With Manchester City showing no signs of slowing down, Chelsea and Liverpool do battle to stay in touch with the Premier League leaders.
Neil Atkinson hosts Mo Stewart, Andy Heaton, Chelsea fan Chris Barbour, West Ham United fan Andy Middleton and Watford fan Bradley Hayden…
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Chelsea vs Liverpool.
a) So Lukaku is back to his usual status. Wantaway.
b) A little overblown but they all loved being Inter Milan there. There is something about Inter Milan that everyone gets right into when it goes well and hates when it goes wrong. Like Everton but with some actual winning from time to time.
c) Ultimately would be happier being part of a front two.
d) The Chelsea wheels haven’t as much come off as just slowed significantly.
e) Wingbacks and injuries.
f) Everyone at Chelsea can play wingback. Tuchel looks at the streets of London and everywhere he looks he sees wingbacks. Some people believe Suggs is the lead singer of Madness whereas Thomas Tuchel knows he is a wingback in waiting.
g) Key question is this: Do Chelsea want to win? Like really want to win?
h) Likely line up.
i) Likely approach.
Liverpool.
a) Leicester not as bad as its press. One of those games where Liverpool deserve to be ahead right up until they fall behind and then they emphatically deserve to lose.
b) No more room for this nonsense.
c) What are Liverpool’s moves? What should they be?
d) Pick a team.
e) Predictions.
Only Leicester/Norwich off as it stands. So…
a) Arsenal/Man City.
b) Arsenal have no coaches but seemingly a lot of players and have had rest. But Man City are in the sort of mood where they don’t allow football to happen on anyone’s terms but their own.
c) The game management is exceptional and is the greatest trick.
d) The strange key to getting a result against City appears to be make their players fulfil traditional roles. Make the defenders defend and the attackers attack rather than everyone basically getting to midfield.
e) Can Arsenal do that?
f) I don’t think so but you never know.
Palace face West Ham United.
a) Important win for Palace. Fancy them again here.
b) But West Ham LOVE THE COUNTER.
Southampton/Newcastle and Leeds/Burnley are both six pointers.
a) Southampton appear to over perform or under perform in every game.
b) Newcastle looked a football team against United but decimated. Fancy this may not happen. If it does and Southampton win they are suddenly 13 clear of Newcastle, same number of games played.
c) Leeds are really in trouble with reference to injuries. Burnley actually OK against United.
d) Win puts Burnley 2 behind with 2 in hand.
Brentford/Villa
a) Brentford need to Hodgson the rest of this season and this feels a winnable home.
b) Gerrard’s impact means this is an interesting test for both sides.
Is there a way for Everton to continue to not play games?
a) Think it would just make everybody happy.
b) They could stay up by pools panel verdict.
