Matchday 28

[Art Vandelay_]

id be shocked if we dont beat city

based on what exactly? You're not exactly overwhelming favourites. $2.60 to $2.70 and you don't even have the better team.

 

[go you pups]

I looked at the highest, lowest, average number of points for each premier league finishing position a while back.

75 points won it in '96-'97, with 78 and 79 the next 2 seasons, so definitely on track for the lowest since then.

This season the top few positions are on track to finish well below average number of points for their position, and it looks like teams 10-15th could well end up with close to a record amount of points to compensate.

Was it 95-96 or 96-97 Newcastles choke?

 

[RossFC]

based on what exactly? You're not exactly overwhelming favourites. $2.60 to $2.70 and you don't even have the better team.

Don't take the bait.

 

[Art Vandelay_]

Don't take the bait.

Liverpool's equivalent to Thomas9??

 

[FAITH]

based on what exactly? You're not exactly overwhelming favourites. $2.60 to $2.70 and you don't even have the better team.

always a reaction after a cup loss.

 

[chef]

would be funny if city missed top 4 and guardiola takes over

Is the cream still rising?

 

[Art Vandelay_]

Is the cream still rising?

Must be still in the udders... Not even cream yet

 

[FAITH]

Is the cream still rising?

pretty obvious there is no cream this season.
ffs it looks like leicester are gonna win it.

 

[Art Vandelay_]

Spurs fans - who is more important, Kane or Lloris?

On this, just heard a stat. We have 14 individual scorers in the league, the most in the division.

 

[Jatz]

Outrageous!

 

[Gosha]

If Tottenham and Leicester win and City lose then I'm ruling them out of the title race. It would also open up the top four with Man Utd right on their arse.

City's run home is a nightmare:
Liverpool (A)
Aston Villa (H)
Norwich (A)
United (H)
Bournemouth (A)
West Brom (H)
Chelsea (A)
Stoke (H)
Southampton (A)
Arsenal (H)
Swansea (A)

Arsenal, Man United, Chelsea and Liverpool all in their run home. I think Swansea away, Southampton away and Stoke at home will all be tough matches. On top of all that they have a game to make up against Newcastle plus more CL fixtures if they end up progressing.

 

[NUFC Tiger]

City's game in hand is against you guys right? If so, that could be a title-decider later on.

Yep it is. Date hasn't been set yet but could be big for both our season's depending how fixtures pan out.

Given our record against City, I hope we'd be moving away from the bottom before playing them.

 

[base615]

Spurs fans - who is more important, Kane or Lloris?

Toby > Lloris > > > Kane

Kane has been important in terms of his hold up play but he hasn't actually scored a lot from open play recently and when he hasn't been on the field we've adjusted accordingly.

Vorm is capable of standing in for Lloris for a game or two but I wouldn't want him out for a significant period of time.

If Toby goes down we are well and truly fooked. Individually he's brilliant but he marshals the whole team from the back.

I'd possibly also put Dier ahead of Kane in importance to be honest.

 

[kangaspurs]

On this, just heard a stat. We have 14 individual scorers in the league, the most in the division.

It really makes a mockery of those who said we'd struggle to score if Kane went down and who said our season was ruined after both transfer windows because we didn't buy a centre forward. I would have liked to get one in, but I really wasn't worried or bothered that we didn't. I don't want to toot my own horn or anything, but I remember writing on a different forum after we beat AC Milan in that pre-season friendly with a 4-6-0 type of formation that I really liked the way we play when Kane wasn't on the pitch and that we were still very dangerous without a specific striker for the centre-halves to mark and I still stand by that statement.

 

[moomba]

City's run home is a nightmare:

Wouldn't have thought that was a particularly bad run home. With 12 games to go you're always going to have some tough fixtures.

As it is we only have 4 of the current top 8 still to play, all of them at home except for Southampton.

Liverpool will be tough, Chelsea will be tough.

This time of year though the banana skins can also come against teams at the lower end of the table.

Don't think a loss tomorrow night would rule us out, but getting close to desperation stakes.

 

[chef]

Costa to be rested in one of our next two. Hopefully Traore gets a start and Pato sounds likely to come off the bench.

 

[Gosha]

Wouldn't have thought that was a particularly bad run home. With 12 games to go you're always going to have some tough fixtures.

As it is we only have 4 of the current top 8 still to play, all of them at home except for Southampton.

Liverpool will be tough, Chelsea will be tough.

This time of year though the banana skins can also come against teams at the lower end of the table.

Don't think a loss tomorrow night would rule us out, but getting close to desperation stakes.

You've probably seen it already but Leicester's draw:
West Brom (H)
Watford (A)
Newcastle (H)
Crystal Palace (A)
Southampton (H)
Sunderland (A)
West Ham (H)
Swansea (H)
Man Utd (A)
Everton (H)
Chelsea (A)

The probable wins are green, the 50/50s are black and the probable losses are red.

Man City's draw:
Liverpool (A)
Aston Villa (H)
Norwich (A)
United (H)
Bournemouth (A)
West Brom (H)
Chelsea (A)
Stoke (H)
Southampton (A)
Arsenal (H)
Swansea (A)
Newcastle (A)

If Leicester can win five of their final twelve games they will be on a total of 71 points. Assuming they lose the rest of them (highly unlikely considering the quality of their team and their draw), that's still 24 points you'll have to make up in twelve games (two points per game). I have generously put you down as winning 23 points in your final twelve. Obviously, a lot of my predictions won't come true, but this just gives some perspective into how hard it will be for you to win the league if you don't win tomorrow night. I've also been pretty harsh on Leicester with where they will drop points because I see them falling off somewhat towards the end of the season but it will still be a massive task for you to get any near them if you lose and they win tomorrow.

