English Premier League Matchday 5 Review

Matchday 5 was turned out to be one where new records were created and once again the Barclay’s Premier League showed why it is considered as the most competitive league among the top leagues of the world. Of the teams seven tipped to be contenders for a top four finish only Arsenal managed a win while all City and Chelsea drew while Everton, Tottenham and Liverpool lost. But the result of the weekend was Manchester United getting “outfoxed” by newly promoted Leicester City and that too after taking a 2 goal lead, twice.

Man Utd Outfoxed:

In my week 2 review I had written that against Chelsea at the Bridge the foxes had come to play and could have scored first. Against United too they had a lively start and missed a couple of tight chances Vardy, Ulloa and Nugent causing problems in the United backline. Louis Van Gaal ditched his favored 3-5-2 for a 4-4-2 diamond with Rooney playing as the no 10 behind Falcao and Van Persie, Mata was the unfortunate one to be dropped. It didn’t take long for the star studded forward line to get their act together as Falcao’s pin point cross was headed in by Van Persie, whoever said Falcao couldn’t assist. The second goal came moments later courtesy the most expensive player in the BPL. Rooney played in Di Maria who showed great class to deftly chip it over the advancing Schmeichel Jr and add another contender for goal-of-the-season. The foxes, who have been playing a very fearless brand of football that has seen them snatch points off Arsenal and Everton, hit back straight from the kickoff. Vardy shrugged off Rojo on the right and his cross from the bye-line found Ulloa to make it 2-1. United, though, kept up the pressure and Falcao and Blind had shots blocked while Rojo headed over from another Di Maria cross.

After the break Rooney and Di Maria’s shots were thwarted but Ander Herrera scored his second in as many games from the edge of the box to restore the two goal advantage the assist again coming from Di Maria. What followed was 23 minutes of complete meltdown by Man United that left everyone stunned. First Rafael was unfortunate not to be given a foul when Vardy had clearly pushed him off the ball and in his impetuosity he fouled Vardy inside the box. Mark Clattenburg immediately pointed to the spot and from there David Nuget made no mistake. 2-3 became 3-3 two minutes later as Cambiasso fired a piledriver through a crowded United box for his first BPL goal. United brought on Januzaj and Mata for Falcao and Di Maria in an effort to shore up the midfield but 15 minutes later Rojo and Mata tried to play a one-two but Mata was dispossessed by De Laet and as Rojo had already overlapped there was acres of space for him to make a run and play in Vardy who scored past De Gea. Five minutes later the final nail in the proverbial coffin arrived when young Tyler Blackett was red carded for shoving Vardy in the box, Ulloa converting the resulting penalty. This is the first time that United have lost in the BPL after taking a 2-0 lead.

United’s strength is their attack and they will score goals, lots of them. But the defense is light to say the least. Rojo will take time to adjust to the pace of the Premier League, Rafael is yet to show maturity and will make the odd rash challenge under pressure and the center backs do not have a leader that can hold the line. Young Blackett has shown promise but would have benefitted playing alongside a Vidic, Johnny Evans unfortunately doesn’t offer the same assuredness. I stilll cannot understand why they did not choose to sign Eliaquim Mangala. The lack of the quality defensive midfielder also showed as Leicester’s counter attacks left Utd short of numbers at the back when they poured forward in search for goals. 5 points from 5 games is one of United’s worst starts ever and worryingly they are yet to face any of the other six teams in contention for a top four finish.

Chelsea 1-1 Chelsea at the Etihad:

It was billed as the clash of the contenders but as such high profile matched usually turn out to be it was more of a game of chess between two master strategists and I got most of the team selections right in my preview for this match. Chances were few and far between as Chelsea spent most of the afternoon defending and City were unable to find a way past Mourinho’s well drilled defensive unit. Chelsea’s midfield had to join in the defensive duties leaving Costa isolated up front for much of the game where Eliaquim Mangala and Vincent Kompany kept him under check.

