EPL Matchday 3

[Zidane98]

Leicester starting the season on fire. If only they had this form going into the back end of last season they wouldne playing CL football.

 

[glenferry23]

Can’t really add much that hasn’t already been said about those handball decisions. Ridiculous really.

At this rate, the only way to counteract this rule change is to use Mr McGreg as the new archetype defender. With a leg for an arm and an arm for a leg.

 

[Zidane98]

Just about given up on Mendy.

Going to be hard to get rid. Ligue 1 your best bet.

 

[Blueboys11]

Handball rule is obviously screwed. Having lesser teams lump balls into the box to a Carrol type to head down is now a legitimate attacking threat. I wouldn’t even bother aiming at the target. Just aim at a sea of defenders and hope for a stray hand to get in the way. Ideally with their backs to goal and off balance while being nudged by another teammate

 

[Zidane98]

Man City midfielder Rodri: Leicester were lucky

Read this news on OneFootball.

onefootball.com

 

[JezzasOnTheAsphalt]

Maybe should manage remotely for a bit longer.

Permanently even.

 

[DBAH0]

Man City midfielder Rodri: Leicester were lucky

Read this news on OneFootball.

onefootball.com

Rodri says they played 11 behind the ball and yet you were bad enough to conceed 5, what does that say to how well you played...

 

[jd2010]

Handball rule is obviously screwed. Having lesser teams lump balls into the box to a Carrol type to head down is now a legitimate attacking threat. I wouldn’t even bother aiming at the target. Just aim at a sea of defenders and hope for a stray hand to get in the way. Ideally with their backs to goal and off balance while being nudged by another teammate

Going to be worth not jumping for the high ball as a defender for those deep dead balls. Crazy really.

 

[jd2010]

Get a load of his voice

Would not want to be a defender not listening to him!

 

[Zidane98]

Not sure how the handball rule ended up being butchered.

For me it should go back to no handball if your arms are in a natural position & the ball strikes the arm without time to get out the way. Any raised arm (unless contesting for a header with arms in a natural position for thst scenario) - handball. Same rules to apply for defenders & attackers. Job done.

 

[Frank Bunn]

Defenders are going to have to jump with their arms by their side from now on

Premier League scouts are getting busy in Kenya.

 

[Lebbo73]

I can agree with this.

Man United lost their first game with Greenwood and AWB on the bench and James and Fosu-Mensah starting.

Chelsea have bought a lot of players but their last game came at a bad time and didn't have the right players to field.

Spurs have 3 Europa qualifiers to deal with and very short breaks.

Man City have a bunch of players out and obviously we saw what we saw just now.

Liverpool are heading into the Arsenal game tomorrow with Thiago, Alisson, Henderson, Matip, Milner, Gomez and Ox all not 100%.

What’s wrong with Thiago and Alisson?

 

[Pykie]

Interesting that quite a few sides with heat on them answered some critics this matchday.

Southampton, West Brom and West Ham.

For all the fist shaking over the unsustainability of the newly promoted clubs and their defending, Leeds have conceded 1 less goal than Chelsea and 1 less goal than Man City with a game in hand.

With Wolves conceding the same amount of goals as Fulham atm.

 

[Blueboys11]

Not sure how the handball rule ended up being butchered.

For me it should go back to no handball if your arms are in a natural position & the ball strikes the arm without time to get out the way. Any raised arm (unless contesting for a header with arms in a natural position for thst scenario) - handball. Same rules to apply for defenders & attackers. Job done.

Too much commonsense

 

[Blueboys11]

Not sure how the handball rule ended up being butchered.

For me it should go back to no handball if your arms are in a natural position & the ball strikes the arm without time to get out the way. Any raised arm (unless contesting for a header with arms in a natural position for thst scenario) - handball. Same rules to apply for defenders & attackers. Job done.

This is the key though, every situation requires arms to be in a different natural position. If you are the last defender and you have a Sterling or Son running at you, you need to have your arms in a natural brace position in order to be able to quickly change direction (similar to Ward with his penalty) As it stands the attacker now can simply flick the ball up on that arm and it’s a penalty

 

[windyhill]

When you have to rely on Arsenal challenging Liverpool

Recent record not bad ! Everton on the otherhand.......

 

[bok_party]

Love seeing Leeds doing well!

