Category: English Premier League

Of six teams in the last 16, only two – Arsenal and Liverpool – look more likely than not to get to the quarter-finals. But does it matter?

The coefficient is safe. The coefficient is yours. You’re going home with the coefficient. But perhaps not, on this evidence, with the microwave, the washing machine or the Jet Ski.

England’s soccer shame. Premier League in EURO MELTDOWN. Robot-ball crisis: how Arteta’s Arsenal destroyed all that is good and true, including the ploughman’s lunch and probably Woolworths. This kind of stuff has begun to do the rounds after this week’s Champions League last-16 matches.

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The leaders haven’t won the title in more than 20 years. Yet very few neutrals are excited about seeing them as new champions

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What was striking after Arsenal’s grim 1-0 win at Brighton on Wednesday was less Brighton manager Fabian Hürzeler’s attack on the Gunners’ style than the way his criticism seemed to resonate. In England, it feels as though almost nobody, other than Arsenal supporters or anyone-but-City fans, wants them to win the title.

“If I would ask everyone in the room: ‘Did you really enjoy this football game?’ I’m sure maybe one raises his arm because he’s a big Arsenal fan but, besides that, no chance,” Hürzeler said.

This is an extract from Soccer with Jonathan Wilson, a weekly look from the Guardian US at the game in Europe and beyond. Subscribe for free here. Have a question for Jonathan? Email soccerwithjw@theguardian.com, and he’ll answer the best in a future edition.

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Spurs took the lead but Micky van de Ven was sent off conceding a penalty and Palace won easily from there, leaving the home side just a point off the relegation zone

Palace, meanwhile, will look to play off Strand Larsen, with Sarr and Guessand asked to run at defenders, width supplied by the excellent wing-back pairing off Munoz and Mitchell. I quite fancy those two to cause problems, especially if, behind them, Wharton and Kamada are at it with their passing.

So where is the game? I imagine Spurs are playing 4-3-3 – if they are – partly to get down the sides of Palace’s outside centre-backs and in behind their wing-backs. For what it’s worth, 4-4-2 is also a decent antidote to three at the back. Otherwise, they’ll want to serve Solanke cut-backs and low crosses to the front post, with Kolo Muani asked to clear space for him, by carrying the ball, bumping defenders out of the way or both.

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The Brighton manager, Fabian Hürzeler, accused Arsenal of playing by their own rules in a void left by weak Premier League refereeing after the Gunners' 1-0 win at the Amex Stadium on Wednesday.

Bukayo Saka’s early goal moved Arsenal seven points clear at the top of the table, with Manchester City drawing 2-2 at home against Nottingham Forest.

'I think there was only one team who tried to play football today,' said Hürzeler. 'If they win the Premier League, no one will ask how ... [But] I will never be that kind of manager who tries to win in that way.

'Of course, every team will manage and waste time but there has to be a limit, and the limit has to be set by the Premier League.'

• ‘Only one team tried to play’: Hürzeler hits out at Arsenal after win at Brighton

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From grappling at corners to VAR, the endless list of complaints reflects a wider sense of dislocation from ‘the product’

A terrible boredom stalks the land. Across the nation’s television studios and podcast armchairs, wearied men grizzle accursedly with forked tongues into branded microphones: entombed by a game they despise and yet are paid so generously to discuss. Out there in the wild digital beyond, the sickness festers still deeper. The game has gone, they type into a little white box. This is not the football I once loved, click send. The beautiful game is broken, pleads the Telegraph. They think it’s all over, and perhaps it always was.

Arne Slot is no longer enjoying himself, and presumably a good proportion of the Liverpool fans at Molineux on Tuesday night know exactly how he feels. John Terry is no longer enjoying himself. Yaya Touré is “disappointed”. Ruud Gullit is so disgusted he has decided to stop watching. Chris Sutton thinks Arsenal will be the ugliest winners in Premier League history. Mark Goldbridge is bored out of his mind, albeit nowhere near as bored as you would presumably need to be to watch a Mark Goldbridge livestream.

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Eddie Howe accepts his Newcastle side are at their best when they create chaos and no one in black and white is better at conjuring it than Will Osula.

The maverick Denmark Under-21 striker is, to say the least, unpredictable. No one, least of all Osula himself, ever seems quite sure what he will do at any given moment. Here though he stepped off the substitutes’ bench to score a fabulous, virtuoso 90th-minute winner for a home team reduced to 10 men by Jacob Ramsey’s controversial 45th-minute sending off for a perceived dive.

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Will Osula scored a majestic 90th-minute solo goal to secure the points – deservedly so - for ten-man Toon

2 min: Newcastle get onto the front foot immediately. Hall bombs down the left; Trippier probes down the right. Shaw looks to have tugged Trippier back, but the referee waves play on. Not too much in the way of fume from the players, but the fans aren’t happy that’s for sure.

Manchester United get the ball rolling. They’re kicking towards the Gallowgate in this first half.

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“Vamos, vamos!” (“come on, let’s go!”) screamed Rodri in his native Spanish following a 62nd-minute header that seemed to grab a precious victory for Manchester City.

But the title chasers’ 2-1 lead lasted only 14 minutes as Phil Foden allowed Elliot Anderson to run off him and the Nottingham Forest midfielder, from range, curled a sublime equaliser beyond Gianluigi Donnarumma. City’s faithful were silenced.