The game changed when Zabaleta was sent off after clattering into Costa who also got a yellow card for lashing out at the Argentine. With 25 minutes to go Chelsea went on the attack and a lovely criss cross run by Hazard found Schurrle, who had made an almost mirror image run, at the far post to put Chelsea into the lead. Another quick move and Fabregas found Costa at the edge of the box but his left footed shot taken on the turn came off the upright. When Chelsea should have attacked and killed off the game they inexplicably sat back and tried to shut shop. Frank Lampard, on as a sub, made one of his trademark runs into the box and latched onto James Milner’s cross to smash it home. Alas, he doesn’t play for Chelsea anymore. Never has a player been so heartbroken to score a match saving goal. The game ended at that scoreline but the traveling Chelsea fans continued to sing Frank Lampard’s name and he went across to acknowledge it and say goodbye. He will always be Chelsea’s favorite son. Chelsea became the 39^th different club against whom Lampard has scored in the BPL, a record.

Jose Mourinho will see it as a point gained while Manuel Pellegrini will rightly see it as 2 lost as his team dominated the game for long periods but couldn’t score. Heartening for him will be the performance put in by Milner and Mangala and also Yaya Toure back to some form.

With Liverpool, Tottenham and Everton losing to West Ham, West Brom and Crystal Palace respectively Arsenal moved up to fourth with a win at Villa Park, three goals in the space of four minutes proving to be enough. They will, however, be severely tested as they play 4 games in 13 days and with 6 first team players out any additional casualty could prove to be their undoing. Chelsea have firmly put themselves in contention for a top four finish while City are favorites to challenge them for the title. Who will be the other two teams to make it is still to be answered.

Manchester City Vs Chelsea Match Preview

Sunday will see battle royale as the two pre season favorites square off at the Etihad Stadium. While the blues from west London have enjoyed a thunderous start to the season winning all four of their opening matches the light blues from Manchester have been inconsistent. A labored win at Newcastle, a comfortable win against Liverpool, a shock home loss to Stoke and a come from behind draw at Arsenal has been City’s mixed bag season so far. A win for Chelsea will give them an 8 point lead over City which, though not decisive at this point, will heap pressure on their main title rivals. Last season the sides faced each other three times with Jose Mourinho claiming a league double while Manuel Pellegrini had to be content with a win in the League Cup. Significantly however, City have won 5 out of the last 6 times these two teams have met at the Etihad. Chelsea have no injury concerns while City have enough depth in their squad to cope with the absence on Jovetic and Fernando.

Both teams had mid week Champions league games and both chose not to start with their star strikers. Diego Costa and Kun Aguero came on as substitutes in the second half and both failed to get on the score sheet. While City lost away to Bayern courtesy a late goal, Chelsea fared slightly better drawing 1-1 against Schalke at home. Mourinho has already stated that Costa will start on Sunday and Aguero is also certain to start. All eyes will be on the two strikers as the battle it out to be crowned the best in the Premier League. However, the game will be decided not only by these two alone but on two key battles that will be fought in the midfield.

Fabregas Vs Fernandinho

Fabregas has been the brains behind Chelsea’s imperious form so far. He has already notched up a league leading 6 assists and scored his first Chelsea goal against Schalke on Wednesday. Playing deep alongside Matic he orchestrates the attack with his vision, creating chances for Costa, Hazard and Schurrle. My guess is Fabregas will be played as the no10 while Mikel will most likely slot in beside Matic as additional defensive cover. Fernandinho was arguably City’s Man of the Match against Arsenal, thwarting the Arsenal midfield again and again. He was, however guilty of letting Mame Biram Diouf get past him too easily for the goal in the defeat to Stoke City. With Yaya Toure woefully out of form Fernandinho will once again be entrusted with the job of breaking up play. He will most likely be partnered by the hard working James Milner as Lampard looked short of match practice at the Emirates and was hauled off at halftime.

