Weekend Review: Does football in 2012 have to end?

After an amazing year in football, we're back with another weekend review of the last games in this calendar year, as the Premier League continues to take shape...

Aston Villa 0-3 Wigan - Wigan put a further dent into Aston Villa's season to make their aggregate score over their last 3 games 0-15. Villa's win at Anfield seems like an age ago now and they have really been pulled into the relegation battle which they seemed to be relatively clear of a short time ago. The worrying thing for Aston Villa is that Wigan are hardly the most prolific team (they have scored 22 goals in their 20 league games so far this season) but managed to score 3 goals against their leaky defence. Emmerson Boyce's new nickname should surely be 'Moses' after the way the Aston Villa defence parted to allow him to score a memorable goal. We've said this before but if Wigan stay up this year a large part of that will be down to Arouna Kone, who looks so good in that team. Not to be unfair to Christian Benteke who has shown signs of real promise this season, but a comparison between the 2 strikers illustrates just how effective Kone is. Benteke had 48 touches in the game and Kone had 49 so they had similar opportunities to put a stamp on the game. With these 49 touches Kone had a pass accuracy of 94% whilst Benteke was accurate with 55% of his passes. They both had 3 shots, and Kone managed to score with one and also assisted a goal for his team. Wigan and Villa are equal on points so obviously there is a long way to go, but this game highlights how much of a contrast there is between these two teams at the moment. Villa seem to be sliding downwards, and you find it hard to see how the January transfer window will help them with Randy Lerner's purse strings growing ever tighter, while Wigan will believe that they can produce enough displays to leave at least 3 teams trailing in their wake come May.

Arsenal 7-3 Newcastle - Theo Walcott should be a striker blah blah blah. That angle on this game has been done to death, yes Theo scored a hat trick, he was clinical and looked great, but there's enough about that everywhere else. Instead it's interesting how Newcastle are aiming to knock Aston Villa off their leaky defence perch, by letting in 11 goals in their last 2 games. Last year Newcastle's defence starred and they conceded 51 goals in their run to 5th place, after 20 games they've already conceded 37 goals and you definitely have to think the Newcastle board are regretting giving Alan Pardew an 8 year contract now! The signing of Mathieu Debuchy from Lille though does seem like an astute signing, and I would be very surprised if they didn't bring in a centre back as well. Newcastle are now just 3 points off the relegation zone, and while it's hard to see the likes of QPR, Reading or Southampton overtaking them by the end of the season it is a worrying time for the Toon Army. Demba Ba is apparently in talks with Chelsea and seems set to leave the club, Newcastle have scored 26 goals in the league - Ba has exactly half of these goals. If they do sell him Papiss Cisse has a very big burden on his shoulders.

Roundup of our teams

C's QPR slumped to a dismal 0-3 home defeat to Liverpool, with all goals scored in the first 27 minutes. A crushing defeat given the fact that their 3 closest rivals before the start of the gameweek all picked up at least a point, with Wigan and Reading winning their games. C's match review will be up in the near future to review his thoughts on the game.

League leaders Man Utd cruised to a relatively straight-forward 2-0 victory against West Brom at Old Trafford to finish the year with a 7 point lead at the top. Shinji Kagawa returned to action and played 66 minutes and looked right back to his early season excellent form. United dominated possession but did allow West Brom to put in a far too high 14 shots on goal. This was only their 4th clean sheet of the season but they had 17 shots on goal and finish the year with 50 goals in 20 games. If they are to keep their lead at the top of the league it will have to be down to the attack and with Robin Van Persie in this form it looks exciting. United have 11 goals more than any other team in the league and the exciting games they've produced this year look set to continue!

Crewe won 2-1 at Oldham to bounce back after defeat from Tranmere on Boxing Day. Mark Ellis bounced back from his mistake which granted Oldham an 82nd minute equaliser to score the winner just 2 minutes later. Mathias Pogba's 11th of the season had earlier put the Alex ahead. 2012 was a fantastic year for Crewe with their 20 game unbeaten run, Wembley play off victory, and they now sit in 13th place in League One just 3 points off the play off places. The big job for Steve Davis will surely be to keep hold of Luke Murphy who is being strongly linked with a move to Stoke in the January transfer window.

