cruciate ligament injury, Clyne had plenty of time to gather his thoughts. “I think I went through everything on Netflix,” he remembers. “Just duvet days, chilling at home watching movies and documentaries.”
Related: Premier League: 10 things to look out for this weekend
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December 16, 2020
Sam Allardyce is back in the top flight but will old truths still apply? | Jonathan Liew
Can the Premier League’s survival specialist, out of work since 2018, get the job done at his eighth club, West Brom?
There’s a knock on the sunbed. The lid swings ominously open, filling the room with an eerie blue ultraviolet glow. A 66-year-old man of medium to heavy build climbs out, accepts the bathrobe that is wordlessly proffered to him. There is a car out front with its engine running. A freshly-pressed suit and referee’s whistle hanging in the back. Destination: the West Midlands, and the Monster HydroSport Training Ground. And with that, Sam Allardyce returns.
Was this how it happened? On reflection, probably not. But then this has always been the thing about Allardyce, who has been summoned from the managerial antechamber by West Bromwich Albion after two years out of the game: the mythology performs as crucial a function as the man himself. When you hire Allardyce, what you’re paying for is not so much a coach or an employee, but a brand, a creed, a lifestyle. You’re buying wholesale into allardycismo as an idea. You’re painting your world, or your little corner of it, a vivid shade of Big Sam.
Related: West Brom appoint Sam Allardyce as head coach after sacking Slaven Bilic
Related: The statistics that show all is not quite right with Manchester City
Continue reading...December 15, 2020
Australia and India can give life to the World Test Championship | Jonathan Liew
A meeting of the two best sides in the world is a rare treat in these straitened times and should be enjoyed while it lasts
There has been a lot of talk about what to do about the inaugural World Test Championship, which was originally established as a way of attracting casual fans to the five-day game by repackaging it in a simple, easy-to-follow format. So, let’s see how that’s going.
As a result of the pandemic, standings are now being calculated on points percentage rather than points total. Australia top the table on 82.2%. New Zealand are on 62.5%, but will hit 70% if they beat Pakistan 2-0 in the series that starts on 26 December. Which means that in order to qualify for the Lord’s final in June India (currently on 75%) would need five wins from their remaining eight Tests, or four wins and three draws. Feel the simplicity. Taste the change.
Related: Gurus, Power Surges and problem-solvers: Big Bash bids to be T20's biggest hitter | Barney Ronay
Continue reading...December 14, 2020
Michael van Gerwen: 'I always liked to play in front of crowds. I'm a bit of a show-off' | Jonathan Liew
The Dutch darts maestro is aiming for a fourth world title at Alexandra Palace and says while the pandemic has affected the game hugely he is staying positive
Michael van Gerwen doesn’t know what climate change is. I mean, he’s aware of the concept. But the phrase is new to him. “I’m not even interested in that,” he says over video link from his home in the south of the Netherlands. “I ain’t got any power over it. People all have opinions about the news, about Boris Johnson or Mark Rutte over here. But you can’t do anything. It’s above your power.”
The reason we got onto this in the first place is that I’m trying to work out how Van Gerwen stays so relentlessly positive, even after a year as bleak as this. Does he not watch the news? Has he not been keeping tabs on the gradual disintegration of human civilisation? Does he worry about anything at all?
Related: My favourite game: Van Gerwen v Van Barneveld, 2017 PDC World Championship | Rob Smyth
People are allowed to say whatever they want. But if you never fulfil your words, then you need to be quiet
Related: Taylor v Sherrock: a thrilling but bloodless glimpse of the future | Jonathan Liew
Continue reading...December 13, 2020
Vicente Guaita's stunning late saves for Crystal Palace deny Spurs victory
There are times when you feel Tottenham have missed a trick by paying £15m a year to a superstar manager when they could have spent just a fraction of that sum putting Sean Dyche in a white wig.
In teeming, swirling rain, Spurs played like the smaller team and were ground down like a smaller team: besieged, beset and breached by the relentless class of Crystal Palace and the irresistible force of Jeffrey Schlupp.
Related: Crystal Palace 1-1 Tottenham Hotspur: Premier League – live!
Related: Mohamed Salah's penalty rescues Liverpool from Fulham defeat
Continue reading...December 12, 2020
Kyle Walker-Peters: 'I wanted a black hole to just swallow me up'
Two years on from a bleak moment with Spurs at the Camp Nou, the full-back is now showing his full worth for Southampton
Kyle Walker-Peters is flat out on the Camp Nou turf. Ousmane Dembélé has just robbed him on the halfway line and run away to score. Barcelona are 1-0 up. Tottenham are heading out of the Champions League. And at this very moment – 9.07pm on 11 December 2018 – a 21-year-old right-back has hit rock bottom.