Matic Vs David Silva

On the other side Matic will be entrusted with the unenviable task of stopping David Silva. David Silva is easily one of the most technically gifted players in the Premier League and most people would be willing to pay to watch him play. With Fabregas joining the attack Matic has been isolated in the midfield quite a few times and that has led to Chelsea shipping 5 goals in their last two matches. He will have to be extra vigilant as Ivanovic too has been playing higher up more often as a wing back. Mourinho may opt to blunt the threat posed by David Silva by playing Azpilicueta on the right and Felipe Luis on the left with Ivanovic dropping to the bench. Silva will be looking to add to his one goal so far and to open his account in the assists department.

The biggest challenge for Mourinho will be to keep his defense tight. In high profile games, especially away from home, he tends to be defensive and doesn’t mind playing out a goalless draw. Chelsea have so far conceded 6 goals in 4 league games and have only one clean sheet to show compared to 24 in the whole of last season. Though a few of those can be put down to having a new goalkeeper in the side, most have been due to poor defending. Expect a tactical game with not too many goals being scored.

Match review Chelsea vs Swansea

An early season top of the table clash saw Chelsea FC hosting Swansea. Both sides came into this match having won all 3 of their opening matches, the only two sides in the league with such a record. Chelsea having seen off Burnley, Leicester and Everton while the Swans surprised everyone with an opening day win at Old Trafford followed by wins against Burnley and West Brom. They also beat Rotherham in the League Cup and had conceded only 1 goal in the process, against Manchester United. There were concerns upfront for both teams. Bony returned late from international duty for Swans while for Chelsea Diego Costa had to withdraw from the Spain squad prior to their Euro qualifier against Macedonia with a hamstring injury. But the smart money would have been on Chelsea getting the job done at home especially since they have a more than able back-up striker in Loic Remy who incidentally scored against Spain in a friendly last week where Costa drew a blank.

For the second game in a row Costa cleared a late fitness test and was named in the starting XI. However, it was the Welshmen who looked hungrier for the win at the outset and their pressing style forced Chelsea on the backfoot. They looked to attack with pace when in possession and harried the Chelsea players when they didn’t have the ball. Chelsea like to build their attacks from the back with Cesc Fabregas the initiator. His distribution has been the key behind their dashing start to the season. By constantly attacking the ball the Swans achieved two things, starved of possession Fabregas was not as big a threat while up front Costa was isolated and didn’t see much of the ball. He did have one shot which, after taking a heavy deflection off a defender, was easily collected by Lucas Fabianski. Swansea were enjoying a lion’s share of possession and the pressure eventually bore fruit. Nemanja Matic broke forward following a failed Swans attack but was chased down by Wayne Routledge who eventually dispossessed him at the halfway line and Ki Sung-Yeung then opened up the Blues defense with a pass to left back Neil Taylor who played a low cross into the box. John Terry had no option but to try and hook it back but as close as it was to goal he could only manage to put it into his own net. The goal added to the Swans self belief, if at all they lacked any. More attacking play followed Bafetimbi Gomis blasted wide on two occasions while Routledge’s curling shot from the edge of the box was narrowly wide.

It took Chelsea a little over half an hour to weather the tide and gain a stronger foothold into the match. The remainder of the half was played mostly in the Swansea half. Hazard, Fabregas, Costa and Ivanovic were at the heart of most of the attacks. Hazard in particular was causing a lot of problems with his jinking runs often cutting in from the right with good effect. It was only a matter of time before the defense would yield. With Terry, Matic, Cahill, Ivanovic and Costa in the lineup Chelsea are a big unit and a threat from set pieces but freekick delivery has been a cause for low conversion rate. After Schurrle and Hazard had wasted three corner kicks Fabregas stepped up to take one at the stroke of half time and with pin point accuracy found Costa on the six yard line. There was no stopping his header.

