Just looked at some replays on youtube and looks inside to me. None of them were great angles though so i'm open to persuasion....
It looks out to me and Coutinho's offside from the initial pass, which he attempts to get. They also should've been down to ten men by that point, as Mane had made about 4 bookable offences, as he does. We didn't get the penalty for Matip's stupid foul on Janssen either, when the Dutchman was never going to get the ball. Liverpool should've put the game out of sight, but they didn't take their chances. They got the benefit of most of the refereeing decisions and still moaned about the officials afterwards, which is standard. Our starting lineup was wrong, Walker went off ill in the first half and they still couldn't get the win. I can't see that as luck though, I'm afraid.
I've just seen the Sky analysis of the Koscielny goal against Burnley and it's nice that they picked an appropriate, unbiased pundit. Is it a handball, Thierry? ****ing hell, they're not even trying, are they?
Just seen brief highlights of other games, some really dull performances. Leicester look woeful, I predicted they'd have a poor title defence but the way things are looking it wouldn't surprise me if they get drawn back into a relegation battle. Their midfield without Kante looks so weak and when Vardy or Mahrez don't turn up, neither does their whole team. Opposition sides will naturally be more aware and more tacticially focused on stopping those two, so Ranieri has to either "tinker" his tactics about or it's going to be a long season for them, regardless of their impressive start in the CL. As for Arsenal, their goal shouldn't have stood, whether that be for Koscielny being offside or for the fact he hand balled it, you can take your pick. Burnley do look tricky at Turf Moor but you'd still expect Arsenal to go there and get a solid result, not a 90th+ minute winner courtesy of an offside hand ball. I'm so glad to see the not-so special one yet again being shown for the complete fraud that he is, ever since after his Porto CL achievement he's had everything on a plate for him, whether that be unlimited finances or a team already equipped to win major honours, now he's in a role where he actually has to improve a faltering side and thus far his big money signings haven't delivered to the level he'd have hoped for. It wouldn't surprise me if he doesn't last the season. West Ham... Well, just . If it's not their team playing ****e, it's their fans trying to jump a single Boro fan and having two of them floored by the bloke!
To add to the West Ham shame, they've been accused of sex discrimination... by their own ladies team chairman! http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/37533926 I've little to no interest in the women's game myself, but if you're going to have a side, then at least try to do it properly. Premier League teams have absolutely ludicrous amounts of money available to them now. Why risk this sort of crap PR when you can avoid it? Amateurish.
Speaking of crap teams that wear claret and blue, Di Matteo's sacking gives Villa an interesting stat. Their league record this calendar year is as follows: P: 30, W: 3, D: 10, L: 17, Managers: 3. They'll now have more managers than wins, when the next guy's appointed.
I'd go one step further and say everything was handed to him on a plate that season. Starting with the Primera Liga, Porto had the grand total of four games that meant something that season: the two against Benfica and the two against Sporting, and their record there was W2 D1 L1 - while both Benfica and Sporting had W1 D1 L2 records, mainly because the two clubs swapped victories during the season. On top of this, Sporting had a poor season in 2003-4, racking up seven defeats in the league against Porto, Benfica, Maritimo, Boavista, Moreirense, Uniao de Leira, and a 4-0 humping from Rio Ave. Similar can be said for the Taca de Portugal, where Sporting's surprise early elimination to Vitoria Setubal meant the trophy was for both Benfica and Porto to lose, and in that case Porto lost in the final. In terms of the Champions League, though, Porto had a pretty easy ride. In the group stage they were drawn against Los Ladrones, Marseilles and Partizan Belgrade - in other words, qualification rested on who had the most points from the two matches between Porto and OM. In the knockout stages they also had the luck of the draw, first being drawn against Man Utd in a transitional season where they finished a distant third, Lyon in the quarters, Deportivo La Coruna in the semis, before a final against Monaco. In comparison, Monaco had a much tougher route to the final, beating Los Ladrones in the quarter finals and trouncing the Chavs in the semis (which confirmed that whoever won the final would be getting a phone call from Abramovich the following morning) yet this is overlooked.
