Is Herrera the new Scholes or Modric?

Is Herrera the new Scholes or Modric?

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Herrera = Modric
Congratulations to Manchester United. After a long long wait, they finally have Luke Modric in their midfield. His name is Ander Herrera.
Tunji, Lagos

…Good performance against a strong team, Mkitharyan will get and deserves the plaudits, but today I want to talk about Herrera, Ander Herrera.

I can’t tell you how much I love Ander, he’s the ‘trigger’ to our pressing, he’s quick (enough) for a CM, he passes wonderfully, he tackles with real bite, he crosses beautifully, he cajoles his teammates, he cries the same cry us fans do when we lose, he’s two-footed, he has a pleasant face and he seems to genuinely love being at United.

I haven’t felt this way about another man since Anderson. I really hope Scholes notices and notes that this man is his heir, Scholesy is untouchable in small areas and with the longer pass, but Ander is better than I ever could have hoped.
Cortez (Carrick for president) MUFC, Botswana

Mkhitaryan’s goal was pick of the weekend
– Oh he is through…he doesn’t have the pace though, will soon get tackled, won’t he? No wonder Jose doesn’t fancy him.

– He’s is actually managed to gain some pace and reached the edge of penalty area – poor bugger’s trying at least

– He’s just gonna attempt the premature low drive in the far corner and miss the far post isn’t he? Pointless..

– Why the f*** didn’t he shoot already? He is almost two yards from the keeper who’s got the whole goal covered with his body!!!! He’s just gonna hit it right into the keeper’s face now !! Idiot!

– HUH? What’s he thinking blasting that shot from so close, surely that’s headed to Row Z??

Holy Cow how did that not break the back of the net??!!!

And that’s why that was the Goal of the Weekend. Those three seconds is exactly why I wake up at 7 AM on weekends.
Raman (Anyone else reminded of RvN by that goal?) NYC

Loving the revitalised Jones
I was really glad to see Phil Jones get some well-deserved praise in 16 Conclusions. He’s not just playing very well himself, but seems to have formed a weirdly wonderful partnership with Mark Red at the heart of our defence (who’d have thought?!).

This CB pairing becomes so much more important with Bailly’s imminent departure for the AFCON. I would dearly love Bailly and Jones to be the first-choice duo, but we’re unlikely to see that combination in full flow until some time next year. It’s good to know that Rojo can more than do a job there.

As for our midfield Armenian, I’m just so, so happy he’s finally hitting his stride. The finish for his goal was fantastic, but the little touch to take the ball away from Vertonghen just as he started his run was a thing of real beauty. Hopefully the injury isn’t too serious, would be a real shame if this sets him back.

A long overdue win in the league, made even better by three teams above us dropping points. Time to try and put a run of wins together.
DJ, MUFC (how long before the knives are out for Pep?) India

Mata has no place in this Man United
As much as I dislike the footballing black hole that Fellaini represents, I dislike the act of booing one of your own players far more. People will be waving their thoughts on printed out A4 sheets soon if we are not careful.

As much as I like Juanly Mata I am afraid his days are numbered with a fit and confident Mkhitaryan stalking the right wing ready to inflict untold damage on defences. The problem for Mata stems not so much from the individual player as much as the danger created when a player is willing to attack their defender and inject pace and directness into the game. Mata is a lovely footballer but we all know his limitations and these are further exposed when he is asked to take up wide positions in a top three or midfield four.

Valencia has adapted well to playing right-back and he gives 100% every match so even in the early days when he was learning the finer arts of defending it was hard to be overly critical. But how much has the team suffered from losing his directness and pace? Maybe the root cause of our ponderous play over the past couple of years was not buying a genuine right-back and therefore leaving Valencia in his natural position. I have been critical of Valencia’s ability to only stand on his left foot over the years but maybe Darmian at right-back (not perfect I know), Shaw or Blind at left back and Valencia replacing Mkhitaryan until he is fit could maintain our hard won forward momentum.

MK-HIT-ARYAN is an easy way to remember how to spell his name, it really isn’t that difficult, especially if you’re paid to comment on it public!
Plato, MUFC

No, it’s okay to boo Fellaini
Booing Fellaini might well be counterproductive and irrational. It’s also cathartic, and perfectly justified on the basis of his performances. Fellaini is now well into his fourth season at United, has just passed 100 appearances without a single performance of merit, and has never given any indication that he has either the talent or aptitude to justify being at United. Maybe he does try his utmost, but he should never have been signed in the first place, and he’s the personification of the worst period in the club’s history since before the fall of the Berlin Wall.

