1) More mayhem between City and Spurs?
Since 2010-11, when the two games between these sides featured one goal between them, this has not been a fixture for goalkeepers. In 12 meetings there have been precisely 50 goals, scored at the rate of 4.2 per match. There is a recent history of mayhem, which coupled with the recent improvement in Tottenham’s form makes this probably the most likely moment for a while for the leaders’ successive-win juggernaut to come to a halt. Between this game and the visit to Arsenal at the end of February, City play Leicester twice, Newcastle twice, and five times against sides they have already beaten this season by an aggregate score of 24-3 (though that includes a visit to Liverpool). Should Pep Guardiola’s side emerge victorious on Saturday it becomes troublingly difficult to see where in the near future they might falter. Last season’s 2-2 draw in this fixture was memorable for some particularly poor goalkeeping: both City goals were down to Hugo Lloris clangers, and Claudio Bravo only faced two shots on target and let them both in. Ederson will present a more formidable obstacle for Spurs on Saturday. SB
- Manchester City’s 15-win record illustrates team’s desire, says Guardiola
- Tottenham’s staying power in question as economic gravity pulls hard
2) Liverpool seek to break drawing habit
This was one of last season’s most thrilling games, Bournemouth coming back from 3-1 down to claim an improbable win, and any kind of repeat would cap a distinctly awkward week for Jürgen Klopp. Fortunately for the Liverpool manager there have been few occasions when Eddie Howe’s team have really put on a show this term but he must be wondering what his own players will produce. It sometimes goes overlooked that Liverpool are extremely hard to beat – they have lost just twice, albeit both defeats were pummelings – but a grossly swollen “draws” column is endangering their top-four challenge and there is still the nagging thought that they do not have the balance of a top-quality team. They miss Adam Lallana and, as one local report noted this week, might well wish the midfielder Naby Keïta’s arrival could be brought forward to this winter. A lack of real dynamism in the middle is sometimes a problem covered up by the explosiveness of Mohamed Salah and company further forward; Bournemouth always give you a chance, so this looks an ideal opportunity both to get back in the goalscoring groove and banish the ghosts of that afternoon in December 2016, but question marks about the overall efficiency of Klopp’s unit remain. Three points on Sunday might, at least, put a halt to his increasingly unbecoming tendency to moan about officials and ill luck. NA
- Liverpool’s Solanke admits disallowed goal did strike his arm
- Lukaku strikes and Manchester United beat Bournemouth
3) West Ham the worst opponents for embattled Hughes
Could there be worse opponents for Mark Hughes this weekend than West Ham? Not that Saturday’s visitors to the bet365 Stadium are anything special; the problem is more that their recent revival under David Moyes perfectly illustrates how clear-headed new management can make sense of a despondent, incoherent squad. Should Moyes underline the point in front of Stoke chairman Peter Coates it is hardly an outlandish thought that quick action will be taken. Hughes’s job is hanging by a thread and, although one view is that the palpable unrest among Stoke supporters owes more to the problem of mid-table boredom than the actions of a manager who has repeatedly taken the club to the ceiling of its capabilities, the status quo cannot afford to continue. There is a sense Hughes’s cycle is naturally up and the obvious storyline would be for Marko Arnautović, one of the signings who helped Stoke to that run of ninth-place finishes before joining West Ham and seemingly transforming into a workhorse under Moyes, to inflict the final blow. Hughes and Stoke have fallen short of their old standards this term but the broader question they, and others in their situation, face is what their realistic ambitions should actually be. NA
- Moyes’s West Ham revival continues with a point against Arsenal
- Barnes’ late goal against Stoke sends Burnley soaring into top four
4) Arsenal hope Wilshere can bring back some style