Liverpool and Everton both had great chances to score but I don't think it's luck. Players give you good and bad. Coutinho and Delafeau should have done better with their chances but how's that luck? Vorm made 2 great saves, it's what he's there to do. Do we then say that when Coutinho and Henderson score screamers against Arsenal and Chelsea, which won them points, is luck? Do we say we're unlucky when our players miss an easy chance? We've definitely struggled in attack at times this season but our defence has been rock solid. I think we fully deserve where we are. We've had 3 big calls go our way this season, the penalty against City when 2-0 up, Wanyama not getting a second booking against Stoke and the Januzaj sending off in the 90th minute. Then we've had decisions like Sterling not getting a second booking, Sane not getting a second booking, the penalty conceded against Liverpool and Son not getting a penalty against Boro. Overall it about evens out but if anything we've been slighlty hard done by. Sides like Liverpool, Arsenal and Chelsea have definitely had more of the big decisions go their way, and a lot of them have had more influence on the result.
I'm guessing that you meant Mane, as the City winger was only on for about three minutes! Otamendi should've gone too and in the first half. His handball was ridiculously deliberate and he made a couple of poor fouls. Compare that to Walker's booking against Boro or Prodl's in the Bournemouth v Watford game. No consistency, unfortunately.
In engineering terms, Jose is a component whose interfaces to other components have low tolerances. So much so the slightest deviation means Jose will bring the whole system crashing down around him. Helps Spurs that Jose has been installed in the Man Utd machine right now.
Was surprised by that one. Specifically that Alli was felled sideways and therefore only went forward a matter of inches as opposed to the metres seen when a gegendiver gets touched.
Oh yeah Yeah, Otamendi's been pretty lucky in both games he's played at WHL. I'd chalk that up to being similar to Lovren against us, who should've had a booking for consistent fouling before he went and kicked the ball away. Tbh I don't thinky they're that bad as calls though. The Sterling and Mane ones really annoyed me because they were already on a booking and both challenges comfortably deserved bookings on their own. Watching it back yesterday, I thought Neville's comments were ridiculous, defending Sterling as his foot bounced off the top of the ball into Rose's leg, even though it was clearly a reckless and dangerous challenge. Had Rose got the ball first it would've still caught him on the shin and Sterling would've got a straight red.
The worst Mane one for me was the one that he managed to get a throw-in for. He put his hands up to apologise for the tackle and the ref was still dim enough to give him the decision. I hate that. Got lucky last season with Southampton, too. He's running under the radar at the moment.
I agree that Henry wasn't the best person to comment on that situation, for a number of reasons, but that doesn't explain Dermot Gallagher's view on it; and he has absolutely no reason at all to be biased toward us. http://www.skysports.com/football/n...koscielnys-winning-goal-was-correctly-awarded
Gallagher's talking bollocks, frankly. He knows what the definition of deliberate is for handball and it includes Koscielny's ridiculously unnatural arm position. Claiming that he's used his arms for elevation when he's on the ground is just plain stupid. I'm not sure that the old fart knows what he's talking about any more, to be honest. He doesn't think that Pogba deserved a booking for throwing Allen to the ground? Really? Don't be silly. The follow-through on Willian wasn't a foul? I hate Chelsea, but it clearly was.
Leicester's success last season was based on not conceding goals. They can't do that any more and their trademark 1-0 is no longer available to them. Plus According to your namesake it was offside...or handball....or after the final whistle. In fact anything but a goal.
I hate it when people see something obvious and yet claim it's not that thing. It's why I can't stand Jim Beglin. He thinks he's on the radio or something. Refs know the rules and they make mistakes. That's fine and it's understandable. Multiple people watching it back and still getting it wrong isn't. It's annoying.
