Jesus is finally available for Manchester City, Klopp faces a choice between Origi and Sturridge and Costa may have to bide time for return to Chelsea starting XIAs Manchester United prepare to visit the Britannia Stadium, examining Stoke City’s record against the league’s best sides this season offers an indication of where Mark Hughes and José Mourinho should both be looking for improvement. Stoke’s record against the elite is awful: five of their six matches against the league’s top six sides have ended in heavy defeats. They have lost 3-1 at Arsenal, 4-2 at Chelsea and 4-1 at Liverpool, while they were thumped 4-1 and 4-0 at home by Manchester City and Tottenham Hotspur respectively. Good enough to take the...
Manchester City resemble the girl with a curl in the middle of her forehead, N’Golo Kanté’s return to Leicester shows Wilfred Ndidi what needs to be done and David Moyes regrets catching the bullet dodged by Mark HughesThis time last year Southampton paid £4m to sign Charlie Austin from Queens Park Rangers. It was a while before he made an impact, but he certainly made an impact during the early part of this season, scoring nine goals in 19 games. But Southampton’s form has tailed off since Austin suffered a shoulder injury last month. They have lacked a cutting edge and have won only three of their past nine games in all competitions, sinking into the bottom half of the...
Manchester United may go for jugular against Liverpool, Morgan Schneiderlin must settle quickly at Everton and Ahmed Musa has chance to shine for LeicesterManchester United were on the receiving end of heavy criticism when they shut up shop and successfully played for a 0-0 draw when they visited Liverpool in October. It was a classic exercise in parking the bus from an unapologetic José Mourinho, who reasoned that a cautious approach was necessary against a team who regularly overwhelm their opponents with blistering attacking play. But while it was possible to grudgingly respect Mourinho’s plan, there is no need for the United manager to play it safe at Old Trafford on Sunday. Although United are unlikely to veer too far...
Mourinho’s moan about the poor atmosphere at Old Trafford against Hull has some justification yet was designed to produce a reaction against LiverpoolOne reading of José Mourinho’s criticism of Manchester United supporters is that it is hardly going to enamour the manager to them. This is a constituency who have to hear the chant, “Fergie’s right/your fans are shite”, from their opposite numbers on most match-days at Old Trafford.Mourinho’s calling out of the faithful came after Tuesday night’s 2-0 defeat of Hull City in the EFL Cup semi-final first leg. The Portuguese’s complaint was that if the volume for Liverpool’s visit on Sunday was not higher the hope of beating United’s fiercest rival is materially reduced. Related: José Mourinho urges...
Surpassing Sir Bobby Charlton has become a distraction in addition to making the Manchester United captain too easy to mark out of the game – as Hull City demonstrated in the EFL Cup semi-final first legMarco Silva would probably prefer to be picking up league points than examining the possibilities presented by cup football in England, though perhaps the Hull City manager should view his first two games as a honeymoon period.Quite an eventful one at that. Victory at the first time of asking in the FA Cup at the weekend may have been marred by a shortage of home fans – Hull supporters were staging a protest against the club owners – but this occasion was even weirder. First...