Union Berlin's last game before the winter break was on December 17th in a 4-3 away loss to Braunschweig and they don't play again until 1 February. At the end of the year Union sit in an excellent 7th place in Bundesliga II in what has been a great start to the season. Here's hoping the break revitalises the team and propels them to an even better second half of the season!

What we learned this week

• Maybe the purse strings really are extremely tight at Arsenal if they can't even afford to give their manager a coat that works.
• Cameron Jerome can score an absolute 'worldy' when he wants to.
• Frank Lampard won't be short of offers should he leave Chelsea.
• Samir Nasri is becoming a bit of a liability.
• Mick McCarthy is still loved in Wolverhampton, Stale Solbakken is not.
• When do 2 yellows not equal a red? When your name is Mick Russell.
• Championship clubs are hedging bets on new managers weaving their magic in January - Nottingham Forest, Blackburn and Barnsley all clearly felt that was their best plan of action.
• It'll be interesting to see if Edgar Davids really can save Barnet on his own.

On that note, happy new year everyone and enjoy 2013! Let's hope it brings as much excitement as 2012 if not more!

C&J

Houdini needs time, but does he have any?

Match Review: QPR 1-1 Aston Villa

And so another 'must win, will win' fixture passes. Gameweek 15 of the Premier League and QPR are still without that elusive first victory. This was another they probably ought to have gone on to win, but the chronic imbalance of the side built by Hughes still shows, badly!

Harry started his tenure positively with a clean sheet and away point at a ground where QPR have had little luck over the past few years. However, Sunderland were also extremely out of sorts and you sensed that that was the Rs' best chance yet of winning at the Stadium of Light for the first time. So, with a motivated team playing for their places under the new boss and with the promise of some fight and passion, R's fans headed to Loftus Road for the game against the Villans in far better spirit than they would have had Sparky still been in charge. This wasn't going to be an easy game though; Villa might not be setting the world alight right now but they will have taken plenty of heart from recent displays against Manchester United and Arsenal and they will have benefited from the morale boost that comes with a late winner (as they had had midweek against Reading). Add to this Paul 'look how far I've come' Lambert's good record as a manager against the Superhoops and the fact that the R's team still comprised the same faces and same ability, fans had every right to be very cautious with their optimism.

QPR were forced into one change and made one other to the side that earned the point up at Sunderland. Rob Green, who was frozen out and in many eyes treated badly by Hughes, especially given that Cesar hadn't covered himself in glory in recent games, was back. The 'England keeper' (his agent asked me to call him that) returned between the sticks at Loftus Road to loud cheers and applause and he clearly appreciated the support he was getting. Not quite so warm was the reception given to Shaun Wright-Phillips, himself making a first start in over a month. Whilst both players have failed to live up to their billing so far when pulling on the Hoops, it would be harsh to slate Greeno for one bad (albeit woefully bad) performance and you can understand the sympathy offered by R's fans. The same can't be said of little SWP, who has, aside from his debut performance at home to Newcastle last season, been nothing like the player we were promised. Still, Harry's the boss, he makes the decisions, so we'd best get behind the team...

Greeno is back

I'm sure that every opposition manager tells his side to get in the faces of QPR during the opening exchanges and come out of the traps all guns blazing. QPR just don't find any time to settle and even after a bright start here they showed signs of being vulnerable at the back. The game was only eight minutes old and the R's were one down again, and unfortunately for Greeno we were reminded why he lost his place in the lineup. The blame can't all be put at the gloves of Green though - the R's defence were the usual shambles we've come to expect. Villa were pinging the ball around on the edge of the QPR area which through a combination of a few passes and, admittedly, some ricochets that only go against you when you're at the bottom of the league, the ball landed at an unmarked Brett Holman around 25 yards from goal. Mbia stood off his man and Holman let fly with a shot which the 'England keeper' should probably have done better with. This reminded me of the first goal Swansea scored against him in his opening day nightmare, where he was only able to palm the ball into the net rather than tip it round the post. So here we were again, 1-0 down early on due to poor defending and the clean sheet from Wednesday night was all forgotten.

