Mails: Liverpool in same tier as Watford and Newcastle?

Matt Stead

Send your thoughts to theeditor@football365.com

 

The real early winner
Sorry but you got this one dreadfully wrong this weekend
.  There was only one choice.  Oumar Niasse.  Saved Koeman’s job ironically.
TX Bill (EFC still have much work to do) EFC

 

A sh*t win is a win
Well that was sh*t, not Davey Moyes ‘pass wide and cross ad nauseum’ shit, and certainly not Louis Van Pass Sideways then Backwards turgid turd sh*t, just sh*t. We should have scored more to make it a much more comfortable game and I was already mentally preparing to pretend F365(football) doesn’t exist atleast until there’s something to talk about other than “Same Old Utd” type articles.

Then we put on Blind and Smalling instead of Ant and it felt like we were asking for a late equaliser, but we held on, and without being Captain Obvious a 1-0 win IS a win i.e 3pts, plus another goal for Rom, Jones continues to be excellent, Dave Saves and Eric is Eric.

So.. I guess what I’m saying is, yeah Morata looks a sexy sexy striker, yeah it looks like Pep has finally landed in EPL and yeah yesterdays game was nerve wracking, but atleast when its not going great on the pitch we can always rely on Jose to clown around on the bench.
Tez(Lukaku isn’t even on form yet)MUFC, Botswana

 

A quick summary of Liverpool
What. A. Game.

But Good Christ, our defence is going to kill me off.
James, Liverpool 

 

Can Bilic manage?
We understand – you’re playing against Spurs, your defence makes Liverpool look Italian, so you go full “Alamo” with five defenders and a couple of guys shielding them.

At half time, it is clear that this hasn’t worked. You’re 2-0 down, both as a result of poor defending and misunderstandings from your 3 man central defence, Antonio is off, and you now have a PFM wet dream strike force of Carroll and Hernandez.

Do you rectify this and replace a central defender with someone slightly more useful at half time (no), once you are 3-0 down (no), once you are 3-1 (no), once Spurs are down to 10 men (no)…you wait until there is 15 minutes left and the game is almost over. What follows is a frantic final 10 mins where you almost get back into it.

Lessons learnt…I doubt it.

As a side point, Spurs were playing with 3 central defenders and Dier in midfield. Davies was marking Carroll??
Matthew (ITFC)

 

Loving this season (Liverpool in the same tier as Watford?!)
Just wanted to write in to say how much I am enjoying the start to this season.

Obviously, as a Man City fan, stuff is going okay at the minute… and United are also playing top notch football, which is great to see.  All the arguments about why Jose was and Pep wasn’t under pressure through the summer seem like irrelevant arse music now.  In that, it seems pretty clear that when these two coaches are in full control of, and are fully supported within   their clubs, the opinions of external, loud-mouth, doom-mongers mean pretty much fuck all.  Even when the competition is fierce, and the stakes are high.  Who’d have thought?

Chelsea and Spurs are arguably a little bit behind in terms of getting up and running, but it looks like the finished articles will be pretty much on par with the aforementioned two.  The managers certainly are.  All four managers have such different approaches, and yet are almost impossible to form into a hierarchy.

Philosophy v Pragmatism?  Which Philosophy is best?  All the answers are subjective – any arguments for a certain conclusion being rendered objectively pointless, and yet remaining thoroughly engaging.

Football, football, football.  The never ending football!

The Premier League is back – it’s like the late nineties and early noughties again.  Even the original Ronaldo is talking about playing again – bless him…  It would be like watching Mansour Bahrami playing in the seniors at Wimbledon.

Expecting a close run for the title between the somewhat ominously, already incumbent top-four, once the dust settles.  Hoping with a degree of confidence that Pep has nailed it with City this season, but that confidence is diminished whenever I think about the other three; and how consistent it is likely the various sides will be over the course of the season.  Also worried Jose might poke one of our coaches in the eye, or something equally dastardly, as he ratchets up the pressure cooker over the late winter.  Pep really doesn’t like that sort of thing.

Of the club’s inhabiting what is a pretty clear second tier (in my opinion), which I suspect to eventually be Everton, Liverpool, Arsenal, Watford and Newcastle – probs only Liverpool really have a chance of stepping it up and threatening for a top four place.  Can’t see it happening via logic, but Klopp’s rollercoaster-whirlwind of a team are pure illogical joy at times, and could pick off a straggler or two from the current top four, if the consistency those sides contrastingly exhibit turns out to be not quite robust enough to withstand the ruckus.  City and Spurs still have soft spots that may or may not become weak links over a whole season.  That City’s is in the same place as Liverpool’s (but nowhere near as soft) should see them safe from the Scousers, and exactly how Spurs will develop with their contextually unique, conservative / nurturing approach to team building is yet to be seen.