After the break it was pretty much the same story wave after wave of Chelsea attack. Ramires replaced Schurrle and Chelsea changed to a 4-3-3, it was more like a 3-4-3 with Ivanovic playing quite high up mostly in the Swansea half, Oscar and Hazard flanking Costa. Farbregas moved to take up the no 10 position where Oscar had been a peripheral figure. The changes had the desired effect. Hazard and Fabregas played some neat passes on the left and the latter played it to Costa who stood still at the six yard line while his marker rushed on and calmly side footed it in. Swansea missed a golden opportunity to equalize as Chelsea waited for them to kick the ball out to get treatment for Amat who had stayed down in his own box following an Ivanovic thunderbolt that struck his groin. The Swans played on and the defense was caught out, Gomis received a pass behind Azpilicueta but his dink over Courtois lacked legs and direction and was cleared by Azpilicueta. Costa soon had his hat-trick at the other end. Intercepting Ramires’ scuffed shot as the defense waited for Fabianski to claim it and slotting in at the near post.

He was substituted to a thunderous applause from the home crowd soon after, Loic Remy coming on to make his Blues debut. While it took Costa 19 minutes to score his first, Remy got his on 9 minutes of coming on, Hazard creating chaos in the box down the right before cutting it back to Oscar who squared it to Remy. Remy found the far corner to make it a perfect day for the new look strike force. I cannot recall the last time Chelsea strikers scored four goals in a game. The defense was caught napping once again when Bony found Shelvy in acres of space. His pace left Terry and Cahill behind and he calmly finished past Courtois. Salah was brought on for Fabregas for the last ten minutes and he was intent on proving a point, his pace and quick feet causing the Swans defense problems. The score ended 4-2 and the blues are now the only team in the BPL with a 100% win record.

With City, Arsenal and Liverpool all dropping points it was a good week for the Blues but Jose Mourinho will not be happy with the defensive lapses that have conceded six goals in the last two matches and will want to fix things quickly before the midweek Champions’ League game against Schalke and next week’s big game, away to Man City.

Premier League's Summer Transfer Window Review

As far as transfer window closing days go, Monday was a disappointment. Apart from the movement of a couple of strikers no major signing was made. That was mainly due to the fact that the usual big movers, Chelsea and Manchester City, chose to do much of their business well in advance. Other than the one in and one out at Manchester United there were hardly any surprise eleventh hour moves where private jets and helicopters are rushed into service. We’ll have to wait till January for that.

The biggest movers of this transfer window were Manchester United. Not surprising though considering last season’s debacle and a change of management. Ryan Giggs, who had been around ever since the Premier League began finally brought to an end a very glittering and trophy laden career. Vidic, Rio Ferdinand and Evra were considered past their use by date and moved on. That leaves a massive gap to fill and while Smalling and Jones have shown potential Evans hasn’t quite made the step-up to the standards a club of United’s stature demands. This year they have put down a marker with the not one but two marquee signings. Angel Di Maria and Radamel Falcao are dream signings for any manager and for the club supporters. Last season United were found short of quality in the midfield and too often Rooney had to drop deep and turn provider for Van Persie to finish. He had 10 assists and created 56 chances. However, when Van Persie got injured the goals dried up as neither Welbeck nor Hernandez had the quality to convert those chances. Van Gaal has sought to address the problem with by bringing in Di Maria who can do for Rooney what Rooney did for Van Persie. With Van Persie’s injury record it is important to have a quality back-up striker and they don’t come much better than Radamel Falcao. United pulled off a major coup by getting El Tigre on a one year loan from Monaco. He is a proven out-n-out striker who really comes to life inside the box. He offers little outside of it but when you have a troika of Di Maria, Rooney and Mata as a creative force behind you all that remains to be done is bang them in.

A lot has been said and written about United still being able to draw top players based on these two signings but fact is that Falcao is something of a footballing mercenary, not that I’m against any man trying to earn a better pay for unquestionable talent and only a short time at the top, but he has never shown any special desire to play Champions League. In any case his first choice was always Real Madrid. Di Maria too had preferred a move to PSG and agreed to come to United only after he PSG back out and he had already burnt his bridges at Real by then. United also paid over the top for him. But I feel it’s better to pay a premium for quality players than save the money and die wondering. These two along with the other new signings Blind, Herrera, Rojo and Shaw have the quality to bring United back into the Champions League. With the failure of the much publicized pursuit of Arturo Vidal and later De Jong failing to materialize it will remain to be seen how Van Gaal manages his 3-5-2 formation without a quality central midfielder.