This shushed what had been a buoyant home crowd who quickly realised that Harry Redknapp can't in fact perform miracles overnight. But ten minutes later we dared to believe he could again: that well-known excellent crosser Samba Diakite swiped the ball with his right boot to deliver a perfect centre onto Jamie Mackie's nut. Mackie, under intense pressure, in turn produced an excellent twisting header which went straight in the top corner. This will have had Harry purring, for he dropped the disinterested Djibril Cisse in favour of playing a determined Jamie Mackie as a lone striker and he was rewarded for his decision with a goal from the fan's favourite.

The Brummies were almost in front again moments after the equaliser: they broke at speed down the right hand side and a cross was headed in by the livewire Christian Benteke, only to be accompanied by a correct offside decision from the linesman. It's fair to say that Benteke has been Villa's biggest threat this season given the continued absence of top marksman Darren Bent for reasons only known by Paul Lambert. His hold up play and technique for a big striker of just 22 is second to none and he is clearly to Aston Villa what Ricky Lambert is to Southampton - a focal point.

For the remainder of the half Villa continued to test the centre back pairing of Ryan Nelsen and Clint Hill, who incidentally have a combined age of 69 and both have the pace of someone that age. Who would have thought that this would be the best partnership we have at the back in a Premier League side in 2012? "That's why we're going down". Well it isn't the only reason... Another is that we don't create many chances and when we finally do we often have nobody in the right place or with the ability to finish them. Shaun Wright-Phillips actually managed to get himself in a striker's position in this game as he was clearly told to run through the middle and latch on to through balls. But unfortunately for the wee man, he couldn't finish a happy meal! In the space of perhaps five first half minutes, he had two golden chances which at this level you just have to be taking! The first came from a ball lofted forward by Esteban Granero, who created a similar chance finished by Adel Taarabt at The Hawthorns a few weeks back. But where Taarabt succeeded with excellent technique, skill and a finish to match, SWP failed miserably, instead firing straight at an on-rushing Brad Guzan when one on one. The second chance was created by Stephane Mbia, himself showing some nice touches playing in a central midfield position. Mbia's through ball released SWP who elected to hit the ball first time when he probably could have afforded to take a touch and control the ball first. The effort, in his defence, was a good one and he was unlucky as it hit the post and bounced away to safety. You could say I'm being harsh with all my criticism of the diminutive winger, but when you pay several million pounds for a Premier League footballer and then pay him several tens of thousands of pounds per week in wages, you are entitled to expect better. In fairness to him, this was the liveliest I've seen him in ages, but still nowhere near the standard required to get into any other Premier League lineup. Just what people like he and Bosingwa have done to deserve places in this lineup, or in fact the QPR squad, I will never know. Maybe they're amazing in training? I don't think so somehow.

As QPR were in the ascendancy a nasty looking collision took the wind out of their sails. Stephane Mbia had to be stretchered off after clashing with a Villa player when challenging for the ball. This had the effect of galvanising the away side, who had two decent chances of their own before the extended first half was brought to an end. Agbonlahor had a good effort saved by Green whilst Brett Holman found himself in a similar shooting position to the one he had for the goal, but this time ended up ballooning it high into the away end. At half time, I was left pondering the continued selection of players who seem to be in the QPR lineup because of their names and reputations from playing at former clubs (though I'm too courteous to mention any names, Shaun, Jose). If Esteban Granero continues to put in the amount of effort he has of late then he'll soon be in this category too. I've had enough of watching him turning in circles on the halfway line to keep the ball, his sideways passing and his static-ness off the ball.

Granero in fact paid the price for his poor first half showing here, as the ruthless Redknapp hooked him in favour of Ji-Sung Park, who was returning from injury to the delight of the Koreans in the home crowd who come each week religiously to see him not appear on the teamsheet. The R's dominated the second half and to their credit looked tighter at the back; I don't actually recall Rob Green having to make a save. But once again, for all their neat build up play, there was no end product, and hardly any chances created. QPR developed an annoying habit under Hughes of playing sideways football on the edge of the box, and this continued here as they struggled to find anyone other than Mackie to run around in the Villa penalty area. Mackie was clearly identified at half time as the only real threat by Lambert and Villa cut off the supply to him and marked him out of this second half. I can't help but think that any other managers watching on will now know to do the same. Ji-Sung Park had one good chance but took far too much time over it. Wright-Phillips summed his QPR career up by inexplicably falling over when under no pressure and when about to set himself for a shot at goal. Clint Hill came closest with a header onto the crossbar but this was a difficult chance and the guy has never scored a Premier League goal (well he has scored one, but it "didn't cross the line").