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Last year Sunderland departed West Yorkshire on a snowy February night with their hopes of automatic promotion from the Championship in tatters. Leeds had come from behind to clinch a 95th‑minute win that would take them top of the second tier and only the most optimistic visiting fans expected a rematch this season.

Fast forward to a balmy March evening, though, and Régis Le Bris’s well‑executed gameplan lifted an injury hit yet streetwise Sunderland and their debutant goalkeeper Melker Ellborg to 11th in the Premier League.

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Dockside site will transform club’s finances, but fans are frustrated with kick-off times and results at venue so far

David Moyes has numerous theories on why Everton do not yet feel completely at home at Hill Dickinson Stadium, beyond the fact that change is inevitably strange after 133 years at Goodison Park. Wins would be instrumental, but his team have managed only five in 16 matches. Supporters connecting to the magnificent venue through a new matchday routine would help too, but for many that is proving nigh on impossible.

One season-ticket holder, who lives in the south of England, said on social media recently that they expect to miss seven or eight home games this season owing to the curse of the modern fixture schedule. The club are aware that this is not an isolated case. The problem is not new nor confined to Everton, who of course reap the benefits of every game that is switched for live television purposes and, let’s be frank, have not held as much appeal for broadcasters in recent years as they do this season. But in their inaugural campaign at a new home, Everton’s schedule has proved to be peculiar and, in turn, detrimental to fans adapting to new surroundings.

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Spurs’ slide from title hopefuls to relegation candidates is a story of complete mismanagement and widespread injury

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Last week, after Tottenham had lost 4-1 at home to Arsenal, Igor Tudor was bullish. It was possible leaving his post-match press conference to think he was a man with the energy and personality to drag Spurs away from the relegation zone. This week, after Tottenham had lost 2-1 at Fulham, Tudor was deflated. The previous week he had spoken of defeat in the North London derby as being part of the process, a game that would startle his players into understanding what was required of them. This week, he just mumbled about having to forget the game and move on. A week in the Tottenham job seemed to have broken him.

Tudor is a specialist firefighter. He has saved teams from worse positions than being four points clear of the relegation zone with 10 games to go, which is where Spurs stand now. But that is what makes his defeatist tone so shocking. He spoke of “big problems”, dismissing a question about his 4-4-2 formation with the snort of a man asked about the shade of the carpet in his hallway as his roof burns down. He talked of an attack that lacks quality, of a midfield that cannot run and a defence that is not prepared to “suffer” to keep goals out. He made fairly explicit that he thinks his players lack the requisite character and pointed out how Fulham were better at reading the game, accusing his players of lacking “brain”.

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• He points to narrowing gap and reliance on set plays

• Liverpool head coach will not change his team’s style

Arne Slot has admitted he does not enjoy watching most Premier League matches but says he will not change Liverpool’s philosophy. The head coach feels the narrower quality gap between top and bottom and a ­growing reliance on set plays have reduced the entertainment.

“Most of the games I see in the Premier League are not for me a joy to watch,” Slot said. “But it’s always interesting because it’s so competitive and that is what makes this league great – because there’s so much competitiveness.

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Jordan Pickford’s ‘best save ever’, Antoine Semenyo’s shifting mentality and Liverpool’s set-piece threat grows

• Premier League top scorers: check the latest standings

Arsenal won the battle of set pieces, beating Chelsea 2-1 to keep Manchester City at bay. In a game that offered few clearcut chances from open play, it was a familiar story of Arsenal overpowering their opponents from corner kicks. Gabriel bullied Reece James to set up William Saliba for their first goal and Jur​riën Timber punished a flailing Robert Sánchez for their second. Mikel Arteta’s side have equalled the record for the most goals scored from corners in a Premier League season (16) with nine games still to go. Meanwhile, Chelsea have conceded seven goals from set pieces in Liam Rosenior’s first 13 games in all competitions. Despite posing a threat offensively through Reece James’s delivery for Piero Hincapié’s own goal, they repeatedly failed to match Arsenal’s physicality when defending. Xaymaca Awoyungbo

Match report: Arsenal 2-1 Chelsea

Match report: Manchester United 2-1 Crystal Palace

Match report: Fulham 2-1 Tottenham

Match report: Newcastle 2-3 Everton

Match report: Leeds 0-1 Manchester City

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The Gunners won a local stramash by two corners to one

4 min: A fairly shapeless start, actually. “The best pints are Thursday night.” Hello Ian McCourt, formerly of this parish. “Or about 1.30pm on a Friday.”

2 min: A mid-octane start to the game. No real shape yet, though it’s obvious that Palmer is prowling the left wing today, opposite to his usual beat.

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Maxence Lacroix put Palace ahead before being sent off after conceding the penalty from which Bruno Fernandes equalised, then Benjamin Sesko headed the winner

We will, of course, be updating you on this afternoon’s other early games: Brighton v Forest and Fulham v Spurs, but here’s Carrick.

So where is the game? Well, United will have to adjust a little, given they’re starting with a centre-forward; with Palace likely to defend deep and centrally, a reference-point will probably be a help. I’d expect Mbeumo to step inside on to his left foot and try and pick him out with crosses to the back post, because if he times it, he’s almost unbeatable in the air. Otherwise, I’d expect them to play into Bruno, who’ll slip passes down the sides of the outside centre-backs, with the two wide players looking to hit the space behind the wing-backs.

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