Two years on, Walker-Peters is reliving the experience. “I wanted a black hole to just swallow me up,” he says. “I was laying on the floor. And I remember Danny Rose picking me up. Harry Kane said to me: ‘Don’t worry, you’re playing well, we’re fine, keep going.’ It was a big, big moment for me.”
Continue reading...December 10, 2020
Manchester United need a structure to break the blame-and-burn cycle | Jonathan Liew
Fingers will be pointed at individuals after United’s latest failure but they reflect a club without a functioning strategy or setup
There are certain clubs that seem to be built on chagrin: where the urge to fulminate and pontificate and point the finger after a big defeat almost soothes the pain of the defeat itself. At the moment, Manchester United feel like one of those clubs. Elimination from the Champions League on Tuesday night was many things: a shame for the club’s fans, a big blow to the balance sheet, an enormous missed opportunity after the opening-day win in Paris. But it was also an unmissable chance to dish out some well-deserved blame.
As ever, Harry Maguire was first to partake in the ritual blood-letting. Over the past few months, it has become something of a staple to see United’s captain “fronting up” to BT Sport after a defeat. And here he was again, looking fittingly contrite and remorseful, like a naughty sea cadet who had wandered into the missile room looking for his jelly babies and accidentally fired a torpedo at Taiwan.
Related: Solskjær retains strong Manchester United backing before derby with City
Continue reading...December 8, 2020
Crossing – like swearing and mixtapes – just isn't like it used to be | Jonathan Liew
Arsenal’s 44 attempts against Tottenham allowed the modern assumption that crosses are aimless punts, not a skill worth savouring, to take over once more
Cross 1, from Héctor Bellerín on the right, loops harmlessly towards the penalty spot. Cross 5 from Kieran Tierney is pinged low and tapped away by Eric Dier at the near post. Cross 7 forces Harry Kane into a scrambling clearance. Crosses 12-15, delivered in quick succession between 43 and 44 minutes, are all headed away. Cross 19 hits Steven Bergwijn and goes out for a throw.
Like all the best performance art, Arsenal’s attacking display against Tottenham revealed itself only in stages: slowly building us a universe, generating its own mesmerising, percussive logic. Cross 30 from Willian sails over Hugo Lloris, over everyone. But – surprise – this merely hastens the onset of cross 31, from Dani Ceballos on the opposite flank, which fails to beat the first man.
Related: Mikel Arteta not blind to Arsenal shortcomings but can't see a solution | Nick Ames
Related: Harry Kane and Son Heung-min a lethal Tottenham double act against Arsenal
Continue reading...December 5, 2020
Manchester United hit back in style to beat West Ham and go fourth
On the day the Premier League opened its turnstiles again, Manchester United treated a fraction of a crowd to a fraction of a performance. Once again, they left it late: three fine individual goals courtesy of Paul Pogba, Mason Greenwood and Marcus Rashford in a riotous 13-minute spell in the second half. It was enough to put them fourth in the Premier League. None of which, impressive as it is, should be allowed to dilute a single insoluble fact: they were awful.
The fact that United won doesn’t make them any less awful: it just means that they were awful and won.
Related: West Ham United v Manchester United: Premier League – live!
Continue reading...December 4, 2020
Danny Welbeck: 'It’s not great to dwell on the past. You’ve got to look forward'
The Brighton striker turned 30 in November and, after years beset by injury, is delighted just to be playing the game he loves
“The new normal,” Danny Welbeck smiles as Brighton’s production manager makes some final adjustments to the Zoom video screen. Interviewing footballers remotely through a little rectangle: another of those subtle little reminders of the passing of time, of just how much has changed in the blink of an eye.
Here is another: last week, Welbeck turned 30. At his best he was a vision: a streak of searing pace and a capsule of pure potential, a Premier League champion at 22. There was the big breakthrough at Manchester United, the backheel against Sweden at Euro 2012, the towering header against Real Madrid at the Bernabéu. In 2014 Arsène Wenger famously snapped him up on deadline day while in Rome meeting the Pope. How did that guy – Dat Guy – turn 30?
Related: Premier League: 10 things to look out for this weekend
He’s a great coach. Tactically he brings a lot to the table
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