Premier League 2025/26

Arteta appears to have taken them up a blind alley. His pound shop Mourinho act isn’t really doing what vintage Mourinho Chelsea did, which was pound everyone else and reliably get at least a draw against direct rivals away, win at home. Instead they have dropped those big game points, and playing for a corner is no substitute for the sheer brutality of the pressure the best Mourinho teams built attacking lesser sides. They are one genuinely bad result against a midtable side from crisis.

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We didn’t though, we weren’t great for about 30 minutes but they did the total sum of fuck all in that 30 mins.

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After the loss to us they needed to beat Man City and the City defence does look shaky however City did create a couple of chances. It certainly showed the ability to exploit what is deemed as impregnable by some.

Our victory over them was at most what was required, it’s the same with them and Man City. Newcastle really is key, we went and won there if they don’t and we get 3pts it will start to build pressure which as we saw last season starts to spiral.

As Barney Ronay says we will likely start to gel more fluidly we aren’t even out of 3rd gear, the first 60 against Madrid demonstrated what we are capable of and if we start to play like that then we should start to see more comprehensive results. We are a work in progress.

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Definitely - I just hope that Wirtz and Isak will filter out the pressure that will inevitably come from outside because people like to see big transfers fail, especially if they are rival fans. They will need time to get with the rest of the side and I feel the two of them fit and firing is what this side needs to hit the fourth and fifth gear.

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And hopefully, just hopefully. Some of their fans who were vociferously Wenger out towards the end of that man’s tenure start putting more respect to the guy and realise how toxic their treatment of him was.

Arsenal would have gotten atleast 2 more leagues if Arsene had half the backing that arteta recieved (in 6 years) over the entire length of his career.

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I see there are lots of Evertonians still complaining that there wasn’t enough added time on Saturday’s match. I checked up the recommendations for this season and there are a few thing that are slightly different to what I thought:

Effective playing time

Allowance is made by the referee in each half for all playing time lost in that half through:

  • Substitutions
  • Assessment and/or removal of injured players
  • Wasting time
  • Disciplinary sanctions
  • Medical stoppages permitted by competition rules, e.g. ‘drinks’ breaks (which should not exceed one minute) and ‘cooling’ breaks (ninety seconds to three minutes)
  • Delays relating to VAR ‘checks’ and ‘reviews’
  • Goal celebrations
  • Any other cause, including any significant delay to a restart (e.g. due to interference by an outside agent

Calculation of additional time
More accurate calculation of additional time in line with IFAB guidance to enhance effective playing time.

Calculation of additional time

  • Goal: Added time clock to start after 30 secs
  • Substitution: Exact time (play stopped to restart)
  • Injury: Exact time (play stopped to restart)
  • Penalty kick: Exact time (award to restart)
  • Delaying restart/time wasting (e.g. ‘ceremonial’ free kicks, goal kicks): Referee to make allowance based on match events
  • Red card: Exact time (red card shown to restart)
  • VAR check/review: delays restart Exact time

The one I didn’t realise is that the clock for a goal starts after 30 seconds of it being scored (and before the restart of play) rather than it being a straight 30 seconds regardless. I’m not sure how fast the restart was on Saturday but I remember it being quite fast. There were three substitute breaks. No injuries, penalties, red cards or VAR delays. That just leaves the ceremonial free kicks at the ref’s discretion.

The regulations are on page 64 here, if anyone is interested:

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Just one more minute would have been more than fine, then we could have finished that break and beat them 3-1.

Everton are a half decent side for where they’ve been in recent years. They need a striker, but they will finish comfortably mid table. They gave it a good go in the derby to try to come back. We could have concentrated a bit better, but essentially we had the thing won early on, and after playing a tough game on Wednesday night against Atletico, it looked a bit like we were managing resources and not going at it the whole game.

Which is lucky for Everton.

Winners win and losers whine. They are barking up the wrong tree on the time thing, as there is a good-sized gap between the level of the sides.

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When we are watching a match together, we have a game to guess the added time. I’m usually pretty good at it: +/- 1 minute. I called it right on Saturday as well. If there is more added time than I expected, it is usually because I forgot one long injury or VAR break.

Interestingly, in European games it is not unusual to see no added time at all at the end of the first half.

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Someone in PGMOL used ChatGPT to generate this nonsense.

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I noticed that too, that there seems to be a bit more time added in the Prem.

It gives Everton a new ending for ifitadnerbinfer…thetime :joy:

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How good is it to be us?

I’m legitimately sad right now I have to wait so long for our next outing.

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Donnarumma coming in for them does make them look better defensively, definitely an upgrade compared to ederson/trafford

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Yet he was pretty poor on the equalizer. It creates an interesting tension for them because if you bring in a goalie like him who doesn’t allow you to play out of the back in the same way every time he concedes one it’s going to start questions being asked about whether the trade off was worth it.

I think city are interesting right now because its difficult to know what to make of them. I think people, myself included, have judged them too harshly at times over the last 12 months treating their relatively lack of City like control on a game as a mark of them being off form when it’s seemingly just what they have evolved into. I’m no longer sure what a good city performance looks like

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Yup that’s fine still won’t make the defenders defend better. They just don’t seem aligned which is something you feel is with us and even say Arsenal though I don’t rate Raya.

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Sam Allardyce the revolutionary… who fucking knew :roll_eyes:

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I’ve definitely noticed the long throws. It reminiscent of our FA Cup match against Tranmere in the early 2000s. They had a centre back called Dave Challinor, who held the world distance record for throw-ins at the time.

It did cause us problems, but you had to balance that with the fact that he was a clumsy useless footballer even by the standards of Tranmere in decline.

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I’ve always said he’s a visionary.
Especially after a few of pints of wine.

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Wasn’t Pulis the one who led with throw ins

Long throws have been a staple of british football since I was a kid. “Can you launch a throw?” was one of the most important skills for a FB even back in the 70s. It’s interesting but not surprising that its come back into vogue after a decade of everyone trying to Barcalona, but the Charlie Hughes/Graham Taylor style punt the kickoff into touch deep into the opposition half kick off makes my skin crawl.

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