Here is an inconvenient truth: Arsenal do not play particularly good football anymore. In the difficult early years after their move to Emirates Stadium, their on-pitch setbacks – most of them understandable in context – could at least be mitigated for by Arsène Wenger’s pursuit of an aesthetic ideal. They played some lovely stuff even in those fallow times, so what has happened now? It is hard to pinpoint what their style actually is: for a while Wenger rebuilt along the lines of a more direct counterattacking approach but that has decreased in effectiveness and the result seems to be a slow, laboured brand of passing that lacks the ingenuity or intuition to get anyone off their seats. It would be stretching things to say their attackers, undoubtedly all talented, show any genuine rapport and although there have been some notable exceptions – a devastating spell that destroyed Huddersfield and that exciting salvage effort against Manchester United – nobody could seriously contend that the tempo and fluidity championed as the Wengerball brand are a consistent feature any longer. Perhaps things will change if Jack Wilshere can string a consistent run of games together: Arsenal have badly missed someone who can carry the ball between the boxes, linking the defence and attack, and there were encouraging signs on Wednesday night in his first full top-flight game for two years. The draw against an unambitious West Ham was otherwise turgid: Wilshere should get even better though and, if he is fit to face a Newcastle side that appears there for the taking, maybe Arsenal will too. NA
- Wilshere says there has been no progress on Arsenal contract talks
- Newcastle sale moves closer as Staveley increases offer to £300m
5) Should Pardew summon Burke in West Brom’s quest for a win?
West Brom have not quite experienced a new manager bounce in Alan Pardew’s first two games although the way they stemmed a free-flowing Liverpool attack at Anfield gives scope for encouragement. Their rearguard action was impressive: now Pardew has to get them scoring goals – and winning. They have not achieved the latter in 16 games, a club record set on Wednesday night, and rather more devilment in attack will be needed if they are to trouble a Manchester United side that – for all their own problems on the entertainment front – will take some initiative to crack. Pardew’s recalling of Grzegorz Krychowiak, West Brom’s expensive loanee from PSG, to the starting lineup at Anfield made a difference in midfield at Liverpool; now one wonders if he might be tempted to give a little more game time to Oliver Burke, another summer signing who was such a hot prospect when he moved to RB Leipzig from Nottingham Forest last season but has struggled since and is yet to make a league start for the Baggies. Burke is strong, direct and has a goal in him: Pardew, who certainly enjoys his wingers, described him earlier this month as “the sort of player I should do well with”; he also suggested Burke “needs some time on the training ground” before playing more but West Brom need something different and the 20-year-old could provide a freshness they have badly lacked. NA
- Klopp brings back Liverpool’s top brass but West Brom leave with a point
- Lukaku strikes and Manchester United beat Bournemouth
6) Fluent Chelsea can give Morata a longer rest
Alvaro Morata’s availability to face Southampton on Saturday remains uncertain but Antonio Conte must be tempted to give him an extended rest regardless. The Spanish forward has shouldered quite a burden in his first Premier League season and it was no shock at all, especially to those who saw him toil through last weekend’s defeat at West Ham, that he did not make the trip to Huddersfield due to a combination of tiredness and a back issue. Perhaps more surprising was that Chelsea did not miss him at all: Eden Hazard, Willian and Pedro made for a fluid front three that pulled the home team’s defenders around and wreaked havoc until, at 3-0 in front, they took the opportunity to ease up. Conte, whose concerns about players’ tiredness are well aired, may choose to rotate certain areas of his starting XI but must be tempted to retain an attacking setup that worked so well. Morata will need to be fresh for sterner tests than a Southampton side that, having taken a step forward against Arsenal last weekend, took two giant ones back in their humbling by Leicester. The stats are certainly in favour of Tuesday’s lineup: Hazard has played in the “false nine” role four times under Conte now – with four wins and an aggregate score of 13-1. At the very least, a team that laboured so badly at London Stadium clearly has another string to its bow. NA
- Chelsea bounce back with comfortable win over Huddersfield
- Pellegrino questions commitment of Southampton players
7) Another late show from Palace?