Everton have sold their best player, and signed half a team of solid team-players.  This is absolutely usual, bog-standard, stock Everton behaviour, but has been disguised by a ‘big’ budget, that is in reality pretty mundane, having  been inflated by the sale of Lukaku and ‘the TV money’; as much or more then it has by Moshri’s investment and some new cash-flashing, irresponsible change in the club’s operating style (regardless of Mourinho’s laser-guided Koeman killer.)  They are a team of solid but unspectacular team players, who are not yet a gelled team.

If the dour and somewhat snide Koeman is good at anything (other than alienating Everton’s mercurial but magical hometown hero, Barkley) it is building a team.  They’ll be fine.  The contrast with Liverpool is as stark as the one between City and United.  It’s like a pale echo of the titanic clash occurring at the other end of the M62, hey Scousers?  Or watching a Cam-Rip pirate copy of Batman Vs Superman?  Lovely.

Wenger has hilariously seen Leicester as a template for success, sadly under-appreciating the then impending, but now solidifying effect of the superior managers, coaching staff, medical staff and directorial strategy possessed by the club’s that have by the looks of it, left Arsenal floundering in their wake.  He would have got away with it if it hadn’t been for those pesky kids…

When I look at what happened at Utd when Fergie left (with the PL Trophy in the back of his Roller, mind); Arsenal could be in for quite a few years of struggles.  Or him finally leaving could be such a huge boost to the club that they immediately win the treble.  With the love-child if Scrooge McDuck and Dick Van Dyke in the hot seat, neither Wenger leaving or the treble are looking to be iminnant though, if we are being brutally honest.

Watford – great manager unfairly critised by ‘proper football men’ proving the doubters wrong.  Newcastle – decent Chairman unfairly critised by seemingly everyone proving the doubters wrong.  At least two or three end of season clashes played in Speedo’s and Sarrongs beckon for them.

West Brom might also have been in that second group if they weren’t going to head off for half a season and summer holiday of hiking in the outer Hebrides, wearing nothing but vaseline and a tractor tyre, after they hit the 40 point mark.

So yeah – loving it.  Suspecting / hoping that our coefficient will be looking even more secure by the end of the European Season….

Love as always,
Ben, MCFC, Manchester

 

W***spangled
Is anyone else slightly bored/worried by the big boys w***spangling all the small fry constantly or is it just me?
Jimmy (The biggest w***spangler)

 

365 to blame for Man United not signing Dybala
The mails section is an ingenious way of making fans  opinions heard across the football fraternity. It is my belief that even the mighty and all important managers take a bit of time off their very busy schedules to skim through these websites and have a feel of what the world feels about their teams. If this be the case then I shall forever hold a grudge against the editor of the mails for what I deem as a  conspiracy to keep great players away from united.

I wrote in 5 times at the start of the transfer period and in my mails were subtle suggestion for Jose to go out and at least try and get Dybala for united. Short of a long story is that all my mails about Dybala to United never saw the light of day while a few that I sent in about Arsenal’s degeneration got published promptly.

Am of the view that if enough fans had sent in mails about  Dybala crossing over to United it could have generated enough debate to pique Jose’s interest and he might have tried to land him and at a cheap valuation. Now look at what the boy is doing at Juve. Eight goals in four matches for a midfielder can turn even the great Messi green with envy. You really should have published those five mails.
Nilote(His glorious left foot is now beyond our price range) 

 

New linear champions
New week, new Linear Champions. Congratulations to Everton on becoming the 6th different team to hold the 2017 Linear Premier League Championship after beating Bournemouth (who beat Brighton who beat West Brom, who beat Burnley, who beat Chelsea).

Can Burnley reclaim the title when they travel to Goodison Park in front of the Sky cameras on Sunday?
Mark in Manchester

 

Say my name, say my name
It’s a well documented gripe but for some reason, recently, it’s getting to me more than ever. Of course, I’m talking about the quality of commentators and pundits during broadcast matches.

With the exception of the Monday Night Football crew I find it incredibly insulting that the quality of commentary is so poor. A sky sports and/or BT Sport subscription is not cheap, the least I could expect for my money is a grown man being able to pronounce 22 names correctly. Some of the attempts are so feeble it’s laughable.

I know of no other profession, particularly in the spoken media world, where such ineptitude is rewarded. Imagine the newscaster for the News At 10 pronouncing the Russian president’s name as Putt-In. They’d be sacked!

The only name that can justifiably be mispronounced is Siobhan, which is just a bag of frogs.
TM 

Suck it up, Storey
21st in F365 Fantasy Football. There’s a good chance I’ll destroy Storey.
Garey Vance, MUFC

 

Love for *that* headline
So Lukaku “inches” United past Southampton!

Now if only he could do this for another 23 times over the season.
Gaurav (not 24) B, India

 

“Lukaku Inches Past Saints” – I raise my hat.
Dave, Manchester

 

I thought it had been agreed that it wasn’t the done thing to keep alluding to Lukaku’s enormous *ahem* ‘salary package’…
Rex (give me an inch and I’ll take a Chelsea smile) BRFC, Adelaide