Perhaps it is unfair to make Fellaini the target of anger which should really be targeted at the club’s owners, Moyes, and Ferguson (who, from Rock of Gibraltar to Moyes is the architect of much of United’s current malaise). But Fellaini is a lumbering, hirsute personification of everything that has been wrong with United for a decade, and which is only now being partially addressed.

He’s paid more than the likes of Harry Kane to perform at a level which is mid-table at best, and symbolises a club and squad which has shown the sort of the overpaid comfort and complacency that Keane, Giggs etc. kept out of United’s dressing room.
Chris MUFC

Rest Zlatan
What a relief. Good three points. Carrick and Jones were very good but it’s time to give Ibrahimovic a rest.

Spurs were soft though and gave nothing until Sissoko (!) came on.

Tis Christmas season so have a joke. What is the best cheese to lure a bear out of a cave? Camembert.
Cormac, Galway

JoMo has lost his MoJo
Once articulate, cunning and a step ahead of everyone, he is now lonely, stubborn and lacks the psychological edge that builds that strong rapport with the players and the fear factor from other teams.

His persona is outdated and the new cult of the ‘pressing’ manager and working with millennials doesn’t suit him or his style.

You can’t teach an old dog new tricks. His time has passed and he cannot handle not being the top dog. Conte, Klopp, Pep, Pochettino, all play a different game and one on the training ground not in the media.

Even though Manchester United won yesterday, JoMo was on the periphery. No game-changing subs, no passion from the sideline. His pre-match interview was sullen and boring.

Who is the heartbeat of this side, that used to be his defining mark.

He can’t handle he is not a winner anymore and even if he gets the EFL trophy we all know that is meaningless. And Portugal won the Euros so he can’t slide into international football as the saviour.

I will be surprised if he continues after United, he has made a fortune and maybe time to do something else.
Ben Roberts

Lloris is still the man
Saying that ‘no player in Pochettino’s squad is performing at a level as high as last season or as well as they did against Manchester City in October’‎ is not totally true. Lloris was immense and made vital saves to keep Spurs in the game till the end. He was the reason the scoreline was respectable or close. Pogba, Ibra, Martial and Herrera had good chances to add to the lead if not for Spurs number 1. He’s been equally as good as last season. Only that Tottenham don’t seem to have a plan B when plan A fails. Yesterday Spurs needed a different approach. Perhaps a striker with a physical presence. Kane wasn’t in the game and he seemed to spend half the game in midfield. And Pochettino don’t seem to trust the other striker.
Smith

Payet forward
How is the best player in the Premier League still playing at West Ham?
Zdravko

What Liverpool need to change…
Need to upgrade the keeper. Upgrade his skills or get Joe Hart or Stekelenberg.

Then get Makalele type midfielder. Hendo is no leader.

Klopp need plan B and C. Plan B is for not being ourselves – let the opposition takes the initiative. Every time we have the ball, blast it out at the opponent side. Let them attack. Make the opponent confused, ruin their plan. Hahaha. It’s kinda boring when other team sit tight and we go full throttle to break them. It’s tiring and not sustainable till the end of our season. Plan C for after leading in games. Maybe a la death by futbal.

I will not be enjoying any English football during the coming weeks due to unfavorable schedule for us in Malaysia. (Hopefully Chelsea will lose a game or three during this festive period). Thus, F365 will be my main source of honest rambling. Keep em coming lads.
Khairur (adopted scouser) Penang

Oh dear…
Well Pep ol’ chap. This isn’t going according to plan at all.
DANNY B, MCFC, MCR

Pep needs full-backs to match his plan
Much has been made of Pep Guardiola and his many, many tactical tweaks for, and during games and he has received a huge amount of criticism for it, due to it confusing his players and causing defensive chaos, costing his team dearly against Leicester on Saturday. However when it works, little is made of it. Ian Wright spoke on MotD of his disbelief at fullbacks finding themselves in midfield. The idea of inverted fullbacks has intrigued me, and brought questions from my friends of my sanity when I suggested we adopt it in our Sunday league.

The fullbacks pushing inside, allowing the midfield players to go wide and forward allows the team with possession to control the game and suffocate the opposition. In order for it to succeed, however, the team, Man City in this case, need a confident defence, comfortable anywhere across the backline with the ball at their feet. The explains why Pep has played Kolarov and Sagna at CB with Stones, as the ability to switch formations easily from, for example 4-2-3-1 to a 3-5-2, would allow them to dominate more effectively.

