EPL Season 2016/7

[NeverFeltBetter]

From what I had seen of Leicester, they were certainly heading directly into the bottom 3 before his departure, CPL knock-out or no. Ultimately, the decision will only be vindicated if Leicester stay up: they are in a better position to do that in the two games since Ranieri was sacked.

It isn't like the Foxes would definitely just bounce back up. Sometimes you're Newcastle, and sometimes you're Blackpool.

[bennocelt]

From what I had seen of Leicester, they were certainly heading directly into the bottom 3 before his departure, CPL knock-out or no. Ultimately, the decision will only be vindicated if Leicester stay up: they are in a better position to do that in the two games since Ranieri was sacked.

It isn't like the Foxes would definitely just bounce back up. Sometimes you're Newcastle, and sometimes you're Blackpool.

Last won the championship in 1927 and never, yeah just like those clubs! It wont be vindicated if they stay up, that just shows the players were culpable and refused to play for their manager. It will be vindicated if they get back into europe or better next season, which i doubt it.

and remember Nigel Pearson had them in the bottom 4 and no better.........not like he was some kind of coaching genius.............rubbish at Derby with a bloody good squad at hand

[sadloserkid]

The myth that this was Pearson's team and that he basically did 80% of the work to win the title actually pains me (looking at you Pat Dolan)!

[OwlsFan]

Well he was hardly going to tell the truth.

No, but he could have said, "I don't want to comment on that" rather than telling bare faced lies.

[OwlsFan]

Who would have followed all that with a relegation. Because as I detailed above, soon as he got his tinkering hands and a bit of time on the title winning set up he inherited, he promptly delivered a nosediving tailspin through needless at best and egotistical at worst changes.

Did LCFC owe Ranieri a relegation ? Yes or no answer please. Because that is what was coming.

I don't think you can say for definite they were going to be relegated. He was sacked right after a spirited team European performance away to a very good Seville side. They were playing an out of form Liverpool and a relegation haunted Hull CIty. I wouldn't have been surprised if they had got results out of those game under Ranieri. And to answer your question, yes they did owe him a relegation and a chance (quarter of season) to get them back. So if Martin Russell wins the Premier Division this season with Limerick and next season gets them through to the league stage of the Europa League but Limerick stand one place off the relegation spots, you'd be calling for him to be sacked ?

[NeverFeltBetter]

You can't say for definite that they would have been relegated, but what you can say is that their league form over the last two games is a significant improvement, and that the chances of them being relegated have decreased.

I'd ditch Russell in that scenario if I'm being honest (but then again, I'd have been happy for him to be let go over the winter). If they can get into the Europa League group stages, they can be in the top six too.

[TheOneWhoKnocks]

Michael O'Neill tempted by Leicester job.

http://www.the42.ie/michael-oneill-t...74145-Mar2017/

[CraftyToePoke]

I don't think you can say for definite they were going to be relegated. He was sacked right after a spirited team European performance away to a very good Seville side. They were playing an out of form Liverpool and a relegation haunted Hull CIty. I wouldn't have been surprised if they had got results out of those game under Ranieri. And to answer your question, yes they did owe him a relegation and a chance (quarter of season) to get them back. So if Martin Russell wins the Premier Division this season with Limerick and next season gets them through to the league stage of the Europa League but Limerick stand one place off the relegation spots, you'd be calling for him to be sacked ?

I don't agree that they would have gotten those results anyway, not at all. They had been getting steadily worse for months, the first half performance Vs Sevilla was a disjointed mess, they were lucky they weren't dead and buried such was the ease at which their opponents created chances. The strikers closed down while the midfield dropped off, etc, it was a shambles. That comes from how your manager sets you up, nowhere else, you either press or drop, but you don't split. That buck stops with the managers tactics or clarity of instruction.

Musa started while Gray was benched, did you see Musa in that game giving the Sevilla winger time for a nice cup of tea before he picked out his cross after having casually lost the ball earlier. Anyone with half an eye on this side would tell you Gray had to start, but no.

The Limerick comparison, I will reluctantly address but it has no relevance as each situation differs. In a way it demonstrates you haven't taken on board at all the reasons CR was sacked by even making the comparison. I would support MR in that circumstance because he has previous in overcoming setbacks and getting things right again at the club, including overcoming a relegation (which I supported him through as there were other factors in play) CR did not have this. CR blew sky high the best circumstances that club will ever find itself in, bit of a difference there. And if you believe he would have mended it and it would have been all happiness again after relegation, well, I want whatever you are smoking. The division below is a graveyard and Leicester know that as well as anyone & how important it is to not end up there.

[OwlsFan]

A record-breaking 74,434 fans attended the Checkatrade Trophy final. This is a competition for the third level of English football. I wonder would you get a crowd like that anyplace else in the world for a third level game. Watched some of the game and it was entertaining stuff, especially after Oxford pulled one back. English football is not all about the EPL although sometimes you'd think otherwise from media coverage.

[CraftyToePoke]

Leicester 5 & 0 since the shedding of Claudio and move into the top half tonight, they are 8 points off West Brom in eighth spot with a game in hand on them & a game against them also, which if they were to manage it would see them best of the rest below Everton , Man U, Man C, Spurs, Liverpool, Chelsea & Arsenal, would be some laugh if they recovered to that extent.

[DeLorean]

And win the Champions League as a little bonus.

[TheOneWhoKnocks]

A record-breaking 74,434 fans attended the Checkatrade Trophy final. This is a competition for the third level of English football. I wonder would you get a crowd like that anyplace else in the world for a third level game. Watched some of the game and it was entertaining stuff, especially after Oxford pulled one back. English football is not all about the EPL although sometimes you'd think otherwise from media coverage.