 

[Frank Bunn]

3 at the back might have to be considered. mendy was never a smart footballer but his knees are gone and he has no pace. just looks a mile off at all times. garcia was slow but w/e he's barca's problem now.

the slightly amusing thing is that it was 3 pens, a backheel flick and an unstoppable curler. vardy is a special breed when it comes to the league. no one else really quite like him honestly. pens were silly but vardy does that to players.

dinho sub will be questioned but he looked every bit of his 35 years today. looked exhausted in the first half. but as i said earlier, this season is just going to be such a slog and it will hit teams at different stages. we'll start off slow and hopefully benefit the most from the international break. but until those sort of breaks clubs are just going to be playing back to back to back so much. even today leicester got 3 injuries

City also struggled offensively. They had a lot of possession but found it hard to get past Leicester's 5-4-1 behind the ball.

The score was 1-1 when Pep went for plan B by swapping Fernandinho for Delap. City are not set up for getting down the lines and hitting a tall centre forward. And it's too much to expect a 17 yo to save the game.

Foden should have been allowed more freedom to switch positions and change the angles. He was subbed off after an hour for Torres who also did nothing.

 

[jd2010]

In regards to Ifab new handball rule "the body also stated extra leeway will be granted in regards to ricocheted handball, or if the player in question cannot see the ball" At first I thought the ref was just following the rules and the rules were the problem but it looks as though the ref had a good enough reason to not pay it with Dier not being able to see the ball coming at him

The rule also states accidental handball is if the handball stops a goal or clear goal scoring opportunity.
"It is not an offence if, after an accidental handball, the ball travels some distance (pass or dribble) and/or there are several passes before the goal or goal-scoring opportunity"
Think Spurs got the 2nd ball so surely there is no clear goal scoring opportunity there?

 

[Zidane98]

In regards to Ifab new handball rule "the body also stated extra leeway will be granted in regards to ricocheted handball, or if the player in question cannot see the ball" At first I thought the ref was just following the rules and the rules were the problem but it looks as though the ref had a good enough reason to not pay it with Dier not being able to see the ball coming at him

The rule also states accidental handball is if the handball stops a goal or clear goal scoring opportunity.
"It is not an offence if, after an accidental handball, the ball travels some distance (pass or dribble) and/or there are several passes before the goal or goal-scoring opportunity"
Think Spurs got the 2nd ball so surely there is no clear goal scoring opportunity there?

The accidental handball while unsighted doesn't apply if the arms are in an unnatural position. ie you can't smother a shot on goal with your arms out while looking the other way. I can only imagine that VAR determined that the arm was in an unnatural position (just like Maupay pen). Dier's arm was up but was borderline for me. The Maupay one was clearer, I feel that the Dier one wasn't blatant enough to overturn IMO. Mou/Spurs can feel aggrieved here.

 

[SM]

Not bad from Starman overnight, doing well for a championship player.

 

[Art Vandelay_]

The accidental handball while unsighted doesn't apply if the arms are in an unnatural position. ie you can't smother a shot on goal with your arms out while looking the other way. I can only imagine that VAR determined that the arm was in an unnatural position (just like Maupay pen). Dier's arm was up but was borderline for me. The Maupay one was clearer, I feel that the Dier one wasn't blatant enough to overturn IMO. Mou/Spurs can feel aggrieved here.

It wasn’t even a foul, that’s the part that has been still annoyed.

Sure we missed chances, and Darlow made some good saves but regardless we kept them to 0 shots on goal, and their only one was a dodgy VAR pen based off a non-foul.

Think last night takes it to 20 penalties so far, on track for 190~ for the season. 105 is the most in the PL era.

 

[SM]

Weirdest part is, for instance, the pens in the city game were normal pens not these dodgy handball ones.

 

[Magma]

City also struggled offensively. They had a lot of possession but found it hard to get past Leicester's 5-4-1 behind the ball.

The score was 1-1 when Pep went for plan B by swapping Fernandinho for Delap. City are not set up for getting down the lines and hitting a tall centre forward. And it's too much to expect a 17 yo to save the game.

Foden should have been allowed more freedom to switch positions and change the angles. He was subbed off after an hour for Torres who also did nothing.

i did say in another post that leicester choked us offensively. sterling was completely isolated, on top of him not being an actual striker just made it even more difficult. kdb tried but again just a mass of bodies in the way. we were poor, leicester were very good

 

[jd2010]

The accidental handball while unsighted doesn't apply if the arms are in an unnatural position. ie you can't smother a shot on goal with your arms out while looking the other way. I can only imagine that VAR determined that the arm was in an unnatural position (just like Maupay pen). Dier's arm was up but was borderline for me. The Maupay one was clearer, I feel that the Dier one wasn't blatant enough to overturn IMO. Mou/Spurs can feel aggrieved here.

But what is the natural position of a human whilst jumping?