Pep, at Bayern and Barcelona, as well as Luis Enrique and Tito Vilanova after him at Barcelona, could take advantage of this with defenders like Dani Alves, Sergi Roberto, Javier Mascherano, Javi Martinez, David Alaba and Philip Lahm capable of playing in defence just as well as in midfield allowing total tactical flexibility. In particular at Bayern, where a defence of Bernat Martinez Alaba and Rafinha could morph quickly into a three-man defence, Alaba moves wide and Bernat pushes up into the left midfield.

Man City clearly want to be able to do something similar, with Zabaleta moving into midfield with Fernando, leaving a backline of Kolarov, Stones and Sagna. That midfield duo compares pathetically with Pep’s previous players in those roles of Vidal, Alonso, Schweinsteiger, Xavi, Iniesta, Busquets, etc.

I think Pep’s biggest mistake has been overestimating the players, particularly the defenders at his disposal. I don’t blame him for persisting with his methods, he’s had success with them before, and when they work, they are hugely effective. I fully expect him to look for a full-back or two in January, or a central defender comfortable out wide, such as Chiellini or Marquinhos.
Dan, Dublin

Peter G’s weekend thoughts
* Don’t in any way underestimate Manchester United’s win against Tottenham. They’re the first team I can recall to score early and defend successfully against Pochettino’s Spurs. Very well done indeed. Also, the advent of Mkhitaryan (thrilled he isn’t hurt badly) means United now have a top-class counterattacker, which will come in handy in the next Manchester derby.

* The games I like the most are the ones that prove me wrong. I said Watford would use three at the back; they used four. (Miguel Britos again showed he’s better in a three, though.) I said Stefano Okaka would be benched after a poor game; instead he started and was all-around fantastic. And speaking of fantastic, Hornets fans have been raving about Sebastian Prödl for weeks, and he delivered a performance of near-vanDijkian excellence and versatility. As for Everton, I think Ronald Koeman’s next move to a bigger club may be delayed a bit.

* Everton old boy David Moyes was up to his old non-tricks, playing conservatively against the bottom club in the division, and getting royally and deservingly thumped for it. In contrast, Swansea were sending full-backs bombing forward in the 90th minute while up 3-0, and very clearly enjoying themselves for once. Baseball has its Home Run Derby, the NBA has the Slam Dunk Contest; how about a Set Piece Delivery Challenge between Gylfi Sigurdsson, Kevin DeBruyne, Dmitri Payet, and Christian Eriksen?

* Forget the scoreline: Hull City actually played some football! Mike Phelan returned to three at the back, unleashed Ahmed Elmohamady and Andy Robertson on the wings, brought Tom Huddlestone back to spray his usual variety of passes, and for the first time in ages instilled what the French call “le fighting spirit.” (Google it if you don’t believe me.) I’ll leave it up to Ed to tell you how f#@@@d Palace are, but my unbiased opinion: a fair amount.

* Football Makes No Sense, Chapter Infinity: Bournemouth, having just come off an epic comeback against a title contender with a cutting-edge manager, found themselves thoroughly intimidated by the Stone Age tactics of a relegation candidate. By the time they got to grips with Burnley’s long ball bombardment, they were two goals down, and never caught up. The Clarets win again at home, and continue their shooting sorcery: at Turf Moor they’ve scored with 41% of their shots on target. How good is that? Since stats were kept, only one team has ever done better over 38 games: Manchester City 13/14, who scored 102 goals and won the title.

* For 45 minutes Southampton looked as if they’d decided not to bother with the rest of the season, but in the end were well worth their win over Middlesbrough. The super-fancy stats have had them underachieving at near record levels, expecting them to climb the table any day now. But they said the same thing in reverse about Leicester City last year. You still have to show up and play.
Peter G, Pennsylvania, USA (Riyad Mahrez, assist of the season)

And here’s Ed
* A draw was probably on balance a fair result for both Hull City and Crystal Palace. City had more of the ball, but the teams had the same number of attempts on goal (15) and shots on target (6) A point is better than nothing but that’s now eight goals conceded in two games against teams in the relegation zone.

* The Robert Snodgrass story was incredibly infuriating. I’m not sure they mentioned it on MotD, but at the time when he dived he had already been booked. However, instead of being shown a second yellow card and forcing his team to play a man light for over an hour, Snodgrass was able to put his team in front. Scott Dann did everything right and then got punished. Can’t condone his yellow card for dissent though.

