Very fortunate not to lose to Villa. They'll see it as two points dropped, but they were very fortunate to come away with one.
Having to dive at Anfield to beat Villa Even a poor Arsenal beat Villa at their place. Still I do like Pool this season and I still reckon it'll be one of the Merseyside teams taking 4th
Who do people want to win today ? Obviously Swansea over the Spuds, I think Swansea have got a decent chance too. They've been pretty poor overall this season but they have beaten Utd and Newcastle recently and certainly have the ability to triumph against Arsenal fan Tim Sherwood's misfits. Chelsea v Utd, although it's a case of wanting to see them both lose that can't happen and I'd rather see Utd win to keep Chelsea at bay and in the process see the Spuds drop another position.
Every Arsenal fan should want Utd to win, but they're an average side without Rooney and RVP and are running into an in form Chelsea so I doubt it will happen. 2-0 Chelsea I reckon, would love to be wrong...
I do want Spurs to win, because if they win, they go level on points with those dirty bindipping bastards.
The pundits are coming up with some bizarre principles on the Suarez matter, such as: - that players have the right to dive (they use the phrase 'go down', but the idea is the same) if there's any contact, regardless of the fact that the contact wasn't sufficient to actually impede the player; - that Guzan was at fault for trying to win the ball the way he did because he should have known that Suarez would go over, which reads like saying 'it's your fault for enabling him to bend the rules'; - that Suarez was moving away from goal so had no reason to stay up; - that the benefit of the doubt should go with the striker (by this I guess they mean the 'victim' of the incident), which runs contrary to how any decent justice system should work; - that plenty of other players do it too. Pat Nevin on MOTD2:Extra made the point that he could've stayed up had he chosen to, and the only responses he got from Steve Bower were rehashes of points 3 and 5 above. The only video of the incident that isn't of shoddy quality that I've found is this one: [video]https://mtc.cdn.vine.co/r/videos/2FE3A253811036397471230009344_19b15f67be8.4.7.1434 4747874714145639_uCK29WXw5Nx5cYQkBT.xfGJt0Mx79KJke 7r2Mi5DEVDMaUHI0Jx5rm8JX0MPrvz_.mp4?versionId=0wAg 2wUfnco.U9O6F4mGolFNa2qEUUYc[/video] From this angle it's hard to say with any certainty that there was any contact (and I'm aware that the one from the opposite angle seems more incriminating for Guzan), but it would take one hell of a charming snake oil salesman to convince me that it was enough to knock him off his right foot - the supposed point of contact - let alone the left foot that Suarez makes out to have been swept from under him.