 

[RossFC]

Liverpool will be tough

Thanks for being kind.

 

[moomba]

You've probably seen it already but Leicester's draw:
West Brom (H)
Watford (A)
Newcastle (H)
Crystal Palace (A)
Southampton (H)
Sunderland (A)
West Ham (H)
Swansea (H)
Man Utd (A)
Everton (H)
Chelsea (A)

The probable wins are green, the 50/50s are black and the probable losses are red.

Man City's draw:
Liverpool (A)
Aston Villa (H)
Norwich (A)
United (H)
Bournemouth (A)
West Brom (H)
Chelsea (A)
Stoke (H)
Southampton (A)
Arsenal (H)
Swansea (A)
Newcastle (A)

If Leicester can win five of their final twelve games they will be on a total of 71 points. Assuming they lose the rest of them (highly unlikely considering the quality of their team and their draw), that's still 24 points you'll have to make up in twelve games (two points per game). I have generously put you down as winning 23 points in your final twelve. Obviously, a lot of my predictions won't come true, but this just gives some perspective into how hard it will be for you to win the league if you don't win tomorrow night. I've also been pretty harsh on Leicester with where they will drop points because I see them falling off somewhat towards the end of the season but it will still be a massive task for you to get any near them if you lose and they win tomorrow.

11/12 you would have had Wigan away and Everton home as probable wins for United. You always get weird results this time of year, especially under the pressure of a title race. Maybe even moreso this season with a few sides in it that don't have a lot of experience.

Just too early for me, if we drop points to Liverpool it will be unlikely but we've chased down big leads in two of the last four seasons, and which less games to go as well.

 

[Gosha]

11/12 you would have had Wigan away and Everton home as probable wins for United. You always get weird results this time of year, especially under the pressure of a title race. Maybe even moreso this season with a few sides in it that don't have a lot of experience.

Just too early for me, if we drop points to Liverpool it will be unlikely but we've chased down big leads in two of the last four seasons, and which less games to go as well.

Probably, but you wouldn't want to be relying on those type of results to get you over the line. As I said, a lot of my predictions will most likely be inaccurate, I was more so just highlighting the fact that something extraordinary will have to go down for you to win it if you lose to Liverpool and Leicester defeat West Brom. There's also the whole Tottenham and Arsenal thing...

 

[WealstoneRaider]

This is probably wrong of me, but I've just been doing some working out of how I see it panning out.

I've given myself a 6pt leeway as no one can be near perfect. Obviously something ridiculous might occur, but from the remaining fixtures this is how I see things:

Leicester will get between 20-26 pts to finish with - 76-82 pts;
Tottenham will get between 16-22 pts to finish with 70-76 pts;
Arsenal 18-24 pts to finish with 69-75pts;
Man City 22-28 pts to finish 69-75 pts;
Man Utd 20-26 pts to finish 64-70 pts

 

[Gosha]

This is probably wrong of me, but I've just been doing some working out of how I see it panning out.

I've given myself a 6pt leeway as no one can be near perfect. Obviously something ridiculous might occur, but from the remaining fixtures this is how I see things:

Leicester will get between 20-26 pts to finish with - 76-82 pts;
Tottenham will get between 16-22 pts to finish with 70-76 pts;
Arsenal 18-24 pts to finish with 69-75pts;
Man City 22-28 pts to finish 69-75 pts;
Man Utd 20-26 pts to finish 64-70 pts

Going by that, 75 points looks like the number that will win the league.

 

[jd2010]

Toby > Lloris > > > Kane

Kane has been important in terms of his hold up play but he hasn't actually scored a lot from open play recently and when he hasn't been on the field we've adjusted accordingly.

Vorm is capable of standing in for Lloris for a game or two but I wouldn't want him out for a significant period of time.

If Toby goes down we are well and truly fooked. Individually he's brilliant but he marshals the whole team from the back.

I'd possibly also put Dier ahead of Kane in importance to be honest.

No way vorm is close to doing what Lloris can. Just look at our fa cup exit. He is a solid mid table GK. Toby is very important to us but as long as 2 of Dier, JV & Wimmer are fit we can get by there especially if there is Lloris heroics on the last line. Again look at the FA Cup game no matter how good Toby might have played a near post shot to Vorm can undo all that. I'd rather Lloris get bombarded with worse CBs in front of him than what we had in the cup the other week

 

[Art Vandelay_]

No way vorm is close to doing what Lloris can. Just look at our fa cup exit. He is a solid mid table GK. Toby is very important to us but as long as 2 of Dier, JV & Wimmer are fit we can get by there especially if there is Lloris heroics on the last line. Again look at the FA Cup game no matter how good Toby might have played a near post shot to Vorm can undo all that. I'd rather Lloris get bombarded with worse CBs in front of him than what we had in the cup the other week

Early save from Gylfi. Don't think Vorm would have saved it personally.

 

[jd2010]

Early save from Gylfi. Don't think Vorm would have saved it personally.

I don't think many would have got that over the bar!

We're talking about one of the top 5-10 in the world in that position. As good as Toby is I don't think he'd be that high up