EPL Round 26 Gamethread

coremiller

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Burnley fight back to get a 1-1 draw against City after Sterling misses a sitter.

Mourinho responds to getting thoroughly outplayed by Spurs on Wednesday by dropping OG Jones from the squad altogether and starting Scott McTominay over Pogba. Mou is the best. Never change, Mou.
 

Mighty Joe Young

The North remembers
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Burnley fight back to get a 1-1 draw against City after Sterling misses a sitter.

Mourinho responds to getting thoroughly outplayed by Spurs on Wednesday by dropping OG Jones from the squad altogether and starting Scott McTominay over Pogba. Mou is the best. Never change, Mou.
Weren't there reports of Pogba demanding a raise due to Sanchez's arrival? Hmmm ..
 

coremiller

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Wenger's solution to the "how can Auba and Lacazette play together" issue today is to bench Lacazette. The guy he just paid 45m for six months ago.
 

OCST

Sunny von Bulow
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I do not get Everton at all. Starting a back five, which they haven’t played all year, NEITHER of Sigurdsson or Rooney, and Niasse over Tosun. After a very good game where the back four played well, Sigurdsson and Rooney played well together for once, and Niasse was awful. This feels like a blindfolded monkey picking an XI by throwing darts at the roster. This team makes me despair sometimes.
 

lars10

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Wenger's solution to the "how can Auba and Lacazette play together" issue today is to bench Lacazette. The guy he just paid 45m for six months ago.
To be fair to Wenger he's also only scored 1 goal since early December.
 

OCST

Sunny von Bulow
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I don’t know why the fuck I watch this team. Everton standing around. Go get the damn ball
 

page 2 protege

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Man, the Mirror and Express are just on another level.

They both use "will" so earnestly, and the only sourcing either provides for their guesses is crediting the other for guessing first. I would love to sit in on their morning meetings.
 

coremiller

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The Liverpool v. Spurs match should be a good one. Liverpool had had Spurs' number for a while, especially at Anfield, but Spurs crushed them 4-1 in the reverse fixture at Wembley in October where Liverpool's defense and goalkeeping repeatedly self-destructed. Spurs have only won two league matches at Anfield in the premier league era, in 1993 and 2011.

Will be interesting to see if Spurs try to press like they usually do or play like they did in October and look to hit quick counters. Last year at Anfield, Sadio Mane ate Ben Davies alive and Liverpool won easily. Davies and Tripper started on Wednesday; I wonder if we'll see Rose and Aurier today, both for rotation and because they're faster and better equipped to match up with the pace of Mane and Salah.
 

SocrManiac

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Jon Moss, the slowest, fattest fuck of a referee in the world, gets the two fastest counterattacking teams in the EPL.
Book it now- he’s going to be talked about for a week after this.
 

SocrManiac

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Spurs also get in-form Juventus, who have conceded once in their past 15 games and scored 7 today, later in the week.
 

SocrManiac

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The better joke would have been “Approximately how long it takes light to reach his eyes from his vantage point.” Sorry.
 

PedroSpecialK

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Liverpool are really gonna regret not putting more than 1 on the board, Son and Kane are bound to exploit the booked Alexander-Arnold and Lovren right side
 

coremiller

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Liverpool deserve their lead. The problem with Spurs' 4-2-3-1 and this personnel is not enough distribution and passing options from deep. Liverpool's press are forcing Sanchez and Dier, etc. into tricky on-ball situations where they don't have great passing options. Even the better passers like Vertonghen and Eriksen are getting caught making mistakes where they have no easy passing options. They badly miss Alderweireld today; with him they could play 3-5-2 and have much easier passing triangles at the back.

The other problem with the 4-2-3-1 is that the fullbacks can't get forward as much. When the fullbacks can't get forward, the attack becomes very narrow. Eriksen, Son, Kane, Alli are all running the same channels. As a result Alli has had to come much deeper to find space. There is room to attack Liverpool wide because Liverpool's fullbacks have been very aggressive and don't have natural wide midfielders to cover for them, but Spurs have nobody to do that. As the commentary team keep pointing out, Spurs have been oddly reticent to play long balls in behind, even though they roasted Liverpool with that tactic at Wembley.

I'm not sure how to fix it. They could bring on Winks for Son, and drop Dier into a back 3, but then they lose even more pace up top.

The good news is besides the goal, which was sort of fluky, Liverpool have struggled to turn their advantage into real gilt-edged chances. If Spurs can make some adjustments and right the ship they can get something from this.
 

Kliq

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Referee probably shouldn’t have stopped play when Kane had the ball at his feet at the top of the box...
 

coremiller

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It didn't look like an advantage from 40 yards away where Jon Moss was standing.
 

coremiller

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Spurs look much better this half. I don't think it's even anything tactical, they're just playing better, not misplacing so many passes.
 

SocrManiac

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I said it last week- Dele Alle is turning himself into one of the biggest cunts in the league. What a waste of what should have been an incredible talent.
 

coremiller

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I have no problem with exaggerating actual contact if there is some, but that was ridiculous.

Lamela on for Sanchez. Poche going for broke here. Lamela yellow card in 4, 3, 2, ...
 

SocrManiac

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Karius is a piece of shit of the lowest order. Why the fuck did he weakly punch that cross? What possible reason was there not to catch it? Fucking awful.