And that was about it for QPR chances. The R's brought on Junior Hoilett in an attempt to find a winner but he did absolutely nothing after coming on and I'd much rather have seen Djibril Cisse give Villa someone other than Mackie to mark. This Villa side looked beatable and offered very little - this is precisely the sort of team we should be getting three points against. Villa offered virtually nothing up front in the second half. QPR's strategy to deal with Benteke clearly worked and Gabriel Agbonlahor - once the rising star of England and the face of Nike - looked lethargic and as though he was carrying a lot of timber. Karim El Ahmadi was brought on late on by Villa and he had a pop at goal from outside the area which wasn't far away but didn't have Green worried.

So all in all this was an OK start from Redknapp who at least seems to have stopped the rot, but will come up against much sterner tests than this in his managerial reign. QPR dominated the second half in particular but never really looked like they'd score the winning goal, a story of much of the early season. If only Hughes had invested in strikers that could stay fit and not sell those who scored goals for us last season! Harry has  much to fix here, and I fear that even for him this is too much...

Standard handshakes

Man of the match: He may have faded in the second half, but Jamie Mackie is the only player that stood out for me here. His passion, perseverance  determination, modest reputation and modest wage packet are the reasons he is adored by QPR fans, but it is the first three of those qualities that get him so many goals and assists in a league so many feel he isn't good enough for. Redknapp commented after the game that we wouldn't be in this mess 'if we had eleven Jamie Mackie's'. I concur, Harry.  

Gameweek Five Proves a Hive of Activity

After the tedium of the international break it was good to finally get back to a full calendar of football this weekend and it did not disappoint. There were quite a lot of talking points and it seems that a lot of the leagues are beginning to take shape.

One thing that struck us this week was that there were an awful lot of goals by debutants in the Premier League this weekend. Dimitar Berbatov, Javi Garcia, Alexander Buttner, Nick Powell and Christian Benteke all scored on their debuts for their respective clubs this week. Obviously this could be (and most probably is, but I've got a nice theory so bear with me) a coincidence, but I think that this is an encouraging sign for the Premier League. I think that this shows the depth of Premier League squads is improving and competition for places is hotting up at almost every PL team. It used to be the case that team's first XI's were strong and were the main focus and the squad was made up of players not quite good enough to get into the starting XI or who were young prospects. Nowadays though there is a lot of more emphasis on the squad and strength in depth is a necessity to compete in the PL. Therefore, new signings are under instant pressure to perform rather than getting into the team by virtue of being a big money or high profile new signing. Dimitar Berbatov has to compete with Mladen Petric and Hugo Rodallega - any one of those could viably start for Fulham. Javi Garcia has to jostle with Gareth Barry, Jack Rodwell and Yaya Toure et al. Alexander Buttner is vying for a place in front of Patrice Evra while Nick Powell has Paul Scholes, Tom Cleverley and Michael Carrick in his position. Christian Benteke is a bit more of an anomaly but he does have Darren Bent and Andreas Weimann in his position and he was arguably not expecting to walk into their first team straight away. New signings are desperate to prove they merit a starting place when they get to a new club and the challenge comes when they are required to keep up their good start and maintain a high level of performance. One thing is for sure though it's good to see top quality players like Berbatov and Garcia come to England (or stay in Dimi's case - and boy he is a joy to watch when he plays), and see good young prospects like Buttner, Powell and Benteke grow and mature in the PL into (hopefully) future stars.