When Crystal Palace and West Ham played out a 2-2 tie on 28 October it was the Eagles’ first draw of the season, but they have certainly developed a taste for a stalemate. Since that game Roy Hodgson’s side have been drawing after 90 minutes in six out of seven matches. Two of those they have converted into victories in stoppage time, most recently against Watford on Tuesday. Their morale will surely be massively boosted by that dramatic last-gasp turnaround – over the last 10 matches Palace have the 10th best record in the Premier League – but even if they have avoided defeat in their last two matches and have not conceded more than one away goal in any single game since September, their form on their travels remains beyond troubling (their travelling fans still haven’t had a goal to celebrate). Against a Palace defence still missing Mamadou Sakho Leicester, up to third in that form table after an excellent midweek performance at Southampton, have the tools to create havoc. SB
- Hodgson: ‘Where we are in the table you have to work hard for every win’
- Mahrez sparkles as Leicester cruise to win at Southampton
8) Silva’s Hornets to stop getting stung
Against Crystal Palace on Tuesday Watford spent 86 minutes in the lead and ended the game pointless. It was the latest in a series of implosions that have seen Marco Silva’s team repeatedly take winning positions in matches, only to dramatically lose them. Against Chelsea in October they led 2-1, missed a fabulous chance to score a potentially decisive third and conceded twice in the last three minutes to lose 4-2; against Everton last month they led 2-0 with less than half an hour to play and lost to a last-minute penalty, missing one of their own in stoppage time. In the first two months of the season they scored late goals against Liverpool, Swansea, West Brom and Arsenal, taking eight points from games that would have yielded just two had they ended a few minutes earlier, and talk was of their mental fortitude and refusal to admit defeat; since then all the late goals have come against them, and talk now is of mental fragility and an inability to hold on to victory. This all adds up to a lot of late drama – the last 10 minutes of Watford games this season have featured 14 goals, more than any other side – but also an impression of a team that is rarely in control of proceedings. Huddersfield are another team that finishes games badly – in the last 40 minutes of matches they have scored twice and conceded 14, and away from home they’re 11-1 down in that period. This is not a game to leave early. SB
- Sako and McArthur strike late to stun Watford
- Want to understand politics in the last 25 years? Look at football
9) Barnes back to teach Brighton a lesson in survival
Ashley Barnes has never been the most prolific of forwards but the other attributes he brings have won admirers where it matters. At Burnley they love his workrate, his selflessness, his ability to defend from the front – with decisive contributions like Tuesday’s excellent late winner against Stoke a welcome bonus. He was thought of equally well at Brighton although, when he left the south coast club for Turf Moor in January 2014, he could probably not have envisaged leading the line against them in the Premier League. Whether he has earned a start, which would only be his fourth of the season in the Premier League, remains to be seen but he might have caught his old employers at the right time. Brighton started the season well but have not won in their last six games, their only two victories since September coming against troubled opponents in West Ham and Swansea. Back-to-back home games on Saturday and against Watford may play a big part in determining the tone of their season; their sixth-placed opponents, and their erstwhile centre-forward, can set quite some example for anyone wondering how to thrive after promotion. NA
- Liam Rosenior: Burnley show value of stability and long-term planning
- Aurier’s slice of luck helps Spurs to victory over Brighton and into top four
10) Another clean sheet for Everton
Sam Allardyce declared himself “a little baffled at how Everton conceded so many goals before I got here”, after Newcastle had 16 shots and hit the woodwork twice against his side on Wednesday night. It sounded a little like a declaration of victory when the battle has only just begun, but Everton have now conceded one goal in their last five games and their defensive record is likely to be further improved this weekend. Swansea have an unusually impotent attack, whose lack of achievement is verging on the historical. Wednesday’s 4-0 defeat by Manchester City was actually one of their better games, in that they had three shots on target, more than 50% above their season’s average. In the last 25 years of top-flight football only once has a team scored fewer than Swansea’s current tally of eight goals in their first 17 games, and that was the record-smashingly catastrophic Derby County side of 2007-08. In short, we’re all set for another smug Allardyce press conference at about 10pm on Monday evening. SB
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