Moneyball won't win the Premiership 2012-13

Gervinho wasted Arsenal's best chance when he made a complete mess of a free header straight in front of goal

unnecessary detail from the BBC here

GAME ON

DAT HEELFLICK BY EVRA

no not evra. but DAT HEELFLICK

rafa out

Aw poor Rafael's going to cry ;_;

DAT HEELFLICK BY EVRA

― Le Bateau Ivre, Saturday, December 1, 2012 6:00 PM (2 minutes ago)

this sounds like dutch

Not really sure why Ferguson persists in picking the reserve keeper when he's clearly worse than De Gea.

Another legendary comeback!

lol @ Wellbeck tucking Rafael in

DAT HEELFLICK BY EVRA

― Le Bateau Ivre, Saturday, December 1, 2012 6:00 PM (2 minutes ago)

this sounds like dutch

― Phenomenology of Spirit Animal (Nilmar Honorato da Silva), zaterdag 1 december 2012 19:03 (32 seconds ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

It might be, half. I meant: Decent flick with ye olde heel, feller!

Another legendary comeback!

― all the people on the right, boogaloo (Nasty, Brutish & Short), zaterdag 1 december 2012 19:04 (1 minute ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

:-D

that free kick didn't go in, wtf

Lindegaard just saved a shot. Defending's corpse twitched slightly.

Over the line, surely?

WAHT

By miles, Nasty

Gah, that ball was more in than Lamps against Germany. THANKS SEPP BLATTER

conspiracy

EVERYTHING is ALWAYS AGAINST ManU

Anderson broken again.

Well, that first half was completely mental

lol swansea had 56% possession away at arsenal today

I hope Anderson's not properly crocked or our joke of a midfield will get destroyed by City next weekend. The nightmare scenario is Scholes and Giggs in the middle.

The second half is under way. Robin van Persie has just said to ref Mark Halsey that he should have had another goal - he even made a 'glasses' sign with his hands.

O-O

it wasn't over by miles, and it happened at speed.

call it evens for rvp getting played onside where the linesman calls every other striker in the league off there (haven't seen a spurs player get 'benefit of the doubt' when level all season, for instance)

call it not-quite-level for darren fletcher not having been sent off for two obvious bookable offence three minutes apart- no card as yet, lol refs

Fucking donkey

it wasn't over by miles, and it happened at speed.

Have you see the replay? Because I get the strong impression you haven't. It was way, way over the line.

saw it in real time, and all the replays. it was certainly over the line. that is all.

If - if - it was over, it was a ball-width over, not a yard-and-a-half like the commentators said

Ech, I was looking forward to slotting in two points behind Arsenal, I could've lived with that.

― Ismael Klata, Sunday, November 25, 2012 3:25 PM (6 days ago)

Hm, we've lost since I wrote that and now here we are two points and one place behind, and still in the bottom half. I should probably reassess who I want in our sights.

Look on the bright side: just three points behind Allardyce's West Ham now and effectively a point and a half ahead of Norwich when you take into account how bad their goal difference is.

― all the people on the right, boogaloo (Nasty, Brutish & Short), Sunday, 25 November 2012 15:41 (6 days ago)

Still keeping West Ham in your sights, but Norwich could close the gap tomorrow - maybe keep an eye on them for now

Big bully. The real answer is probably not to have sights until about February - I genuinely am surprised to see West Ham only three ahead, and frankly staggered to see us ahead of Fulham. City and Utd are probably uncatchable, but I reckon third is still on.

phil neville giving wayne rooney props as a right back here. hm.

bubble machine motm imo

http://i.minus.com/iol70KAs0Y6Ds.gif

haaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

Best weekend since the one of the Arsenal-Newcastle 4-4 I reckon.

Also when Arsenal lose to teams like Stoke they can kid themselves that they lost because their opponents weren't prepared to play the right way or let them play their natural game or whatever. But there's a particular kind of joy in seeing them comfortably beaten by a team playing open, fluent, passing attacking football who were in the Championship two years ago.

Yes - just going by the highlights, it looks like Swansea absolutely murdered them.

by and large arsenal havent been the signature super passing dudes for at least a couple of years now, it's kinda just atrophied to "sorta technical idk"

^^^

fuck it gonna have me a rant about the villa now

had another couple of villain dickwads i know blowing up my pager telling me about oh villa they were totes in the game apart from our little spell. BOLL. OCKS. OUT. PLAYED. (even tho we were still p shit). villa boys always have these fucking stuck-up vestigial delusions of being english footer royalty and it's even more insufferable now that cunt lambo is playing the kids p much for the sake of it, like no matter that it's all kindergarten mcleish long ball shitemerchantry they can solemnly and snootily intone about the bleeding kids even though it's just chris herd and matt lowton burping and falling over. like farmers market but the crap midlands version of a dude selling indeterminate slabs of meat out the back of his astra in the pub car park

piss off villa ur shit fuiud

(ashley westwood is quite good tbf, if you're the kind of person that rates michael carrick)

pens never seem to get given for fouls after the frwd has got his shot off. This cannot be the actual rule surely? Like if a player lays off a pass in MF and is caught late then it's a free-kick, if a player is in the box and shoots just before the defender takes him out it's rarely a free-kick. I mention this cos i've only had a quick glimpse of it but I could've sworn swp gets taken out after his shot hit the post y'day. I may be wrong tho.

villa boys always have these fucking stuck-up vestigial delusions of being english footer royalty

Don't we all these days.

I read somewhere that if Bent plays like three more games for Villa then they have to pay up another chunk of his massive transfer fee which is why he isn't playing. If that's actually true then a) fucking stupid because Villa are in no way good enough to dispose of the services of a 20-goal-a-season striker and b) they only signed him in the first place because they were shitting it about relegation.

i guess it's probably not the actual rule but idk more like human nature to view the shot as the end of the passage of play? it's not a denial of a goalscoring opportunity

free kick inside the box is possibly the accepted solution for something notably brutal

haha yeah spurs fans' similar delusions are well known but they manifest themselves differently

expectations of a style of play obv and, imo based on first hand experience, greatest disinterest in other teams in the league

I don't know if anyone knows that for sure about Bent, but he's played 47 games so it seems a reasonable inference especially if they've found a suitor in Redknapp. And surely nobody denies b) they only signed him in the first place because they were shitting it about relegation?

They should still be shitting it about relegation, not selling their best goalscorer, and especially not to a team who might end up staying up at their expense.