Stottie

At Everton, there was clear pressure on him to be the main man and make things happen, like ASM under Bruce. Now he's a cog in the Howe system. This may sound bad, but is the way it should be if a manager is doing his job and not just dialing it in like Captain Steakbakes. In the Merseyside derby last year, Gordon beat his man a couple of times early doors and spent the rest of the game being fouled. Liverpool were terrified of him getting in behind. Gordon is apparently the second fastest sprinter in the league. Give him opportunities and I'm sure we'll get to see what that means.

After Botman, Gordon has our highest passing completion ratio. My impression is that Gordon is neat but kind of playing within himself and not taking risks. It's speculation, but this is what you might expect with a young player who has joined a bigger team and doesn't want to make mistakes and mess up. There's definitely more to come.

Given the manufactured controversy about our owners, a country to which the UK happily sells lots of arms, it is understandable for the club to not push the envelope on any FFP matters. There will be far more scrutiny of us than others. As for Top 4, we're doing pretty much everything but scoring. Some of this is variance but unfortunately some of it will be a lack of quality in the team that will take time to remedy. With the overhauled off-field, scouting and youth teams we now have, the rewards should come if we can be patient. I've not given up on Top 4. There is still a lot of football to be played and a lot of teams in the mix who will take points off each other. As with Leeds away last season or Fulham away this, it does feel like we need another "turning point" game to get us back on track and get some momentum going.

After the foul on Rashford for the opener last week, he dived in again this week and gave up a direct free kick in a very dangerous shooting position. That's after diving in and getting himself a straight red and ban in the previous game, the far more nervy than it should have been semi final. Bruno's a fantastic footballer we are lucky to have, our best player, but the above is not the behaviour of an elite "6". Since he's also about the only player we have exceeding his expected goals and are missing chances galore from midfield, the case for playing him at 8 just grows stronger. This is definitely something that our recruitment in the summer will have to consider.

Conceded from a deflection, were in it for most of the game, and created two or three chances that should have got us a goal. It would have been interesting had we got it back to 1-1, especially the Joelinton one. As it was, we didn't get to see if Man City did have another gear to go up into. Terrible miss by Wilson, and such a poor effort from him that does suggest something is up. Niggle, illness, mental health or something.

That's a great comment and I'll just add that the press is not just to "defend from the front". Winning the ball high created a lot of goals for us in the first half of the season. The caveat here being that most of those goals were against weaker sides, not Top 6 teams like Man City. The second goal at Spurs being the exception.

First game in weeks to not be on in the middle of the night in the Far East, so good for me!

More than anything, I think we need the ball to hit someone's arse and go in. A match like that Southampton league one where we got four (five?) off the same number of chances. Sunday was disappointing, but Man U are good. For context, in both legs, Barcelona had 1.2 xG vs. Man U, the same as us on Sunday. No-one is calling for Barcelona to reinvent their attacking play. In Isak and Gordon, we (finally) have quality attacking players who can come in. The most concerning of our recent games was Bournemouth, but it's been like that every time we play them under Howe. Maybe its a voodoo/them finding an extra 10% for Eddie thing. Time to refocus, stick Isak in for Wilson, and go again. Our first team is great but the squad is threadbare, so shocks like the Bruno red card end up having much bigger repercussions.

We can't press as hard with Maxi in and Willock out.

I think he picked the right team for the occasion yesterday, but various setbacks and dips in form meant it wasn't to be. We needed more things to go right for us to beat Man U on their current form. Going forward, it's looking like he'll have to play Isak over Wilson, who's struggling. Gordon wasn't available for this game, but with Miggy's dip in form, the case for integrating him sooner rather than gradually has also become stronger. I wouldn't change anything defensively just yet.

Disappointing. We needed our big players to step up, Wilson, Trippier and Bruno, and they didn't. Wilson was invisible, Trippier's delivery was very poor, and Bruno gave away a silly one for their opener with Trippier right next to him. A bit vexing that we couldn't put in a decent corner, with the height advantage we have. I thought Man U looked beatable today, but we made it easy for them. Their first looked borderline offside, but whatever. They'd have found a way to score before we did.

A bit soft, and nice camerawork to have that angle available. Arsenal get away with it otherwise, not least because of how unconvincing Ward is.

"FTM" on the Mackems flag. We're living rent free in their heads man.

We're joint top in goals from outside the box, but yeah, not so many recently. We're also top in hitting the woodwork. Third top in "big chances missed". All three are on the Premier League website According to understat, we're massively underperforming xG for attempts inside the six yard box. Seven goals from nearly fourteen xG. This will mostly be from set pieces.

Ich nichten lichten!

Man U should have played 50 minutes with 10 men yesterday, which goes a way to mitigating our advantage here. The match was 1-0 when it happened, so it may have cost them points too.

Just on the Liverpool game, but his best chance and the ball in for the Isak swivel shot came with ASM on the right.

Here's a table from the post WC restart, ranked by expected points based on expected goals (chances created and allowed). The obvious takeaway from it is that we are still making lots of chances. A team that creates chances cannot be massively "leggy". The usual short-term fix for poor finishing is to buy far more expensive players. However, the other team that is vastly underperforming xG in the same chart is Chelsea, who've just bought loads of far more expensive players and have a squad so good that Raheem Sterling gets forgotten. Since we've not underperformed xG by such a large margin all season, there is no fundamental lack of quality in our players and this is simple variance (i.e., form that's likely to improve). xG is based on a calculated average player, not the most clinical finisher in the league. In more immediate matters, our expected (not actual) points from the last eight or so games is actually better than Spurs and Liverpool. If we play better than them, we should finish above them and for top 4 that's all that matters.

Its a pity he didn't score, not because it would have majorly affected the result, but because we could have seen the paragon of virtue and fair play that is Liverpool Football Club not time waste or do any kind of sportsmanship in closing out the game with a precarious one-goal lead. As it was we merely got to see Fabinho, who committed the worst unpunished tackle of the season but didn't get a ban.

Six points ahead of Liverpool and in a final next week. I'll take that! Still the league's best defence by absolutely miles. The positivity out of the way, we made some basic errors today and got punished for them big time. Gaping holes in our defence. The Pope one was a carbon copy of the Salah goal against Man City earlier in the season. BIg hoof to Salah is their Plan B and we should have been better prepared for it. From the way that felt, maybe one of yous has done a Faustian pact with the devil and we'll lift the cup next week in reward for sacking this one off. If looked like voodoo or at least old NUFC was at work for it to fall apart so spectacularly.

Liverpool were shit scared of Gordon last season. Fouled him four times. He has to get a run out.

Ha ha, 10 men and two down but still in this. Just on the January window, but you could argue that's FFP working exactly as intended. They want the established teams to stay established. Its a de facto Super League.

Just on the "helped relegate Burnley", but the move also helped Weghorst end up at Man U. I hope that does not hurt us next week. That transfer story may have more to come.

Book Saka for the first one and he's off there.

Ten more draws and we'll be level on points and probably ahead on GD. We have a game in hand too! In other optimistic news, we can lose 9-0 today and still have the joint best defence in league.