In football, you need eleven players playing together.
Not ten or nine or eight.
And putting square pegs in round holes rarely works.
But Roberto Di Matteo doesn’t know this.
At the Etihad, he played his best player out of position. Chelsea had no chance with Ramires wide on the right in a 4-3-3.
He’s a steely warrior with pace and stamina and good skills. He can make long runs forward with the ball and long runs back to win it back. He couldn’t do any of that at the Etihad on Wednesday night, so it’s no wonder Chelsea lost 2-1.
Harry Redknapp looks washed out.
The clamour of Harry for England hasn’t been heard across our land for a while. Nine games left, still 27 points to play for. But all Tottenham’s momentum has vanished.
As we always say, football is 90% confidence and a game of sequences. If you’re 13 points ahead of Arsenal and playing well,you feel confident and play well and think you’ll win.
But if you’re 2-0 up at the Emirates but you can’t get near the ball, then you will wobble and fold and get thrashed 5-2. After that, you’ll be shattered.
In The Times, after an interview where Brad Friedel says he refuses to panic, Gary Jacob notes that Spurs have collapsed in February for the second season in a row.
Last season, after winning three in a row, they only won one of their next 10 league games.
Kenny Dalglish’s grumpy behaviour reached a tipping point at QPR, where he refused to do radio and offended the print reporters. Liverpool had lost 3-2 after being 2-0 up in 72 minutes.
QPR’s Joey Barton has been abysmal this season and soon after he was taken off by Mark Hughes and replaced by Jamie Mackie, QPR scored three goals. Not a coincidence. Barton and SWP have been garbage, I\’m afraid. At this stage its all about the arithmetic of survival and three points against Liverpool, or anybody, is priceless.
FACT : Dalglish has spent very badly on Charlie Adam, Andy Carroll and Jordan Henderson. Carroll is far too static and clumsy.
FACT : Suarez needs somebody else to play with, not just Stevie G.
FACT : Liverpool’s season stalled when Suarez was suspended for eight games.
FACT : They miss Lucas and Agger. With those spinal players, they’d never have conceded three goals in the last 14 minutes to Derry, Cisse and Mackie.
At Manchester City on Wednesday night, Drogba was rested.
But Torres had spent most of the match tackling Micah Richards because he had no help from Mata, a peripheral bantamweight, or Meireles, who could not make a five-yard pass.
When Drogba came on in 73, he did nothing.
Di Matteo had dropped Sturridge, who was ridiculously selfish against Leicester. He refused to pass.
With David Silva carrying an ankle injury for the last few weeks, it was up to Nasri to provide creativity and a goal threat and he did that. Nasri tried things, hit the bar, and then, when Tevez smuggled the ball to him, scored the winner.
Chelsea are concentrating on the Champions League, thinking they have a chance of winning it. That’s madness. They should concentrate on fourth place.
The oligarch has allegedly offered Pep Guardiola £40m net (after tax) to manage Chelsea for the next four years.
Don’t know about that. If Pep left Barca, I think he would want to join a big club.
So there you have it.
Arsenal are playing really well and have won their last six league games.
They have eleven players playing together and right now they’re showing the others how to do it.
A friend has jokingly asked : Did you have a dream that Vermaelen would score at Everton?
No, I just thought that as you run out of games, and as the matches themselves get very, very tight, it’s not the players with the most skill that make the difference. It’s the players with the most determination.
Sport at the highest level isn’t just a test of technique and athletic ability.
It’s a test of character.
PS Have you ever checked out ANR’s varied Reviews page?