Another interesting point to note is the form of Fulham. They look like they will be a strange team again this season in respect of their home form v away form. Last year Fulham won 10 matches at home and lost just 4. Conversely they won just 4 games away and lost 10. This season so far Fulham have won both of their home games but lost both of their away games. They've scored 8 and conceded 0 at home, whilst scoring just 2 away from home and conceding 6. So that begs the question is Fulham's style too cavalier away from home? At home they play swashbuckling football and look as good as any team outside of the top 4 arguably when they play well, but away from home something seems to go wrong. The answer may be that Martin Jol's style of play, whilst admirable and very attractive, is simply not suited to playing away from home. The likes of Man United and Man City have in recent years adopted stifling tactics away from home similar to their European tactics which is designed to primarily avoid conceding and then grinding out a goal or two at the other end. Fulham are perhaps being a bit naive in thinking they can win away games in the same style as they can at home. The problem is that this will start to put pressure on their home games sooner or later and they will have to win at home just to stay out of a dogfight at the wrong end of the table. Don't get me wrong I'm not saying that they will be in any kind of trouble, I just don't think that their tactics are the smartest way to go about it. But hey, they've had the heart ripped out of their team with losing the likes of Dempsey, Dembele, Johnson and Zamora so it may be that they will start to adopt a more pragmatic approach away from home, and having Berbatov up front will probably help that as well. Either way Martin Jol has done well to keep Fulham's style at home, but may want to consider toning down his attacking away from home.

Roundup

As you will have seen in the excellent match report here QPR got a very credible 0-0 draw against the League Leaders Chelsea. In my opinion, it is the clean sheet that is most impressive about this result for the R's as Chelsea have been popping in goals for fun in their previous games - all in all, a very good debut for Julio Cesar then.

Man Utd beat Wigan 4-0 in a fairly unspectacular contest at Old Trafford. I hope Danny Welbeck gets a dressing down from Fergie about that dive it was embarrassing and the last thing we need is for another one of our players to get a reputation for diving after Ashley Young's shenanigans last year. Welbeck is a good enough player not to have to resort to diving so please stop eh Danny? On another sad note it seems that there were some chants about Hillsborough and I'm not going to debate whether it was referenced specifically or not - as a human being it is disgusting to even make a thinly veiled reference at such a human tragedy and it needs to stop. Please don't think all United fans feel the same and these 'fans' aren't fit to wear the shirt even in the stands. On to the match and the most pleasing thing was that United won without the likes of Rooney, Kagawa and Van Persie. A big effort is needed in Europe this year after last years disaster so it's good these players got to rest for the Galatasaray game. Buttner at left back looked pretty good from the highlights and hopefully now Evra has some genuine competition his form will get back to the high standards it was before it dipped in the last 2 years I'd say.

Crewe drew 2-2 at Stevenage having been 2 goals up after just 10 minutes. AJ Leitch-Smith produced 2 clinical finishes and looked to have put the Railwaymen on the way to a second away victory of the season, but Stevenage pulled one back before half time and then Chuks Aneke's sending off (coincidentally on his debut - so forget what I said above!) put too much pressure on the Alex defence and Stevenage equalised to maintain their unbeaten start to the season. All in all though not many teams will come away from Broadhall Way having taken points off the hosts this season so I think the Alex can be fairly satisfied with that point.

Union Berlin did actually play this week so our German correspondent Hans Vree finally got something right. They did unfortunately succumb to a 90th minute winner by FC Ingolstadt's Manuel Schaffler and they now sit second from bottom in 2. Bundesliga worryingly. They've got a massive match coming up next though against 1. FC Cologne who sit directly above them in the table so let's hope they can get a result from that one.

What we learned this week:

• Peter Crouch doesn't just have the necessary height to succeed in the NBA he's got mad ball skills, as shown by his 'NBA goal' against Man City.
• Andy Wilkinson is still a thug, and he's lucky Balotelli's reputation probably stopped him getting a red card.
• Jermain Defoe is on fire, and how long will Adebayor be willing to wait in his shadows?
• Southampton's defence is shocking - I saw a suggestion of Craig Gordon in goal for them; might not be a bad shout?
• Barnet look very rocky this year - could they finally be going down?
• Gillingham and Tranmere look very good at the top of their divisions.
• Christian Benteke is the oldest looking 21 year old I think I've ever seen.

This week the Champions League proper is back - YAY! - and the standout fixture is obviously Shakhtar v FC Nordsjaelland...I kid, it's obviously Real Madrid v City. I for one can't wait to see the ideas that José Morais picked up whilst scouting Stoke play City at the weekend be put into action on Tuesday night!

We will have a report from the Man Utd v Galatasaray game which yours truly is attending. Crewe are also playing on Tuesday against Carlisle. So enjoy your football this week there's a lot of it!

J