Stottie

After seeing the highlights, I'm pleased I listened to their commentary, not our muppets. Another blank and another defeat, confirming the systematic problems we have. fwiw, the Watford commentary said our strikers had poor movement and weren't getting in the box. We have poor movement and poor service feeding back on each other.

There is legal online radio at their end on BBC Three Counties Radio.

As for Mitrovic, he gets into good situations and shows promise. He's raw though, and it's a big ask for him to mature quickly in a harder league.

Good post and the bold bit is an interesting point. It's only six years since we played in the Championship, but I thought there was a huge gulf at that time between the strikers in both leagues. Mistakes that would have cost goals in the Premiership didn't end up hurting us. Even Shola looked pretty good and scored goals. The mental one for me is that both Ba and Remy were proven in the Premiership when we got them. Of course, their situations meant they were available on the cheap, as we like them, but they had both shown enough in half a season to confirm their ability. So Austin comes along, is even more Premiership proven, and is holding all the cards in his contract situation vs. QPR. He is the real deal going cheap. So what do we do? Spend the pretty much the same money on a punt on a kid from a lesser league. Not only do we not learn from our failures, we do not learn from our successes.

Yeah, I think it's wrong to take the total shots number or shot on target number as indicative of us being outplayed the whole game. 9 of Everton's attempts were from outside the box. Inside the box, it was 11 attempts to them, 7 to us. Mitro's and Gini's probably the biggest chances. Mitro did well to pull off so he could attack it, but the header itself was awful. His headed effort in the first half was also a better chance than Waddle and whoever made out in the commentary. As ever, we're crying out for a CM. Like De Jong last week, our forwards are also not good enough when we do manage a clear opening.

3-0!

Man U managed only 11 attempts in a game where they were behind for 70 minutes. They used to manage that in the last five minutes and Fergie time.

Well said that man! :lol: Merry Christmas everyone!

Dunno if it was Hutton bad or tired or Thauvin good, but he beat him several times to the outside and swung in good crosses. On another day, Mitrovic will reach them.

SDJ has to hit the target from there. What a terrible header. I think a goal there would have killed the game. As for the other two, Gini should have had a shout from Thauvin and Ayoze's was behind him and he took it early like he does. They were both only half as good as the SDJ chance. That one Mitro missed into his feet just after coming on was also a decent chance. On the whole, we didn't create enough, given how poor they were/are. A point is all we deserved.

Sacking him is the obvious move given how they've been playing and the woeful points total, but it's still a bit of shock given his standing and long-term track record. Some pundit is probably going to try and reduce this to one or two little factors to make a nice, easy to understand story, but he's been effing up on multiple fronts. You can't just call Hazard's non-performances the canary in the coal mine, because half the team isn't performing. Oscar, Fabregas, Costa, even bloody Matic. The off-the-pitch stuff with the doctor etc. would be dismissed if the team were winning, but they aren't and you end up with the suspicion that he has indeed completely lost the plot. Without Willian's freekicks, they've hardly scored any goals this season. We would have beaten them but that Ramirez wondergoal. If whoever comes in gets them playing, they've got a title winning team, albeit too far behind to do anything this year. Their ageing defence looks like the biggest problem. Man City and the fee for David Luiz even show that you can buy big and still not get the finished article. Maybe a bit striker-lite, but I suppose Hazard or even Fabregas could still do a pretty good job with the right set-up.

If Leicester's rivals for top four are Liverpool and Tottenham, they rely heavily on Coutinho and Kane and are 11 and 9 points behind Leicester, respectively. Sturridge isn't a factor anymore. Chelsea have the players but they are too far behind and in turmoil. Leicester were lucky against Chelsea but it still looks like they've tightened up defensively compared to earlier in the season. It's unlikely they will continue with what is title winning form, but they're not far off the point where Europa league form and their headstart should still leave them ahead of Liverpool and Tottenham. Leicester would be wise to buy to consolidate their position, but it's hard to see Liverpool and Tottenham making a strong challenge without making big buys.

