'tis the damn season

Sky's Christmas music and snowfall graphics are out, it's Prime Week this week and the Coca Cola lorry is winding its way through the commercial breaks... you know what that means

Kick Off

I was away last week and so haven’t seen masses of the available football to watch, however I did watch some or all of a few Champions League games in the wild and was in fact with Geordies for their 1-1 draw against PSG, a scoreline I cursed them with before kick off by confidently announcing it was going to be a score draw. Sorry Mags. I was also in a pub in Liverpool for the United game at Galatasaray; I had my back to the screen but the friend I was with helpfully pointed at the screen in the manner of that Leonardo Di Caprio meme when the Turks merry band of Premier League rejects got their third.

By the time Arsenal played I was ensconced in Mowgli, a wonderful Indian street food restaurant, tucking into delicious food and a gorgeous cocktail, and each time my wrist buzzed with a notification I ignored it, assuming it was WhatsApp or I dunno, Uber Eats telling me they’ve added 92 new restaurants since I last used them. What a fool! When I finally looked at my phone it was in fact LiveScore letting me know that we were already 4-0 up, with goals from all my faves. A fifth goal was added before half time by Martin, another fave, and I managed to watch the last few minutes, including Jorginho’s penalty, in SD in my hotel room.

I missed all of the Europa action being too drunk on red wine in Manchester but well done to everyone, I think all the English team’s won? (No I will not fact this).

And so to the weekend. No early kick of meant that I had nothing to worry about on my train journey home, until the 3pm KOs, with the only football related intrusion into my consciousness being an Everton fan on my first train and a flagpole in someone’s garden with a Stoke City flag on, seen from the window as we sped past.

So by 3 I wasn’t really that stressed about the Arsenal game, especially not when we went 1-0 up within six minutes, with a second added after 13. Were we going to get another Lens? Maybe! Paul Merson certainly thought so, calling it all over after just 25 minutes.

Alas, we are the Arsenal, and a turgid second half followed in which we allowed Wolves back into the game and gave ourselves a tetchy final 15 minutes which included an endless amount of stoppage time and gave me thumb ache from refreshing LiveScore so often. But we did it, and we remain top of the table, hopefully, given our next opposition, for another week.

The other two games at 3 saw Brentford beat Luton 3-1 and Burnley finally get their first home win of the season and their biggest ever Premier League win, with a 5-0 tonking of Sheffield United, leaving Paul Heckingbottom, as I type, hanging by the thinnest of threads and, by the time you read this, probably the first managerial casualty of the season.

At 5:30 we had Forest v Everton and… it was not good. I actually can’t even remember anything about it. Sorry lads. Anyway Everton won and as everyone I know has said too, I think they’ll be OK, even if the 10 point deduction is upheld.

Then at 8pm it was the battle of the Uniteds; Newcastle and Manchester. Both drew in the week but both under less than happy circumstances with Newcastle falling foul of soft penalty in the last moments of their game against PSG and United yet again losing their lead in Europe. They were also both suffering a long list of injuries, though Newcastle perhaps bearing the brunt of it. Frankly, anything could have happened.

As it was, what happened was that United looked terrible and Newcastle stepped up, taking advantage of their opponent’s disorganisation and snatching a 1-0 victory via Anthony Gordon. They also suffered the loss of Nick Pope two thirds of the way through to a shoulder dislocation, adding to their woes but Martin Dubravka stepped up and kept the clean sheet.

I have nothing to add to the United discourse. It’s clearly a toxic club with issues at every level and it’s hard to see how they make things better.

Newcastle however, no matter how much you might disapprove of them as a club, have shown real mettle in the past month or so, getting through games with strength and passion. That’s all fanbases want. Sure we’d all love to win things but mainly we want to be proud of our team and enjoy watching them (beyond the stress it inevitably causes us!) and I know that’s how NUFC fans are feeling right now.

Sunday then, the scheduling of which I will address below, with four games at 2pm and the “big ticket” fixture at 4:30pm.

