Hull’s Harry Maguire is dreaming of England, Spurs are better placed than ever to best Arsène Wenger’s Arsenal and Aitor Karanka continues to divide opinionThe Dozen: the weekend’s best Premier League photos In a cartoon history of Arsenal’s ongoing run of springtime top-four escapology acts – the battle, above all, to stay ahead of Spurs – Arsène Wenger would probably be depicted right now wriggling furiously inside a sealed lead trunk, still rattling his padlocks but descending towards the seabed. Tottenham are six points ahead of Arsenal with 11 games to play, to Arsenal’s 12. Tighter spots have been negotiated. But as Spurs beat Everton to take their half of the weekend’s London-Merseyside derby exchange it was hard to avoid...
Manchester United’s options continue to evolve with their record £89m signing offering a less flamboyant, more responsible presence in the win over WatfordSometimes when José Mourinho crowbars a comment into an answer it is because he can seem an incorrigible mischief-maker, forever ready to take a sly dig at a rival. At others, he is less provocative, but more instructive. So it was when he was asked about Manchester United’s fourth consecutive clean sheet.After praising his defence, he took a detour to cite Paul Pogba’s influence. “He is playing with great balance in these last two games: he is playing with his brain, he is recovering a lot of balls, he is very good in his positional play,” Mourinho said....
Liverpool’s defence needs to find cohesion fast, Lincoln felt the force with Alan Power and Bastian Schweinsteiger is welcomed back by José MourinhoIt was an afternoon when the ball would not go in for Ruben Loftus-Cheek. The Chelsea attacking midfielder was twice denied by the Brentford goalkeeper, Daniel Bentley, and, when he clipped over him on 58 minutes, the effort came back off the crossbar. Loftus-Cheek had two other moments when he jinked inside the area but could not find a finish. It was, nonetheless, an eye-catching performance from the 21-year-old – in front of the watching England manager, Gareth Southgate – in which he advertised both his power and the deftness of his touch. Could it offer him a...
Will Daniel Sturridge get a chance to regain his verve? Will Ranieri fine-tune for a relegation battle? Will Ravel Morrison return to Old Trafford?A clutch of (fool)hardy Lincoln City fans queued through Wednesday night in sub-zero temperatures in order to get their gloved hands on the last tickets for their club’s biggest and indeed only fourth-round FA Cup tie since 1976. Those fans were evidently not discouraged by the fact that the National League leaders had suffered their heaviest defeat of the season the previous night, when they were beaten 3-0 by Barrow, whose rugged approach on a treacherous pitch fairly knocked Danny Cowley’s men out of their impish stride. The Championship leaders, Brighton, will probably not resort to such...
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...