It sounds like they're giving Mignolet a new contract. I don't think he's a top four keeper. I was digging through some stats Mr. Logic style to see if its worth betting on Leicester or if they're just being flukey and apparently 42% of shots on target against Liverpool go in. Worst is Bournemouth at 45%, including that Ayoze toe poke that looked stoppable. Stoke are best at only 17%, followed by Cech and De Gea. It's 34% for us. Liverpool actually lead the league in fewest shots on target allowed, so the others must be doing their jobs. http://www.footstats.co.uk/index.cfm?task=league_shots_perc

PL history? It would be one of the most amazing things in sporting history. Leicester have basically the top 6 away in the remaining fixtures, the middle at home and the bottom clubs a mix of home and away. If the middle clubs are seen as the tricky games that are hard to consistently win, they're maybe the best ones to have at home. Its actually a myth that you have to beat the top four to win the league or get CL. Man U lost to Benitez' Liverpool home and away in the season Torres was on fire and still beat them to the title. Their record against the top four that year was something like played six for four points. Leicester finished last season with seven wins and a draw from their last nine, which means 57 points from their last 25 games. It looks like as low as 77 will win the league this year, and 68 will get top four. With a nine point lead on Spurs and 11 on Liverpool, top four is looking a good possibility for them. Maybe as high as fifty-fifty. Any prediction you see giving Leicester Europa league on 60 points is assuming only 25 points from their last 22 games. They should get them in their sleep. It looks like you can still get close to 3-1 on Leicester Top 4, which looks well tasty to me.

Sounds right to me. They've only got six goals from open play in sixteen games. Don't feed them set pieces and we should do okay. They pinged in a lot of shots from out of the box against Arsenal yesterday, but it was woeful stuff. Arsenal's second was also a strong candidate for the worst defended counterattack of the season, so if we get one and remain up for it, there should be more. Like against Liverpool and Spurs, we seem to do much better when the game opens up. Sissoko is not a factor when the play is crowded and static.

Mitro was playing like a fanny before he was dropped. Play acting and appealing for everything instead of using his strength. Credit to McClaren the way its worked out.

Mad game, but a deserved win if you ask me. We created the best chances. Spurs lack proper width and a final ball in general. In the first half, they won it back regularly high up the pitch and did bugger all every time. If we could only apply ourselves that much every week.

Thought we were doing okay in not giving them clear openings but they got a corner and Colo decided to play statues again. They're first to every second ball, but they've not done very much to hurt us. Our pass completion 61%. Lowest in the league for four years. Hoof! Hoof!

Just some numbers from Who Scored for anyone interested. Tottenham have scored 8 from set pieces, lead leading. They also lead the league in yellows, but have no reds. They have the third lowest crosses per game number. Only Stoke and the mackems lower, both teams created relatively few chances against us. Liverpool struggled to do much with their little width last time. Conversely, high cross number teams like City, Palace, Norwich, Southampton all cut through us very easily. Spurs also appear stronger down their left than right. Fifth highest in average possession. Liverpool are sixth but I think Coutinho and Can were big misses there. Aside from the numbers, Kane vs. our CBs. Last week was blip-esque, so back down to earth this week. Maybe 2-0 to them, one from a set piece.

England loses an almost four point gap once 11/12 is replaced with 15/16. The current gap is three points, with the points for 15/16 level at the moment. Another two point gap goes next year when 12/13 stops being counted, and then again the season after. http://www.uefa.com/memberassociations/uefarankings/country/ I don't watch much European football, but you'd expect Roma to go through and probably Arsenal to go out tonight. Juve could also go further than City and Chelsea, based on experience alone.

It would be great if Leicester qualify, don't get very far (well, they won't be seeded and will probably get a tough draw), and it works out as the final nail in the coefficient coffin sending England below Italy and down to three places. One reason England's coefficient has been falling is that English teams don't take the Europa League seriously, so it will be just desserts.

That advert with the dog really winds me up.

Wigan with their 3-4-3 beat everyone, and I seem to remember Pulis getting some big scalps at Palace. Leicester last season had the best turnaround of anyone, getting seven wins and a draw from nine games, though it was practically all favourable fixtures. They went from bottom and five points off safety to walking-the-league form.

To get 37 points (which doesn't guarantee safety), Villa now need to rack up points at the same rate as a team that gets 53 points over a season and typically finishes 8th or 9th. They need a miracle.

I was fearing the worst, then I saw Coutinho was out and they were playing both Lucas and the Welsh Xavi. A nothing midfield to rival our own. I was tempted to post on here that we might do all right but didn't want to jinx it. Poor, scrappy game on the whole, but we competed much better and got some luck. Shocking miss by Benteke first half, our deflected goal, and their disallowed one. Liverpool hardly worked Eliot all game though, so I doubt neutrals would have much sympathy. I haven't see the stats but was it two goals from one shot on target? There is still plenty of work to do.