That the official attendance or the real attendance?

It never gets tiring seeing an official attendance of 30,000 for a 35,000 seater stadium when half the stadium is empty.

[NeverFeltBetter]

After watching Man Utd roll over a dire Sunderland team, I went back to one of their better fansites for the first time in a while, Roker Report, and was struck by the below. I've gotten so used to seeing Sunderland survive in the last 10 games of a season that I didn't realise how bad things have gotten there.

http://rokerreport.sbnation.com/2017...low-supporters

[OwlsFan]

After watching Man Utd roll over a dire Sunderland team, I went back to one of their better fansites for the first time in a while, Roker Report, and was struck by the below. I've gotten so used to seeing Sunderland survive in the last 10 games of a season that I didn't realise how bad things have gotten there.

http://rokerreport.sbnation.com/2017...low-supporters

I just couldn't be bothered watching that game. Every year there were joyous scenes as Sunderland avoided yet another relegation but for what? Another year of seeing their side struggling in just about every game and paying Premier League prices at the gates for the privilege. Just don't see the fun in that. At least with Wednesday's 17 years out of the EPL there have been more relegations, more promotions and a bigger fish in a smaller pool and generally something happening every season at different ends of different leagues.

Despite the hype by Martin Tyler ("that's why the Premier League is so brilliant" - pass the sick bucket), I enjoyed watching Everton and Leicester and Everton playing a few kids who came through the ranks. This was Shakespeare's first major test (the CL last 16 game aside) and they were found wanting, albeit with a weakened side (Sunderland, Stoke, West Ham, Hull and at the time out of form Liverpool being the previous games). Both sides attacked and found each other's defence wanting.

I also watched Aberdeen and Rangers, with the Dons playing Rooney, Hayes and Anthony O'Connor. Hayes was like the curate's egg, while Rooney was always a danger if he got any sort of service. Apart from one major faux pax which gave away a goal, I was impressed with O'Connor but he was subbed after his mistake. Aberdeen dominated the second half only to be punished by who else, other than Kenny Miller.

[NeverFeltBetter]

Joey Barton was handed an 18 month ban for gambling offences today. He has a long response here, says the ban as stands basically retires him: http://www.joeybarton.com/betting-statement/

I'd say the game is rife with this kind of thing, at all levels.

[OwlsFan]

Sunderland relegated with £100 million debts from the richest league in the world. Wait for it: the Championship play off match will be described (mostly by Sky) as the most lucrative game in the world. Trouble is you have to spend a fortune to try and stay in the league and if you don't stay....well ask Coventry, Blackpool, Wednesday, Leeds and many many others but I suppose these clubs went down before the parachute payments. Got to bounce back within 2 seasons, otherwise it's a big struggle.

[DannyInvincible]

I thought this piece by Ken Early was very good: https://www.irishtimes.com/sport/soc...days-1.3074829

It debunks the naive/spurious mantra of "sport and politics don't mix" and exposes the hypocrisy of avid EPL supporters who simultaneously espouse anti-immigrant views.

Some of the critics of the Corbyn banner [at a recent Liverpool game] argued that politics and football should not mix, but those critics are failing to grasp that the Premier League promotes a certain set of political values simply by its existence and example. From its inception, when the richest clubs decided to break the link with the rest of the football pyramid so that they could take a greater share of the forthcoming boom in TV money for themselves, the Premier League has embodied the values of neoliberalism. It has become Britain’s most successful cultural export, and probably its most globalised industry. Owned by foreign capital, dominated by talented foreign coaches and players, and compliant with up-to-date standards of political correctness, it stands for internationalisation, deregulation, conspicuous consumption, and free trade.

...

Whether the Corbynistas at Anfield or the Tories who seem to be in the majority elsewhere, it seems that the great majority these days would have some reason to hate the model of the Premier League – a Murdoch-sponsored greed-fest where immigrants have already taken two-thirds of the jobs. Perhaps the league can take comfort in the fact that people seem to be rather good at disconnecting their thinking about football from their thinking about politics. No other set of immigrants is as warmly received in England as talented football players. There are millions of football fans who cheer every week for foreign footballers, then vote for whichever party promises the harshest measures against immigration.

[DeLorean]

Yeah, I enjoyed it too. I think Early is better at writing about the politics of football rather than football itself.

[DannyInvincible]

Just watching the Manchester City-Leicester game on Sky Sports - which City have led 2-1 for the entire second half - and there have been empty seats all over the Etihad throughout the game with an absolutely awful atmosphere to boot. Do Manchester City fans feel so entitled and jaded by their club's vast riches and comparatively modest successes in modern times that the club can't even sell out an end-of-season game against the current EPL champions where securing Champions League qualification is still on the line?

The Sky Sports commentator attempted to put the serious lack of atmosphere in the stadium down to "possible nerves"... Of course, it's in Sky's interests to pretend that the real issue here isn't that the heart and soul of the club, or the league generally even, is long lost, because a soulless "product" is a much harder sell. There's never any atmosphere in the Etihad anyway. It's well-known. Manchester City are the epitome of modern football's totally soulless club. I get that sense every single time I watch them play.

Embarrassing, but also sad in a way.

[NeverFeltBetter]

And their neighbors will generally sell-out every EPL game (or come close to it). I guess it might be a legacy thing in a way? Not that the typical atmosphere at Old Trafford is anything to get excited about either.