Let’s start with the televised game: West Ham v Palace. It was fine wasn’t it? Fine. Passed the time. Nice to have a bit of football on in the background right?

Meanwhile, in games I like to call “secret”, Liverpool were having a wild time against Fulham, gaining, losing, then gaining the lead in the most ridiculous fashion, with four banger goals from Trent (Leno og? Sure Jan), Alex Mac and Endo.

OK so the opener was technically a Leno og as it knocked off him into the net, adding to the tally to make it three goalie ogs where the ball has bounced of their back unknowingly. The kind of trend in a season I can really get behind.

Fulham showed their worth, scoring three (well, four if you count the Ream offside one) goals at Anfield in the pouring rain, and highlighed Liverpool’s vulnerability without Alisson. Kelleher can step up though and I suspect this will be a hard but valuable lesson for him. Sheffield United, possibly with a new manager bounce, next.

Elsewhere Chelsea beat Brighton with two goals from my beloved Enzo Fernandez and one from previous Brighton loanee Levi Colwill. Brighton fought back and had it not been overturned (correctly, boo), we might have had some absolute scenes right at the end. 90+12!

Bournemouth continued their decent run, drawing with flavour of the month Aston Villa, twice taking the lead, only to have it snatched from them on the 90th minute.

After all of that, we then turned our attentions to a game that had a frankly ridiculous build up by Sky, City v Spurs.

Apologies for the regularity with which I recycle my own comments from Twitter for content for this newsletter, I simply cannot sit on a good quip or observation, but I’m starting to think we should put City in the 16:30 slot against a London club every week. We had the Arsenal game, not by any stretch a classic but we beat them, we had the game against Chelsea which was, frankly, an epic, and now we’ve had the game against Spurs.

It started with a shock, Son scoring after only six minutes. Only to go up the other three minutes later and score an og.

Then Foden scored on 31 minutes and what felt like it could have the makings of another Sunday evening thriller got the whiff of another boring City victory.

But no! Lo Celso popped up with a wonderful goal on 69 minutes (nice) to even things up. It remained that way for only 12 minutes when Jack Grealish scored to restore City’s lead. The Narrative/Football Gods weren’t done yet though, with yet another equaliser from Kulusevski on the 90th minute.

There followed a tense and aggy eight minutes of time added on, including a bizarre moment when Simon Hooper appeared to give City advantage, only to blow for a foul on Haaland with Jack Grealish heading towards goal on a one-on-one with Vicario.

Naturally the City fans took this with their customary grace, as did Haaland.

Meanwhile Spurs had a victory that was favourable to their old rivals Arsenal, keeping City from their heels for another Gameweek. Whatever happened Arsenal fans couldn’t lose to be honest, though tablewise this was probably the best outcome.

It’s now time for Prime Week, where we get to tune in early and see the countdown on the Prime app and enjoy some tasty midweek Barclays.

Right, Europe.

A very quick pitstop around Europe as I’ve basically watched nothing of its leagues week, so, Germany; Leverkusen are top despite drawing with Dortmund, due to Bayern’s game against Union being postponed because of snow. In Italy Inter are top and Milan have slipped to 3rd, with Juventus taking second. In Spain Madrid are top on goal difference, with Girona on the same points and Barcelona in second and finally, in France, PSG are starting to pull away after Nice lost to Nantes.

Lastly, a brief shoutout to England Women for pulling it back against the Netherlands at Wembley on Friday, going from 0-2 down to winning 3-2.

And that’s that!

Half Time

A brief one today, but a something I need to get off my chest. I can’t remember if I’ve tweeted or written about this before (probably, I’m nothing if not tediously repetitive) but tough, we go again (maybe).

So there were lots of tweets yesterday about the fact that the televised 2pm match was West Ham Palace, which perhaps, on paper, seemed like the worst of the three offerings. Unfortunately, for the point I’m about to make, it was. There was drama in all three of the other games (Bournemouth Villa, Chelsea Brighton and Liverpool Fulham) and while there were at least a couple of goals, not much went on otherwise.