Arsenal seem to have given up on winning the league. As happens every year, they were linked with a host of stars but finally ended up only signing Danny Welbeck from United. Big names like Falcao and Cavani were touted as targets while Arsenal publicly said Wenger turned down Balotelli twice. When they moved to the Emirates from Highbury they said a few years of austerity would follow in order to balance the books. Academy graduates were promoted to first team with success and they always managed to finish in the top four bringing with it the spoils of Champions League football. But in reality they were never in a position to challenge for the either the Premier League or the Champions League. There is no need to be frugal anymore yet Wenger refuses to buy a top striker. What he has at his disposal is an excellent collection of playmakers but he needs someone to provide the end result. Giroud is a decent striker but nowhere near the quality of strikers Chelsea, Liverpool and the two Manchester clubs have on their roster. Sanogo and Joel Campbell are not Premier League standard, not yet. It’s a good move for Welbeck though he will be first choice striker at least until Giroud returns. He could make a name for himself like Sturridge did at Liverpool. Arsenal are also short on defenders with only six in the first team. With any one of them injured it leaves them quite vulnerable at the back. Why was Varmalen allowed to leave so late and not suitably replaced is a mystery.

Liverpool, having qualified for Champions League, needed to add numbers to their squad. The likes of Adam Lallana, Rickie Lambert, Dejan Lovren and Lazar Markovic were swiftly brought in to cover all areas but the icing on the cake was the signing of Mario Balotelli from AC Milan for a bargain £16 million. The enigmatic striker comes with a reputation of being a disruptive force in the dressing room. But if there is one team where he can settle down it is Liverpool. His spells at Inter, Man City and AC Milan have been highlighted mostly for the wrong reasons but he is older now and realizes it is probably his last chance to get his head down and be in the news for the right reasons and the fact that he took a pay cut to push through the move points in this direction. He will be entrusted with leading the line and will have no shortage of service playing alongside the very gifted duo of Sturridge and Sterling. The challenge for Brendan Rogers will be to integrate the host of new faces into the team quickly and avoid a Tottenham like situation who despite spending over £100 million on new players last year failed to achieve the minimum of a top four finish. He will also need to find a new formation since Balotelli is a very different player comparedd to Suarez.

Tottenham and Manchester City saw few changes and were content with plugging the gaps. While Ben Davies, Federico Fazio, Michel Vorm and Eric Dier were Tottenham’s pick Man City’s main signings were highly rate Porto duo Eliaquim Mangala and Fernando. Getting Frank Lampard on loan till the end of the year will give them the added experience in midfield.

The winners of the transfer window in my eyes were Chelsea and Everton. Chelsea identified their weaknesses and moved quickly to bring in quality players to fill those gaps. A dependable striker was priority and Diego Costa has taken to the PL like a fish to water scoring 4 in his first 3 matches. Another Mourinho masterstroke was the signing of Cesc Fabregas. He is a proven entity in the PL and has provided the creative vision behind strike force notching up 4 assists already. The biggest success, however, was getting Fernando Torres off the books and swiftly replacing him with Loic Remy. Remy is, at £8.5 million, a steal and although he failed a medical at Liverpool it was surprising that Arsenal and Tottenham did not pursue their initial interest in him. I suspect he is a short term signing and will probably be replaced by Mattia Destro next season. Everton not only managed to keep hold of all their star players they also made permanent the loan signings of Lukaku and Gareth Barry. Getting Eto’o on a one year deal is a great deal for Roberto Martinez apart from giving a different dimension to the attack he will also play the role of a mentor to the youthful team, Lukaku in particular.

On the basis of the existing squads and the signings made over the summer its quite safe to say that Chelsea and Manchester City will be front runners for the league winner’s trophy at the end of the season while there will be tough competition for the remaining two Champions League places. But football is not played on paper and if Falcao, Di Maria, Balotelli and the usual suspects produce the goods as only they can this could be the closest finish to the league for positions one to seven.