West Ham v Newcastle, a 560-mile round trip, has been mooted for a Super Sleigh Bell Sunday on the night before Christmas, along with Arsenal v LiverpoolThe almost total lack of regard in which broadcasters hold football fans is no secret, so it should have come as no surprise to learn Sky Sports is proposing to reschedule Arsenal’s home match against Liverpool for Christmas Eve in what the Football Supporters’ Federation has described as “a new low point in putting the interests of football broadcasters over those of match-going fans”. And yet somehow it did come as a surprise. Even by the notoriously cut-throat standards of TV networks scrambling for subscriptions, this seems unnecessarily grasping.With an already hectic festive grind...
Everton’s defence has gone walkabout, Swansea and Southampton are serving up stodgy fare and Antonio Conte may rue being in a tougher league than Serie AChris Hughton, the Brighton & Hove Albion manager, said it all when he highlighted how his team had not been “out of sight” against Arsenal, just as they had not been against Manchester City on the opening weekend of the season. On both occasions, the final scoreline of 0-2 hinted at respectability. Which, in truth, was Brighton’s priority. The gap to the Premier League’s top six clubs yawns like a chasm and Hughton’s approach at the Emirates Stadium – an approach born out of necessity – was characterised by damage limitation. Hughton used a 4-5-1...
The Bosnian represents an echo of the powerful, hard-running players who characterised Arsène Wenger’s best title-winning teamsOne thing you often lose watching a football match on television is the sound levels. Not just the noise of the crowd but the noise of the players, a scale of collision and opposing force that means certain incidents, and indeed the careers of certain players, can have an entirely different register in the flesh.David Luiz’s red card against Arsenal on Sunday was one such case. Replays and stills will show a raised foot but really this was a red card you had to hear. So profound was the thunk of contact those nearby knew instantly the challenge went beyond necessary force and into...
Belgian forward comes on to give his side creative edge they had been lacking but too late to find way through Arsenal in claustrophobic game of fine detailsOn a rowdy, bruising, enjoyably intense afternoon at Stamford Bridge Chelsea showed two sides to their game. First came the one that doesn’t involve Eden Hazard. For the opening 70 minutes of this 0-0 draw the champions were neat, focused, disciplined and aggressively blunt in their attacking rhythms, the gears a little gummed.After which, in glimpses, they played the other version, the Hazard-remix, the one where Chelsea’s No10 provides a vital free radical element in Antonio Conte’s hard-running 3-5-2, somebody to see the angles between the angles, to create space rather than simply applying...
Sead Kolasinac has the steel Arsenal need to end their run of five defeats at Stamford Bridge but Arsène Wenger must play him on the left and stick to three at the backArsenal fans will travel to Stamford Bridge on Sunday with a dram of hope, even though they know that by most measures their spirits should be low. Recent visits to Chelsea have been harrowing for the north London club, with Arsenal losing their last five matches there by a combined score of 15-2. Both their away games in the Premier League this season have brought similar ordeals, with Liverpool thrashing them 4-0 and Stoke City punishing errant finishing and flaky defending to inflict a 1-0 defeat. A strong...