HOWEVER, the point is that all three of the games that weren’t televised featured teams that played in Europe on Thursday. They were probably meant to be 3pm Saturday games but got shifted because of this. They were never going to be on TV. Now I’m sure most of the people moaning about this know this, I’m sure most of you know this, but we also have to remember that every team is entitled to a certain number of televised appearances and sometimes that means we might get a ‘crap’ game prioritised over a ‘good’ one.

The thing is, while it sometimes feels like games are going to be awful, you just don’t know. Brentford Arsenal for example sounds like it should be entertaining, but it was one of the worst games I’ve had the pleasure of sitting through, whereas earlier in the season we all moaned about Sheffield United Everton which turned out to be a thriller.

And yes, there is definitely a wider conversation to be had about the accessibility of games to a UK TV audience and the cost thereof but for now just accept that this is what happens!

Full Time

I don’t understand the Cilla-naissance and I especially don’t know how I’ve become embroiled in it to the point that a friend sends me every video of her she sees, but I was grateful (?) for this, which provides some excellent crossover content. I have to say though, have you ever seen a less shapely leg than Cilla’s stick pins here??

Should this be in the Thirst Trap section? Probably. But just look at him. FUCK!

I did a thread of all the best Christmas tat available from Premier League clubs on Saturday but the outright winner, and the winner by a country mile, was this legend from Fulham. I want him so so badly.

Please enjoy this thread reminding us of when Budweiser celebrated Lionel Messi's record-breaking 644 goals for Barcelona by sending personalized beers to the 160 goalkeepers he scored against.

Donnarumma got a straight red against Le Havre, for, well, watch and see

US Sports Scran brought us this incredible looking chorizo bap and fries available at Defensor Sporting in Uruguay

While at Hull City you can get a tub of toffee apple crumble with lashings of custard

There was a keeper assist in the Milan Frosinone game

West Brom’s Boiler again showed his allyship for Rainbow Laces and the Proud Baggies

If this leaked England away shirt is real it will be zooming right into the Drip of the Week

Drip of the Week

I’ve decided to change the title of this section as so often I want to mention a cool jacket, or a sweet collab that’s dropped.

So on that basis, the first Drip of the Week has to be the Ian Wright x adidas x Arsenal collab. Isn’t it gorgeous? I’m always going to be drawn to something black and white but if you add gold? Hell yeah. I love the design of this too, the graphic feel, the use of all the things that are important to or reminiscent of Wrighty.

You can read about what each one represents here.

Sticking with Wrighty for a moment, he also wore this spectacular coat at the Eastleigh Reading FA Cup game on Sunday and boy oh boy do I want one for Arsenal Chelsea Women at the Emirates this Sunday. It also seemed to connect with everyone on the internet as my tweet popped off to a ridiculous degree and honestly, I’ve seen George Constanza more in the past 24 hours than I have in my previous 44 years.

Thirst Trap

The Thirst Trap this week is a throwback to Aldi Giroud, Yohan Cabaye. He was with the punditry team before PSG Newcastle on Tuesday and I thought huh, I’d forgotten about you, what a shame. So for anyone else who’s forgotten here’s a reminder. He’s very much giving Harry Judd bottom left too right?

And there we have it, all done for the week.

Please enjoy Prime Week, if you choose to indulge, or if you have the means I know there’s Pokal this week too and while I haven’t checked when there’s one cup competition in Europe going on, there’s usually another, so there might be Copa del Rey and/or Coppa Italia too. Or maybe you’re going to have a break from football and gorge on Christmas films instead. Or, heaven forbid, maybe you even have a social life???

Whatever you’re up to I hope you have a lovely week. Remember you can always drop a couple of quid to my Ko-Fi if you like what I do and want to contribute to Emily’s Can’t Stop Booking Tattoos Fund but if not please Like and share and all that good stuff.

Until next week, au revoir!