His post-match comment of “I’ve not seen it” was possibly the most ridiculous thing any player has ever said after a match. How could he not have seen it when he was the player fouled? Then, he tweets a few hours later that he accepts it wasn’t a penalty. F###ing coward.

Until I heard Mike Phelan after the match I realised I’d forgotten he used to do media duties for Sir Alex Ferguson for so long.

* The trouble with diving is that the chances of getting caught are minimal compared to the rewards for getting away with it. Likewise, for all the talk of retrospective punishments, these won’t solve the problem. This is similar to the ‘on report’ system that Australian rugby league referees use – the perpetrator gets punished in the form of a suspension, but the team he offended against gets nothing.

In this case, were Snodgrass to have been punished retrospectively and, for example, given a one-game ban, he sits out against Tottenham Hotspur, in a game most people would expect City to lose. However, before then, he has cheated one of his team’s main rivals out of points. Palace will not be compensated against what happened – the FA will never dock points from City and give them to the Eagles, because that would be excessive, and would apply context to a situation that would mean it wasn’t judged impartially. Therefore, the FA get good headlines by punishing a cheat for diving, but in a way that won’t stop players taking a chance in important games.

* The worst-case scenario would have been losing 1-0 to the Snodgrass penalty. Any other means of defeat and Alan Pardew’s position would have been untenable, yet in this instance the huge injustice would have been enough for Steve Parish to be sympathetic. Even so, the lack of fortune from officiating looks to have allowed Pardew to survive another day.

As a polar opposite, Jose Mourinho had the best-case scenario for Henrikh Mkhitaryan, because he got both a goal and an excuse not to play him for the next couple of games out of the Armenian.

*Even though Palace got a point, was this really an improvement on the Swansea game? For the second and third goals, the defence and midfield were unpicked far too easily, in particular Yohan Cabaye and Joe Ledley, but they weren’t the only ones.

Cabaye looks really out of sorts. As the Rednbluearmy.co.uk blog points out, he’s either not following instructions because he isn’t able to, not following instructions because he doesn’t want to, or he is following instructions. Whatever it is, he’s a bit of a problem.

Similarly, Andros Townsend was almost completely anonymous. his isn’t the most accurate barometer but the BBC live text for City v Palace shows him mentioned once, when he was substituted. He’ll play against Manchester United because Jason Puncheon will be suspended, but being removed (at half-time, naturally) in place of Zeki Fryers, of all people, needs to be a kick up the bum for him.

* There were some positives, though. Christian Benteke now has more goals than any Eagles player had last season (8) Wilfried Zaha was also incredible – he now has three goals and six assists for the season, and has been Palace’s standout player for all of 2016.

Zaha’s goal was one of the best of the weekend, although I also really enjoyed Jeff Hendrick’s goal for Burnley. Of course, if an English player had attempted to trap a long ball like that, tee it up off his thigh and fire home, people would call him a dinosaur, but because he’s a foreign, he’s hailed as a genius.

* Stats emerging this weekend appeared to show that despite Pardew and his followers wanting to play patient, passing football, the ball is still being launched towards Benteke on a regular basis – according to Squawka he’s attempted more duels than any other Premier League player. This is weirdly reminiscent of when Michael Cox called out Owen Coyle for his “we’re playing the right way” assertions being different from reality Here’s hoping Pardew rails against ‘Squawka Football dot whatever’.
Ed Quoththeraven

Late goalscoring heroes please…
I am a proud plastic fan of Real Madrid ever since I saw that volley from Zidane as a 10-year-old. It was the first football match I ever saw and since that day Zidane shared the mantel of my only other sporting demi-god along with Tendulkar. Even though I support United (La Liga had sh*tty coverage in India and it wasn’t that easy to find illegal streams in the early 2000s), I still try to catch Madrid’s matches especially now that Zidane is the manager.

The point of the mail however was not to talk about Zidane but about Sergio Ramos who seems to be the king of last-minute goalscorers at the moment. Apart from this weekend, his 90th-minute goals in the Classico and the Champions League final stand out. He also scored in the UEFA super cup in the 90th minute to equalise. I cannot think of another player who has scored so many goals in the dying minutes, especially in such important matches.

My question is, who is your favorite player known for scoring goals in the dying minutes? The only rule is he should have scored at least two after the 89th minute.
Apoorv, MUFC (Ramos has 75 career goals, 75!)