Ed Vinegar

Is Arsenal's set piece magic as simple as taking absolutely forever over each corner in the hope the opposition loses concentration? Or is that just my ADHD showing.

I thought this! The foul was in the D and they were just allowed to line it up from the most advantageous position they could find. It's stuff like this that makes you think refs could be bent!

This ref has got his fucking blinkers on like. Isak wrenched down running thru? Nae bother. World's most comical slow motion dive? Freekick and a yellow. Incidentally it's quite funny reading the reactions in here while everyone's watching a source that's delayed slightly differently.

Reflecting on it again, I think we were just reacting to the game state in the way we played and doing it with discipline. While we weren't totally dominant in the second half, I was pretty relaxed while watching. They had a couple of chances but we looked pretty comfortable absorbing what they had to offer without expending too much energy. Some really assured performances last night. Hall looks incredibly good, Tonali was maybe a step behind his Villa performance but still excellent. Isak always looks to me like he could step it up 2 or 3 more levels if he needed to, he just generally doesn't have to. A mate of mine who is a Hearts fan but follows Man U as a second team said that we "didn't even show them the respect of turning up and giving 100% effort" and that sums it up well for me. We did what we needed to - killed the game in 30 minutes and trucked along steadily to the end. Get in!

We could catch anyone ahead of us except Liverpool. What a tasty way to end the year. I think we were actually quite comfortable in the second half, I just have toon induced PTSD and can't handle us being ahead. It's actually pretty jarring, just a routine 0-2 at Old Trafford. Doesn't feel right. But we're proper good at the moment.

I'm hoping our gameplan was to try and coast to HT... Let's hope we give them another hellish 20 mins start of the second half

If Tonali scored that it would have been one of our best ever goals.

My nephew is a Man U fan and my BIL has taught him to be a proper gloating twat about them, so I hope we win otherwise I'm going to be on the end of numerous wind up attempts off a ten year old. I don't think form matters here. If we turn up properly we'll win, but it's highly bottleable imo. Isak tap in 0-1.

He did that a couple of times with Hall, looks like they have a good understanding developing. Shame that goal was disallowed as the pass was filthy.

Tonali played brilliantly. There were a couple of moments where he looked a level or two above everyone else. A bit towards the end where he held possession in our third, spinning and bumping two Villa players away from him before releasing a simple pass just looked so effortless. Similar to when Bruno started playing for us and I couldn't believe he was a Newcastle player.

Spotted this too, some great combative ball winning in the midfield. Looks mighty!

Tonali and Hall have linked up a few times down the left, led to some good chances including that disallowed goal. Promising stuff.

Absolute bullshit yellow for big Joe. Clear simulation from Rogers too.

It's a weird one - looks bad but I'm sure I've seen loads similar unpunished.

3 points between 3rd and 11th just now. Does that make it a low or high quality league, I can never tell.

Beaut! Big Joe caught that one sweet!

Yeah we're playing how they want us to. Ref not helping but we're shooting ourselves in the foot too.

Clear yellow, second cynical foul from him.

Don't think we're having a disaster here. But need to tighten up the final touches at either end. Willock offering a bit of hope.

What a shite goal to concede. They barely had to move to score. FFS.

Thought Gordon presented himself well on the TNT sports coverage, he's very likeable. Still thinking we could have won that if we'd just had a bit of extra quality in a few positions. Great performance though and shown ourselves we can play, so hopefully we'll kick on

Good point. Games like this your see the difference really top class players make though

I'm not sure if this is wildly unfair, and I can't remember the exact games, but there were a couple of Sylvain Marveaux performances that left me raging. So lightweight and scared looking. Very tempting also to suggest everyone who played in the aggregate 11-1 defeats to Man Utd in 2007/08. Had the misfortune of watching at least one of them in a pub and we were fucking hopeless to a man. Team from the 1-5: Newcastle: Given (Harper 46), Beye, Taylor, Faye, N'Zogbia, Milner (Geremi 84), Butt, Barton (Carroll 61), Duff, Smith, Owen. Subs Not Used: Cacapa, Ameobi.

You're right, but does Howe think it's outside the realms of possibility he'd achieve less than GS? Surely he'd have to think he's a better manager. He doesn't strike me as the sort of person to go into a challenge thinking he'll fail. If he'd screwed up at Newcastle it would have been the end of his career arguably, so I reckon he's comfortable taking a risk. Robson is the last England manager to get a top role after leaving the FA. I reckon Howe is more likely to be basing things on his own perception of his abilities than precedent. Anyway it's all speculation until he's gets an offer, I just don't think he's nailed on to turn it down if he gets asked

Difficult this. It's a job he's said he wants and there might not be a better time for him if he does get offered it. I think there's a chance of him leaving. 20%? I mean, what if he has another 8th place finish next season? The England role would be filled and his star would have dropped. I can see why he would take it if offered. I believe that he loves this club and wants to win things here, but I also think he's clever and pragmatic. For the record I'd hate for him to leave.