Klopp earns his first Premier League win against ‘Dumb’ Mourinho-
If you didn’t listen to Mourinho’s post-match interview at the weekend, hell! You ‘missed’ and I mean ‘nothing’ because he said ‘nothing’ (guess the outcome of the game left him dumb!).
The Normal one had earlier hinted that it was going to take some time before his team began getting the desired results and after his first two games ended in draws, questions were already being asked. Apparently, there wasn’t going to be a better time to get his first Premier League win than in the game against a Chelsea side that had lost the habit of winning games.
Personally, Liverpool were the better side even though they slowly got into the game. The gegenpress (counter-press) strategy seems to be yielding fruits. This style takes a lot of risks, energy and intelligence with midfielders and defenders running forward simultaneously and aggressively, trying to close down spaces in a bid to regaining the ball as quickly as they lose it in the half of the opponent and passing forward in the same tempo while attacking.
On the other hand, Chelsea seem to be far from the free-flowing and expressive team we all admired at the start of last season and some of the blame can be laid on Mourinho’s feet. He seems to lack in ideas on how best to utilise the flair players in his squad with the Portuguese continuously clamouring for a more defensive outlook and this was evident at the weekend; immediately Chelsea got the first goal, they took their foot off the gas and allowed Liverpool enough possession to control the game (that order must have come from the manager to defend the lead) but with the team having lost the habit of winning games, they gave in as soon as the equaliser came.
It must also be reiterated that Mourinho hasn’t been saying the right things in post-match conferences as he has continuously failed to accept responsibility for the team’s woes and instead pointed fingers at external bodies. I recommend he walks away to allow for fresher ideas!
What do United and Artists have in common?
Of course, they draw! It’s been three consecutive games and Manchester United have failed to pick a win in duration time and more distastefully, all have been goalless. Many have made Rooney the scape goat clamouring that he be dropped for his below-par performances.
Personally, I think Rooney deserves the sticks owing to his status; however, some players in attack haven’t lived up to expectation similarly. I also feel that Van Gaal shouldn’t be left out; he has been overly strict with his tactical application with players having to play strictly to instruction further limiting their creativity and like Paul Scholes said, “LVG has refused to take risks”- I agree.
I recommend that Martial be restored to the central forward position to enhance his potency and Rooney rested but who comes in his place?
Kone’s hat-trick brings Sunderland back to the earth-
Certainly, Sunderland were still in celebratory mood (after the resounding win against Newcastle) when they faced a Kone-inspired Everton and they were humbled by 6 goals to 2. The Ivorian was particularly lethal in his finishing as he leveraged on excellent performances from Barkley and Lukaku.
Everton seemingly are back to the side we saw two seasons ago- expressive and effective. However, Allardyce now understands that his team has a long way to go if the team is to survive relegation but with Chelsea just some points above them, they might just be complacent.
Chelsea’s Cuadrado gives Juventus the edge in the Turin derby-
Amidst numerous derbies in Europe, the Turin derby is perhaps the least famous. However, the game between Juventus and Torino at the weekend was the most interesting in my opinion.
Torino last season had the advantage over Juventus and with the Bianconeri side looking a shadow of themselves, the game was finely poised.
The game looked braced for a draw until Cuadrado scored perhaps the most important goal of his career in the last kick of the game. The celebration was priceless as the Juventus team took time to celebrate with the fans after the game. The Old Ladies are back!
No Messi no Problem-
At the weekend, Barcelona got a routine away win at Getafe. Neymar and Suarez appear to have taken up the mantle in Messi’s absence but I think Barcelona’s unsung hero has been the young La Masia product, Sergi Roberto.
The lad has been Barcelona’s X-factor; playing in numerous positions on the pitch and over the weekend got two delightful assists to move the Catalan side to joint top with Madrid on the League table.
In my local parlance ‘one more feather to the La Masia cap’!
Inter slowly back on track
In recent times, Internazionale have slowly fallen off the pecking order in the Serie A and seeing them in second position having beat Roma at the weekend is as surprising as Sir Alex returning to coaching.
Mancini seems to be doing something right with Inter with his overly defensive approach while grinding out important wins and with Juve still not firing on all cylinders in the Serie A, Inter can perhaps start to dream big!
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